Chester based not-for-profit fostering agency celebrate ‘Good’ Ofsted Rating

Foster Care Matters is celebrating a ‘Good’ Ofsted rating, with the effectiveness of leaders and managers judged ‘Outstanding’ - the inspection highlights the agency’s commitment to providing safe, supportive, and high‑quality foster care.

The report also highlights the strong relationships built with foster parents, the positive experiences of children in placement, and the organisation’s commitment to ensuring every child feels valued, heard, and supported.

This achievement reflects the hard work of staff, foster parents, and partners who share a vision of creating stable, nurturing homes for children who need them most.

Comments from the report included:

The agency is highly child and family focused. Staff support foster carers to provide high quality nurturing and individualised care to children.

Staff support foster carers to use therapeutic parenting techniques for the benefit of children in their care . Foster parents also have access to specialist therapeutic support from the agency’s in house therapy service.

Supervising social workers have an in-depth knowledge of the children and their foster carers. They are in regular contact with foster carers and provide a high level of professional and child centred support.

Feedback from foster parents about the staff and the agency was overwhelmingly positive. One foster carer described the support as ‘absolutely brilliant’ and another as ‘great’.

The effectiveness of leaders and managers was rated ‘Outstanding’ with the report stating:

The manager is inspirational, child centred and highly experienced. She knows the foster carers and the staff incredibly well and is a strong advocate for them. The manager leads by example and instils a culture of high expectation and ambition. She is held in high regard by the foster carers, staff and other professionals.

This achievement reinforces the agency’s ethos of continuous improvement and determination to create the best possible outcomes for children in care, while offering high‑quality, therapeutic support to families.

Karen Palfreyman, Foster Care Matters Registered Manager commented:

“We are absolutely delighted with the outcome of our recent Ofsted inspection. We are also proud that Ofsted recognises the dedication and expertise of our staff together with our commitment to our therapeutic training and dedicated support we offer to our families.

I also want to say a heartfelt thank you to all the families and professionals who spoke to the inspectors during our inspection, your kind words really do mean a lot to everyone here at Foster Care Matters.”

Foster Care Matters, part of children's charity Adoption Matters, is based on Liverpool Road in Chester and it covers the whole of the North West and Stoke-on-Trent areas.

The report can be read here: 

https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/4/2783211

Find out more about Foster Care Matters at: 

www.fostercarematters.org.uk