Should foster parents get salaries ?
The big question is whether you think foster parents should be given a salary to improve the future of care children.
On the 10th October 2006 Alan Johnson, an education secretary, proposed that foster parents should be given a salary. He believes that this will improve the life chances of children in care within education rights.
As it stands children in care have not achieved the average standards of other children. By giving this salary to their foster parents will result in an extra £2,000 to fund towards university fees. Recent reports have shown that 75% of fostered children have no educational qualifications, 50% of these will be unemployed and only 1 in 100 will be able to go to university.
Futhermore, 50% of all prisoners under the age of 25 have been in care at one point in their lives, and one in four girls have been pregnant by the age of 16. Alan Johnson suggests that these percentages will reduce dramatically after the salary is in place.
But should this salary be compulsary? We will find out.
As it stands children in care have not achieved the average standards of other children. By giving this salary to their foster parents will result in an extra £2,000 to fund towards university fees. Recent reports have shown that 75% of fostered children have no educational qualifications, 50% of these will be unemployed and only 1 in 100 will be able to go to university.
Futhermore, 50% of all prisoners under the age of 25 have been in care at one point in their lives, and one in four girls have been pregnant by the age of 16. Alan Johnson suggests that these percentages will reduce dramatically after the salary is in place.
But should this salary be compulsary? We will find out.