‘They don’t come to us skipping and singing, with backpacks on.” So says the actor Joe Swash’s mother, Kiffy – who became a foster parent 15 years ago when her own daughters and son were leaving home – of the children who find themselves part of the care system. It’s a system that, as her son discovers by meeting some of its inhabitants and graduates in Joe Swash: Teens in Care, is sometimes barely worthy of the name.
Swash considers her last foster child, Daniel, to be a brother; the family is bursting with pride that he is about to start university. At the same time, they are aware that Daniel is a rare success story – and emerging from a time (just) before the cost of living crisis and other factors pushed the system past breaking point.
