This is a transcript of the Foster Carers Speak video clips.

Introduction
Assesment
Support
Skills and Qualities
The Children
Family Life
Reflections on fostering
and finally...

Introduction

Various foster carers:
"Fostering is looking after children on a temporary basis."
"It's people that need to be looked after, that need help."
"I had a girl and I enjoyed it."
"Each child comes with a different story."
"The rewards are huge."
"And when they go if you've helped them, that's wonderful."

Clare - Fostering  Service Manager:
"A child might need a bed, a home for a couple of nights, one weekend per month to give the family a break or it might be for several weeks or on a much longer basis for up to several years, whilst decisions are made about where that child will be in the future, whether that child will go back to it's Mum or Dad or whether that child will need a permanent home somewhere else perhaps with an adoptive family. What our foster carers do is they step in and they look after that child whilst those decisions are made."

Assessment

Clare:
"Well, we do assess foster carers and it is quite a lengthy procedure but we think it's worth it."

Sonia:
"The assessment process is quite long winded but at the end of the day it's definitely worth it. There's an awful lot of work to do on ourselves and for us to find out information."

Julie:
"We had regular meetings at home with the social worker coming in. She went into our lives, our family and everything."

Geoff:
"They just asked questions about myself, trying to find out who I was."

Tina:
"Obviously it's what the department have to do to make sure you can be a good candidate for fostering."

Mick:
"It's necessary obviously, you're dealing with children, vulnerable children, it's got to be done."

Brenda:
"They go right down into your life, you growing up and how you felt and how your parents behaved. Nothing is sacred. They dig up everything and they should do, I mean it's very important, isn't it? You're looking after little children that are very very precious so it's important."

Tina:
"You are going to have, through the assessment as well, you're going to have some tough times because you're going to re-evaluate your own self because there are a lot of things that come up that you've totally forgotten about."

Sonia:
"It also gives you the option to stop and think, hang on this isn't for me or to ask lots and lots more questions."

John:
"You find out things that you do as a parent and this is what you thought to do as a foster carer so you already knew some of the stuff."

Sharon:
"Friends are asked their views on you and that can be very nice, obviously they're your friends but you don't necessarily know what they think. For me one friend said I always do what I say I'm going to do which I hadn't thought was an issue, that was very pleasant."

Support

Clare:
"Foster carers get quite a lot of support and it's very important for us to make carers know that they're not going to be on their own, there's always somebody there that they can call. There's experienced Social Workers that they can call 24 hours a day. We put on a lot of training for foster carers to help support them. There's foster carers support groups, there's practical support around, may be helping to get the children to school on some days or looking after the children while your in a meeting. We can help put foster carers in touch with professionals, with experts who can give advice about children's behaviour. There's holiday activity programmes. There are a lot of things going on. It is really important that the carers know that they're not on their own and that they work as part of the team and we're there supporting them whilst they do a good job."

Brenda:
" Personally I get a lot of support, I do get a lot of support from my support worker who's always there at the end of the phone."

Sharon:
" You have regular contact with your support worker to discuss issues, you have support from their social worker as well."

Thelma:
" I've got very good support from some best friends who are also foster parents so we phone each other up if we've got any problems."

Julie:
" I know that there is always somebody on the end of the phone if I ever need to talk to them and that just isn't during office hours that's also during the evenings and weekends as well."

Geoff:
" Social services do support after school activities."

Simone:
" Well it's fantastic. I always say I feel as if I'm the only foster carer they've got because they're always there."

Sonia:
" We have a social worker that is for us, all the children have an individual social worker as well but you can ring anybody if you've got a problem, there is always a duty social worker as well."

Simone:
" I get much more support from the fostering team than I ever did when I went to work, much better."

Skills and qualities

Clare:
"Well foster carers need to be interested in children, working with children and committed to children. I think they need patience, tolerance, endurance all of those qualities, a sense of humour is absolutely essential. I think that being calm and bringing stability to children's lives is really important as well. I think that our carers are a group of very ordinary but very essential people."

Julie:
" You do need to be flexible, I think, when you have foster children because sometimes your hard and fast rules don't always fit in and so you have to be able to move around those."

Thelma:
" I think you've got to have lots of patience and also love."

Brenda:
" You need to be child orientated, for want of a better word."

