Eleven projects win Fostering Innovation Fund backing to trial new ways of fostering

The Department for Education has named the 11 programmes sharing the £12.4 million Fostering Innovation Fund, in a document published on 14 October alongside the national recruitment campaign. The money covers 2026-27 and 2027-28 and includes evaluation costs.

Seven lead organisations are listed, all of them regional recruitment hubs or regional care cooperatives. Greater Manchester Combined Authority's cooperative leads four programmes: a housing solutions scheme with HOME, an expansion of its HIVE model, a specialist remand fostering programme and a transition pathway programme. Foster with North East is working with Now Foster on a 'weekenders' recruitment programme, and Fostering South West has two projects, one on recruitment, retention and training with the Black Foster Carers Alliance and one on support and training with Coram Leap.

The others are a specialist foster care hubs programme led by Foster4 Cheshire and Merseyside, therapeutic fostering training from Home and Future with the Mulberry Bush, a parent-and-child specialist fostering programme led by Local Community Fostering Greater London East with TACT and Somerset Council, and a carer retention programme focused on allegations, led by the London Regional Care Cooperative with The Fostering Network. Individual grant amounts and project descriptions have not been published.

The fund was trailed in February's Fostering Action Plan and opened in May, when the DfE said it wanted fostering models that fit modern households, a younger and more diverse carer base, and trials of respite and weekend-only fostering for children in residential or kinship care. Only cooperatives and council-run hubs could apply, with charity or independent partners.

What this means for you: if your fostering service sits in one of these regions, you may be offered new placement types, training or support over the next two years. London carers may see changes to how allegations are handled. The lead bodies are all council-led, so agency carers would be involved only through local partnerships.