Four Waifs on Our Doorstep by Trisha Merry

Author:Trisha Merry [Merry, Trisha and Buttriss, Jacquie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781471138461
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK

16

Over My Dead Body!

‘Review meeting. What a shock!’

Extract from my diary

As foster parents, we were always the last to hear anything, and we were rarely consulted about any potential change of plan. But I suppose the signs were there.

The children had been with us for two or three years now and they were costing Social Services about £6,000 per month. They paid the agency and the agency paid some of that over to us. Because they had been such a hard-to-place family with so many problems, we were given a good fostering allowance, well above the norm, but of course our bills were huge. Food alone cost more than £300 per week. And we’d had to buy all of them several sets of new clothes.

The washing machine and tumble dryer were on permanently with all the nappies and almost daily changes of sheets, and I couldn’t begin to tell you what the electricity bill came to. We needed to swap our previous family car for a people-carrier, which consumed petrol at an alarming rate, and of course there were all the outings Mike took them on to keep them occupied and give me time to get things done.

We were called to attend a review meeting and, as usual, I went on my own. Mike was deaf and his hearing aid wasn’t discerning enough to help him cope with round-table discussions, so he left all that to me. I think I was in shock when I drove back home that afternoon, but I had to go and get the children from school and do all the usual things, so I didn’t have time to sit down and really think about it until after the children had gone to bed.

‘I need to explain what might happen,’ I said to Mike. ‘From what they were saying at the meeting today, I think the time has run out for the children, financially.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘Social Services can no longer afford to pay that much and they are now looking for cheaper options.’

‘How can they do that?’

‘Well, they say that the children will have to come out of the system because they cost too much to foster for any longer.’

‘But that’s ridiculous.’

‘Yes, they’re pulling the plug, or trying to. They’re pushing to get the children adopted.’

‘Oh. Did they ask you what you thought about that idea?’

‘Of course not. I soon realised I wasn’t there to contribute to the discussion. Their decision had already been made in some anonymous office where they don’t know anything about children, or care about their needs.’ I paused. ‘To be fair, I can see it’s a very high cost to the local authority.’

‘But they should have thought about that years ago,’ said Mike. ‘When they could have intervened and avoided the children having so many problems.’

‘Well, we always knew their time with us might be limited.’

‘Yes, but they need more than two years for us to set them on the right road.’

‘They might need a lifetime for that!’

‘So what will they do?’ he asked.

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