The current cost of living crisis will affect us all, that is why TACT is doing everything in its power to support its foster carers and combat the impact.
As a charity, we are beyond profit and our sole focus is ensuring that our carers and the children and young people in their care receive the best possible support.
In the last two years, TACT have made multiple payments to support its carers with the financial challenges that have been faced. However, sadly this has not been the case for foster carers from other fostering agencies or local authorities – a recent report has found that a majority (88%) of foster carers have received no financial aid from local authorities or independent fostering agencies to battle the rising costs.
So what has TACT done to tackle the cost of living crisis so far?
Cost of Living Support
With the cost-of-living crisis only putting more strain and pressure on families, TACT have created a brand new support package to its carers. The scheme that was launched in July 2022 will last until March 2023 and is worth £350,000 in total. This represents a significant portion of TACT’s budget surplus for the year, underlining our commitment to our carers in these unprecedented times and our gratitude for the incredible work that they do.
The wellbeing and stability of our foster families is our primary focus, and we will continue to monitor the situation to ensure that we are providing the best possible support to our foster carers.
Fostering Fee
During 2021 we raised all our foster carer fees, increases ranged by placement type and the largest increase was set at 11%.
Our fostering fee increase was just one of the ways to show our thanks and commitment to our carers for all of their ongoing hard work.
One-Off Payments
Since 2020, TACT has made multiple one-off payments to its foster carers as a way to provide additional support during what has been a very challenging couple of years.
These payments have included a lockdown payment, summer holiday allowance and a winter fuel allowance and have totalled up to £1,435 per household.
As an organisation, we are committed to our foster carers and their wellbeing. All of the additional payments have come directly from TACT and unfortunately local government have been unable to offer any additional financial support to foster carers.
TACT CEO, Andy Elvin, said: “We recognise these are exceptional times and that there is still a lot of uncertainty around. We value the support and commitment from our carers and hope that these additional payments, alongside the support that central government has announced, will help alleviate the pressures we are all feeling.”
The wellbeing and stability of our foster families is our primary focus, and we will continue to monitor the situation to ensure that we are providing the best possible support to our foster carers.
Read more about our fostering allowance.
