The Fostering Services (Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2003

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the Fostering Services (Wales) Regulations 2003 so as to substitute the provisions of regulation 52 which makes transitional provision. Under the substituted provisions:

Regulation 52(1) — (5) make provision for persons who continue to carry on or manage a pre existing fostering agency as long as applications for registration in respect of that agency are made by 1st July 2003.

These Regulations apply to local authority fostering services on their coming into force. By regulation 52(6) and (7) they will also apply to a pre existing voluntary organisation which continues to place children with foster parents under section 59 of the Children Act 1989 and which duly makes an application for registration by 1st July 2003. These Regulations do not apply to an independent fostering agency until it is registered, but sub-paragraphs (8) to (10) of this regulation allow a local authority to delegate certain duties to a pre-existing independent fostering agency which is carried on by a voluntary organisation and which duly makes an application for registration by 1st July 2003. Regulation 52(11) disapplies regulation 20(5) (which limits the circumstances in which a person who is approved as a foster parent by a fostering service may also be employed to work for the purposes of the service), in certain cases.