3.1.3 Simba Family Care

The effects of Covid-19

The Simba team mostly works from home. Contact with parents, children, the family house and foster parents, partners and youth care professionals was largely conducted online. This meant that family counsellors spent less time travelling and had more time to provide support, but it was also a question of seeking opportunities for effectively maintaining contact with families. Where possible, and in accordance with the guidelines of the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), our family counsellors paid visits to parents and children, such as to establish arrangements for contact. Lots of issues were managed online, such as discussions with new partners and family houses. This generally worked well and we were occasionally able to meet in person.

Growing up together with your brother or sister is a right for every child.

3.1.3 SIMBA FAMILY CARE

Every child has the right to grow up in a loving and safe environment. In the Netherlands too. Although we have an extensive infrastructure for youth support, so much more can still be achieved for children without a loving family or safe home. Reintegration with the family of origin after an out-of-home placement often does not happen, even though it is a widely supported basic principle. It is estimated that in 10 to 50% of cases children do not return to their parents after they have been taken into care. Furthermore, following an out-of-home placement, contact between family members: between siblings and between the children and parents often diminishes. In the Netherlands, in the case of an out-of-home placement, siblings are not placed together in an estimated 50%* of cases, while this (usually) would have been in the interests of the children. Our international experience in 30 European countries, among others, shows that it can be done differently. In all SOS programmes placing siblings together and making vulnerable families more resilient is an important fundamental principle. We aim to use this expertise in the Dutch context.

Methodology - Focus on family reunification

The methodology that forms the basis of Simba Family Care focuses on preventing families breaking up for good. Two major pillars in this regard involve intense support for parents in the form of family-strengthening and all siblings being placed in care together in the event of out-of-home placement. Parents are provided with intense support devoting attention to the strength available in their network, on which everything is aimed at repairing the relationship between parents and children to facilitate the return of the children to one or both parents.

* Source: report ‘Samen, tenzij’ (Together, unless) by the Netherlands Youth Institute