New to care

Care Plan

Every young person in care has a care plan – your Social Worker is responsible for keeping the care plan up to date. The plan should say what your needs are and how workers and family/friends can support you.

The plan should include your views and wishes and should be agreed with you.

Placement Planning Meeting

The Placement Planning Meeting should happen within 5 working days after you have come in to care. The meeting will be all about you and your day to day care; things that you like to eat, activities that you like to do, as well as things that you don’t like will be discussed in the meeting. The aim of the meeting is to ensure that all of the people involved in your care are clear about your needs and how these can be met.

Review Meeting

Your first review should happen within 28 days of coming into care. The meeting is a chance for you and everyone else to talk about how you are getting on and the plans that are being made with you.

You, your parent/s (if appropriate), social worker and foster parent will be at this meeting, there may be times that other people are invited, like your teacher.There is always an Independent Reviewing Officer (IRO) at reviews. It is their job to lead the discussion at the meeting and help decide your long term plans. They will make sure that you understand what is happening.

They will talk to you before the meeting starts. They will ask you if there is anything you would like to talk about at the meeting and tell you exactly what will happen in the meeting so that there will be no surprises.

Remember your views are very important there are lots of ways for you to be involved in your meeting, you can also ask an advocate to support you to attend your meeting.

You will have another review after 3 months and then they will happen at least every 6 months.