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Friday, June 14, 2013 Medway Messenger (MM)
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It’s the best A drive has been launched to find foster carers – so what is the job actually like? Dan Bloom spoke to a couple who have seen it all
O
ne night in April 2000, nine-yearold Sarah turned up on Sharon and Paul Jackson’s doorstep. She was sullen, mute, mistreated. That sleepless night was Sharon and Paul’s first as foster carers. In the years that followed their ordinary lives would be upturned by emotionally damaged children and even death threats. So deep did they get into their foster children’s lives that they took them in permanently as their own. Sharon, 42, and Paul, 55, live in a cosy, chaotic home on the Hoo Peninsula. To the casual observer, they are like any other family. Sitting round their kitchen table with mugs of tea, they say they would never regret taking on some of the most troubled children imaginable. And despite numerous battles with social services, including trips to the High Court and local government ombudsman, they feel sorry for embattled council officers who have to do an impossible job. Thirteen years ago, Paul was a firefighter and Sharon a bereavement officer at St Thomas’ Hospital in London. Paul, who had two daughters by a previous marriage, was going through the divorce and they needed cash. “It was the usual thing,” said Sharon. “We had no money and he said ‘shall we start taking in foreign students?’. I said I had always wanted to foster. “Both my parents didn’t have the best upbringing. I couldn’t have kids myself because I had kidney problems which meant I had to be sterilised.” The couple signed with a private fostering agency which dealt with councils in south London. The money was better than going to councils directly, but it meant getting tougher cases. Their first surprise came four months before they were due to be approved as carers. “In April we got a phone call
saying would we be prepared to take a placement,” she said. “I said ‘but we haven’t passed panel yet, we’re legally not allowed to do this.’ They said ‘not a problem, we will sort it all out’. “Sarah arrived at the house and said nothing. She was really hard, she had had it drummed into her head not to talk to anyone. The social worker had told me that she had been voluntarily mute for three months on a previous occasion. She was like stone. “We were really nervous when social services left and we were left with this child that we could do nothing with. “It was frightening. It was our first child and although we were enthusiastic, it was scary.” The couple were approved as foster carers and had another phone call, this time asking them take in two brothers. Again, they claimed it was against the rules. They said they had been approved to look after two children and no more, but they accepted. The eldest of the boys was nine-year-old Andy. He had the face of an angel, but his toenails stuck out of his tattered shoes, his arm was in plaster and he wore oversized, filthy glasses. Now 21, he is the eldest of the Jacksons’ adopted children. Andy came as a package that day with his five-year-old brother Eddie, now 18. The boys were spending their first time away from their criminal father. He has since been murdered, the Jacksons have been told. “Eddie was wobbling, he couldn’t walk properly, he preferred to be on all fours and he had no control over his bottom jaw,” said Sharon. “He was dribbling all the time and his chin was infected. No one had taught him to use his jaw, it was as simple as that. “They had absolutely no toilet training, they were just going to the toilet all over the house. We always had lots of pets so we always blamed the pets, not realising it was them.”
keep allowances after 18 A leading charity has called on the government to continue providing fostering allowances once children turn 18. Since Eddie’s 18th birthday last week, Sharon and Paul stopped receiving cash for him. They have chosen to continue looking after him.
Fostering Network campaigner Vicki Swain said: “It would allow for more young people in care to have the stability and support so many of us take for granted as they enter adulthood, which will not only benefit them but also society as a whole.”
Despite their troubled past, she said: “From the moment Andy turned up on our doorstep he never ever wanted to go home.” Paul chimed in: “I suppose he realised for the first time what it was like to be treated as a human rather than an animal.” Foster carers are allowed four weeks paid respite from their children a year, but Sharon and Paul say they never took it. The couple married in 2002 and took a 10-day honeymoon to Thailand. Police came round on their wedding day to deal with disruptive behavour. “By then we were used to a level of chaos,” said Paul. “It was our job.” In the highest-paid placements, the Jacksons received about £450 a week for each child. But Sharon said: “These kids come with nothing. When the boys came they had no toothbrushes, no pants, no shoes, no proper school uniform.” In 2004, Sharon and Paul won a residence order over Andy and Eddie which said the two boys would continue to live with them until they were 18. Paul added: “No one truly cares about these kids unless they make an emotional attachment. You can dot the Is and cross the Ts in a report but that’s not caring. “It’s the best thing I’ve ever done by a country mile, but it’s also given me the worst experiences I’ve ever seen.” Sarah’s name has been changed.
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life as a foster carer
thing I’ve ever done ThreaTs Terror At Christmas 2003, Sharon got a card addressed to one of the children. “I opened it and there was just a note saying ‘dad’s nearly there’. We didn’t know he had just got out of prison for firearms offences,” she said. “The following Easter we got another card saying ‘dad will see you soon’, and we got a phone call left on our answer machine saying ‘don’t believe what they’re telling you, dad’s a good man, we will all be together soon.’ “By now we’re freaking out. They’ve got our phone number, our address, and they know what we look like. ” Frightened, the Jacksons moved to a new home with panic buttons and an armed response alarm. Sharon said: “I was packing up in the old house and the social worker phoned and said ‘get out of the house, he’s on his way, he’s going to shoot you and Paul in the head and he’s going to firebomb the house.” The threats came to nothing, but eventually the couple gave up fostering.
Above, Sharon Jackson with Andy; left, Paul Jackson with Eddie and his daughter by a previous marriage, Lauren; right, Eddie and Andy at High Halstow Primary School; below, Paul and Andy on a summer’s day; below left, Eddie at home and Andy on his first day at Hundred of Hoo school
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