Geoff:
" Patience, understanding, endurance."

Laurie:
" Tolerance, a good sense of humour."

John:
" You need a sense of humour and a willingness to adapt and work with lots of different people."

The Children

Geoff:
" Each child comes with a different story, and it doesn't matter what the story is, they all need a little bit of special love, care and attention and when they go if you've helped them then that's wonderful."

Thelma:
"You see the children blossoming, you see the children thriving and you can see the children more confident and outgoing and all those sorts of things."

John:
" I think the only goal that you can have is giving them a safe life, one that's fun, as much as you can make it, and one where they have different experiences, so they are able to go on and live."

Brenda:
"They need to be taught very carefully and very patiently what is expected of them in the world and what is acceptable."

Simone:
"And they do pick up quite quickly that this is a good place to be and it's safe."

Geoff:
" As I say, they turn up and they have nothing and their lives are empty and you try and fill their lives and when they leave hopefully, they've got at least part of their life back."

Family Life

Thelma:
" I've been very lucky. I think it's made my own children very caring and they're very tolerant of other people's needs."

Brenda:
" My daughter was that horrible fourteen age and I think she did find it quite difficult, I think she found it that someone else was taking her place because she was the baby."

Geoff:
" My daughter at the time was fourteen and we obviously discussed with her about fostering and she was fine with it. When the children came in, everything worked fine".

Sharon:
" They do quarrel. I tend to see that as quite a good sign. If someone's prepared to have an argument with someone it must mean that they are feeling fairly secure."

Julie:
" In the beginning they thought it was lovely because we'd have all these different children around and they could play with them and if there were babies they were really lovely so they enjoyed playing with the babies."

Sonia:
" They're just used to it. When they're out and about they refer to all the children as their brothers and sisters, they always have done."

Laurie:
" Done wonders for them, absolute wonders, it really has. It's made them much better people. They're much more tolerant."

Reflections on Fostering

Verna:
My very first foster child is¿ he's coming up twenty-four. I still see him. He still lives in the area actually... calls me mum¿ visits me all the time... does my garden. Actually, my kitchen, he's responsible for.

We have a great relationship. I had two children of my own when I first thought about it. By the time I got into fostering, I had my third child. She was probably about six when everything happened and I was approved and I actually started fostering. I think I wanted to be a foster carer so badly that I was a bit scared that I may not be approved and how I'd manage that, basically, because I really, really wanted to be a foster carer.

The first child I had move on was the most difficult. I wouldn't say to anyone it gets easier. It doesn't because each child means something to me. I've learned to cope with it. How I deal with it personally is I look at the child's needs instead of my own: does this child need to be with me or is it me that needs this child to be with me? And that's basically how I do it. Doing that way it's still very difficult: there's the tears and, you know, I really miss them and I worry.

Not that I think that there's no one else out there who can care for this child like I can¿ It's just, you don’t know and, for me, I just want to protect children so much that it's always there that every single child I've fostered, I just want to keep them, but I have to meet their needs and that's basically what I do: meet their needs instead of meeting my own.

And Finally...

Clare:
"If you're interested in becoming a foster carer we're always looking for foster carers and we're looking for foster carers from all different sorts of backgrounds and it's all around meeting the needs of our children. It is very rewarding, having the opportunity to see those children develop and thrive in your care, seeing a child to get to school for the first time, or the first time a child gives you a hug; those are really important things."

Geoff:
" If somebody had said to me ten years ago, 'is fostering worth while?' I would've said 'no,' but ten years on and looking at the results and the children that have gone through my hands, I'd say 'do it'."

John:
" Think about it very carefully and don't be put off by what you might regard as the sort of, I think some people say ' well, it's not for me because I'm not the type to foster care.' I think it takes, I think they need a whole range of different people doing it."

Simone:
" It's a life changing experience and it's for the better, you know, it's so rewarding and there's so many people to support you."

Mick:
" It's quite a challenge but I would say to anyone who thinks about it, ' to give it a go'."

Thelma:
"Yes, I think you should. I think if you've got the time, the energy and the love."

Sharon:
" It really can bring the best out in you and it can also test you as well. It's a challenge but a good one."

Laurie:
"I'd say, 'make sure you've got the time and then go for it'."