Caring for Unaccompanied Minors

From time to time, homes will be needed for children who have entered the UK as unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, unaccompanied migrant children or child victims of modern slavery including trafficking. They may have just arrived in the UK or may have been here for some time.

Some of these children will have been trafficked or persecuted and may have witnessed or been subject to horrific acts of violence. Other migrant children may have been sent in search of a better life or may have been brought to the UK for private fostering and subsequently exploited or abandoned when the arrangement fails.

Unaccompanied children are children first and they should be given the same care and love as with all other fostered children, ensuring that their individual needs are assessed and met. However, they will need additional or different support in some areas of their life and your Supervising Social Worker can help you to develop a better understanding of the circumstances and the support which can be accessed for both you and the child. You should ensure Placement Plans and Children in Care Reviews address the following areas:

• Communication and language, including how children will be communicated within their first language, and enabled to develop English language skills;
• How religious and cultural needs will be met and promoted, including making links with religious and cultural communities as appropriate;
• How children will be helped to learn about life in the UK and to understand cultural norms, and practices in the UK (especially in relation to the law and relationships for older children);
• How they will be able to keep in contact, or trace relatives who are still overseas, including the provision of phone credit, international calls, and access to the Red Cross tracing service;
• How their physical health needs will be met, including catching up with immunisations, latent TB screening (if appropriate) etc.
• How their emotional health needs will be met. Children are likely to have experienced significant trauma prior to leaving their home country and/or on their journey to the UK, and will also be dealing with the feelings of loss, bereavement or separation from family and friends;
• How their legal status in the UK is progressed, including application for asylum, application for leave to remain, obtaining Biometric Residence Passes, and any application to the Family Court for a care order (if relevant);
• How they can develop friendships and support from refugee organisations and peers;
• What their permanence plan is;
• How they can be supported with advocacy and independent visiting.

The Unaccompanied Asylum Team in Surrey Council is developing a resource handbook which can be accessed in the Resources section of this handbook, and there is a range of information on the Fostering SharePoint site here.

You should be alert to the discrimination that unaccompanied minors may face on the grounds of their ethnicity, religion, immigration status, age, gender and seek support if needed from the child’s social worker and your supervising social worker on how best to address this.