More than 250 children in care of Wakefield Council live away from district

While some youngsters are sent to live miles away from where they grew up to protect them from harm and abuse, others have to move because there isn't any space for them closer to home.

Children's charity Barnardo's said the issue was a "worry", with Covid restrictions further limiting social workers' ability to check up on children placed miles away from the district.

In recent years, Wakefield Council has tried to address the problem by creating more children's homes and recruiting more foster carers.

But information from Wakefield Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), which oversees local NHS services, said that there were 256 children in care living outside of Wakefield, as of the end of March this year.

By the same token, there were 356 youngsters in the care of other councils living in the Wakefield district.

Barnardo's carries out some work on behalf of the local authority, including visiting looked after youngsters.

But in a report going before the council's corporate parenting committee this week, Barnardo's said: "The distance of out of area placements is significant, which poses challenges for workers in regards to Covid-19 restrictions.

"A lot of the meetings for children and young people are still taking place virtually which can limit the child or young person’s engagement. Plus technology can cause issues."

Victoria Schofield, Wakefield Council's service director for social care, said: "It is important to us that children should be cared for in or near the area where possible.

"Unfortunately, there will be a small number of occasions when this is not possible.

"There is a rise in the number of children in care both regionally and nationally. This means an increase in demand for placements and at a national and local level this shortage of placements means a greater reliance and use of external foster care and residential provision.

"Although the number of places available in Wakefield is increasing, we still require external placements for some of our children and young people.

"Where an external placement is required we work hard to return them back to Wakefield as soon as possible.

"For some young people a placement outside of Wakefield may be in their best interest.

"Again, this is continually reviewed to make sure this is the right plan in order to improve their outcomes.

"Meeting the needs of children in care in the current climate can present some significant challenges.

"In response to this, Wakefield has a sufficiency strategy that recognises the need for increased placement options. As a partnership, we are working hard to ensure, where ever possible, Wakefield children are placed in the local area and ideally with Wakefield foster carers.”

Local Democracy Reporting Service