Nottinghamshire County Council has had more foster carers joining the service than leaving for the first time since before the Covid-19 pandemic.
The authority says that in the past six months, fewer foster carers have left the council, with an increase in applications and approvals – resulting in a rise in foster carers in March 2025, the first increase since before the pandemic.
Nottinghamshire County Council, Nottingham City Council, Derbyshire County Council and Derby City Council are currently running a joint campaign to recruit more foster carers for the local authorities.
The campaign, now named ‘Foster for East Midlands Councils’, was originally launched in March 2024, with funding from the four member councils and the Department for Education.
An update on the project was discussed at Nottinghamshire County Council’s Corporate Parenting Panel on Tuesday (1 April). The meeting confirmed that the scheme will now be funded for the next year, until March 2026.
Panel papers also noted – as a national issue – that more foster carers are leaving their duties compared to new foster carers being recruited.
Reports stated: “This trend in Nottinghamshire has now plateaued since October 2024, and we are hoping to break this national trend by showing an increase in foster carers overall in the next six months.”
Data shows that in the first three months of 2025, only three foster carers stopped their duties for reasons such as retirement, personal circumstances, and one looked-after person transitioning to adult social care as they turned 18.
In the same period, six new foster carer households were approved to look after the authority’s looked-after children.
Applications to become foster carers also appear to be rising, with nine received between January and March 2025, compared to four in the same period in 2024.
Councillor Mike Introna (Con), a panel member, said efforts to increase fostering in the county are “going in the right direction”.
He said: “[We’ve] got a considerably higher number of people overcoming hurdles to become foster parents. The general consensus among us as councillors is that the direction of travel is positive.”
Cllr Introna questioned whether more could be done to support foster carers and encourage others to sign up.
He said: “Things like free bus travel, possible assistance with healthcare, maybe long-service payments, or accruing a payment each year as a foster carer.”
This was echoed by fellow panel member Councillor Anne Callaghan (Lab), who said: “How can we incentivise fostering? It might involve looking at increasing pay, further training, or a pension scheme.”
As of 3 April, there are 187 foster carers working for the council’s service, compared to 194 this time last year. However, there are also 59 fewer looked-after children in the council’s care, with 900currently.
Speaking on the importance of children in care being placed in a home environment, Cllr Callaghan said: “We do have quite a lot of children in care, and we don’t want them placed out of area either – we want them close to home.
“For whatever reason family relationships broke down, these children have come into care, and they still need to maintain their local links. Some still need to attend the school their friends are at – that’s their one constant in life sometimes, and it’s really important.”
Of the applications received by the collaborative council project, Nottinghamshire County Council had 22 (26%) allocated for assessment for potential new foster carers.
These assessments follow the national standard, taking between six and eight months to reach the approval stage.
