Our Story

Foster Care Matters is a not-for-profit fostering agency, part of the Adoption Matters family, a children’s charity and well-established voluntary adoption agency with over 78 years of experience in the children’s sector.

Launched in 2024, responding to the crisis in foster care sector, we wanted to offer a not-for-profit option to our local authority colleagues, where all surplus is reinvested back into our charity to offer the best support to our foster families and the children they care for.

Children in Care Statistics

54,820 children were living with foster families on 31 March 2025

This is 67% per cent of the 81,770 children in care looked after away from home.
There are around 42,190 foster families in England.
Every year thousands of new foster families are needed in England.

In the last 5 years:

The number of children in care has increased by 2%.
The number of children in foster care has decreased by 3.8%.
The number of fostering families has increased by 0.2%.

For more details see statistics from the Department for Education and Ofsted.

We offer a therapeutic approach and dedicated support to our foster parents. Our experienced team will guide you through your fostering journey, and be by your side every step of the way.

As well as offering generous weekly allowances and regular support from your own dedicated supervising social worker, as a Foster Care Matters foster parent you will also have access to The Centre for Fostering and Adoption Support, an established and recognised centre in the North West, offering innovative, bespoke, ongoing support from a multi-disciplined team including occupational therapists and trained therapeutic social workers.

Helping children matter

Every child deserves a safe, loving and nurturing home—and every foster parent deserves the support to provide one. At Foster Care Matters, we work tirelessly to recruit, train, and uplift foster families across the North West and Stoke on Trent.

As part of larger children’s charity, Adoption Matters, our charity supporters play a vital role in helping us offer ongoing dedicated support and special events like Christmas and Winter Parties.

Your donation helps us:

Reach more prospective foster parents
Provide additional and add on training and resources
Provide social events for children and families

Visit our fundraising page here: www.adoptionmatters.org/fundraising

Download Fostering Guide

Our Statement of Purpose

Download our Statement of Purpose – a document that outlines our mission, aims, objectives, and services, focusing on providing high-quality, child-centred care, and ongoing support and training for our foster parents.

Foster Care Matters Statement of Purpose 2025-26

Our Values & Mission

Honesty

We will treat everyone fairly, be professional, respectful, honest and transparent in all our communications and accountable for all our decisions.

Empathy

In our organisation everyone matters. We seek to create a safe environment for individuals to express themselves openly, challenge kindly, seeking to learn and develop within a culture of respect and acceptance.

Ambition

We are ambitious for our children’s futures and will ensure that we listen to children and ensure their voice is heard in plans being made about them and will advocate that their needs are met to support them to fulfil their potential.

Respect

We will listen to and value the views and experiences of our children, families, staff and volunteers, ensuring equality of opportunity regardless of gender, race, religion, culture, heritage, age, disability or sexuality.

Together

We will continually develop and improve our services together, through increasing engagement with our children, families, staff and external stakeholders, using their feedback to inform future developments.

Meet our Service Manager

Hello everyone, my name is Karen Palfreyman, since our Registration with Ofsted in May 2024, I have been the Registered Manager at Foster Care Matters. I joined Foster Care Matters…

Foster Parent or Foster Carer?

So, is it foster carer or foster parent? There is no difference. Some prefer to be known as a ‘foster carer’, while others prefer to use ‘foster parent’. In practice,…