Proposal 7: Devolve Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund funding and responsibility to regional and/or local decision makers

Proposal 7: Devolve Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund funding and responsibility to regional and/or local decision makers

This proposal sets out a vision for how the ASGSF could be run from 2028 onwards. The aim is that instead of a centralised Fund as we currently have, this funding will be devolved to either Regional Adoption Agencies or Local Authorities to administer and be responsible for. This is to ensure funding is held and administered by those ‘closest to the children and families it affects’. 

Potential benefits:  

• Providing therapeutic support within local authorities and regional adoption agencies may reduce the time taken to access support as social workers won’t have to apply to a centrally held fund on behalf of applicants, and the assumption is this will reduce the administrative burden. 

• Regional commissioning of support services may enable more joined-up approaches to support since all the services will effectively be ‘in house’ and there may be opportunities for economies of scale, reducing overall costs, and improved accessibility to services.  

Potential concerns:  

• Devolving the ASGSF funding to LAs or RAAs could effectively mean the end of guaranteed ring-fenced funds for adoption support, as we currently have. The risk is that the money meant for therapeutic support interventions gets pooled with wider RAA or LA budgets. The impact of this on children and families is unknown, but many families have already reported that RAAs and LAs are refusing to ‘top up’ funding gaps for therapy caused by cuts to the ASGSF because of lack of resources.   

• There is currently no formula for distributing national adoption support funds at the local level. The proposal is that this would be developed by the DfE and the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government. It is not yet clear how a fair distribution of funding would be achieved. Obviously demand within any geographical area changes over time. 

• Adoption UK has significant concerns about the proposal to devolve funding to LAs. The proposal states that this would be via the Children, Families and Youth Grant. Currently, this grant includes funding for early intervention where families are struggling, for virtual schools’ duties towards previously looked after children, and for young people leaving care amongst other things. Should the adoption support funding be folded into this grant, it is essential that it is ring-fenced for adoption support (within a coherent definition) with robust accountability for LAs not fully compliant and clear appeal mechanisms for agencies/families. 

• Devolving funding to the local or regional level and relying on local commissioning of services risks creating a postcode lottery where the support available is dependent on what has been commissioned. While this risk may be offset by the creation of a national Practice Guide (see proposal 4), the premise must be that support for adoptees, children in kinship care and their families is offered on the basis of what is needed rather than what is available.   

• The options do not include an improved centralised model, which would be Adoption UK’s preference. 85% of families who accessed support through the ASGSF last year say it has had a positive impact on their family. Whilst we recognise it requires improvement, the system has had a transformative impact on thousands of families and there is no evidence put forward in this consultation that devolving the funding would improve outcomes for adoptees and those in kinship care; or even that it would save money.