Kinship Care Ireland — A Guide to Relative Foster Care Under Section 36

Kinship care is not something most people plan for. You do not sit down one evening and decide that next month you will take in your grandchild, your nephew, or your sister's children. It happens because something goes wrong — a family crisis, a parent's addiction, a mental health breakdown, domestic violence, or a sudden death — and someone needs to step in before the child ends up with strangers or in residential care.

If you are that person, you are a kinship carer. And while the term sounds clinical, the reality is deeply personal: you are keeping a child in the family at what is often the worst moment in that family's history.

This article explains how kinship care works in Ireland, how the assessment process differs from general fostering, what financial supports you are entitled to, and what the emotional landscape actually looks like.

What Kinship Care Is Under Irish Law

Kinship care — also called relative foster care — is governed by Section 36 of the Child Care Act 1991 and the Child Care (Placement of Children with Relatives) Regulations 1995 (S.I. No. 261 of 1995). These are separate from the regulations that govern general foster care, reflecting the reality that placing a child with a relative involves different dynamics than placing them with a stranger.

Under Section 36, Tusla can place a child with a relative rather than with a general foster carer. In law, "relative" is interpreted broadly — it includes grandparents, aunts, uncles, older siblings, step-parents, and in some cases close family friends who have an established relationship with the child.

Kinship placements account for a significant proportion of all foster placements in Ireland. In January 2024, 25.1% of all children in care were in relative foster care. Tusla's stated policy preference, in line with the principle of family preservation, is to place children with relatives whenever possible before considering a general foster placement. The rationale is straightforward: the child already knows the carer, the carer already knows the child's history and needs, and the disruption of removal is reduced when the child stays within their existing family network.

How You Typically Enter the System

The experience of becoming a kinship carer is fundamentally different from becoming a general foster carer. General carers go through a months-long process of enquiry, training, assessment, and approval before any child is placed with them. Kinship carers often have the child in their home before the formal process even begins.

The typical sequence is:

1. A crisis occurs — a parent is hospitalised, arrested, enters residential treatment, or is otherwise unable to care for their child
2. Tusla's child protection team becomes involved and determines that the child cannot remain in the parental home
3. A relative (often the person the child is already most connected to) offers to take the child or is identified by Tusla as a potential carer
4. The child is placed with the relative, often within days or even hours of the crisis
5. The formal assessment process begins after the placement has already started

This sequence creates a fundamentally different emotional dynamic. General foster carers have months to prepare — they complete training, set up the bedroom, discuss the impact on their household, and mentally adjust. Kinship carers are often caring for a traumatised child before they have had a single conversation with a social worker about what that entails.

How the Assessment Differs

Kinship carers go through the same core assessment as general foster carers — Garda vetting, medical clearance, references, training, and a home study — but the process has important differences.

Timing

The assessment runs concurrently with the placement. The child is already living with you while you are being assessed. This creates pressure: you are simultaneously adjusting to the child's presence, managing the family crisis that caused the placement, and cooperating with a detailed social work assessment of your home, your history, and your capacity.

Adapted Criteria

The assessment recognises that kinship carers start from a different position. You already have a relationship with the child. The social worker's task is not to determine whether you can bond with an unknown child, but whether the existing relationship is safe, stable, and in the child's best interests.

Some aspects that are closely examined in general assessments — such as your views on managing contact with birth families — take on a different character in kinship care, because the birth family is your family too. The social worker will explore how you feel about the parent whose child you are now caring for, whether you can maintain boundaries while preserving family relationships, and whether the dynamics of the extended family create any risks for the child.

The Eco-Gram

During the home study, the social worker will map your support network using an eco-gram — a visual diagram of the people you can rely on for practical and emotional support. For kinship carers, this exercise often reveals a complicated picture: the people who would normally be your support network may be the same people who are part of the crisis that led to the placement. Your sister might be the child's mother. Your mother might be struggling with guilt about her own parenting. The eco-gram helps the social worker understand whether you have genuine, independent sources of support.

Training

Kinship carers are required to complete the same Foundations in Fostering training as general carers, though the timing may be more flexible given that the placement is already underway. Many kinship carers find the training unexpectedly valuable — not because they lack parenting experience, but because it introduces them to concepts like trauma-informed care and attachment disruption that help explain the behaviours they are already seeing in the child.

Financial Supports for Kinship Carers

Kinship carers who are formally approved by Tusla as relative foster carers receive the same financial supports as general foster carers:

• Weekly foster care allowance: EUR 400 for children under 12, EUR 425 for children aged 12 and over
• Carer's Support Grant: EUR 2,000 per child per year
• Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance: EUR 160 (ages 2-11) or EUR 285 (ages 12+)
• Child Benefit: EUR 140 per month per child after six months of placement
• Initial Placement Bonus for outfitting the child's room and wardrobe

All of these payments are tax-free and are disregarded in the means test for social welfare payments. For a full breakdown, see our guide to the foster care allowance in Ireland.

The Gap: Informal Kinship Carers

There is a significant and well-documented gap in supports for kinship carers who are caring for a child informally — that is, without a formal Tusla placement or care order. These carers are not entitled to the foster care allowance. They may be eligible for some general social welfare payments (such as the Domiciliary Care Allowance if the child has a disability, or the Guardian's Payment if both parents are deceased), but the financial support is substantially less than what formal foster carers receive.

If you are currently caring for a relative's child informally and have not been through the Tusla process, it is worth contacting your local Tusla office to discuss whether a formal placement is appropriate. The financial difference is significant, and the child may also benefit from the additional social work support that comes with a formal placement.

The Pre-Approval Period

During the period when a child is placed with you informally but your assessment is pending, you may not be receiving the full foster care allowance. Tusla has the discretion to make interim financial arrangements, but these are not automatic and are not always offered proactively. If you are in this situation, ask your social worker explicitly about what financial support is available during the assessment period.

Your Rights as a Kinship Carer

Once formally approved, kinship carers have the same legal standing as general foster carers. This includes:

• The right to a Link Social Worker for ongoing support
• The right to a written placement agreement
• The right to participate in the child's care plan reviews
• The right to be heard before any decision to change or end the placement
• The right to appeal decisions to the Foster Care Committee
• The right to seek advocacy support from the Irish Foster Care Association

Section 4 Orders for Long-Term Carers

After caring for a child continuously for five years, kinship carers can apply to the District Court for a Section 4 Order under the Child Care (Amendment) Act 2007. This order grants broad parental decision-making authority — medical consent, educational decisions, passport applications, extracurricular activities — without needing individual Tusla authorisation for each one.

A Section 4 Order does not transfer parental rights permanently. The child remains in state care, and the birth parents retain their legal status. But it gives you practical autonomy over the child's daily life that is much closer to what a biological parent has. For long-established kinship families, this provides meaningful legal security and recognition.

The Support Gap in Practice

In practice, kinship carers sometimes report feeling less supported than general carers — partly because the assumption is that the existing family relationship means less support is needed, and partly because social worker caseloads mean that stable placements receive less attention than placements in crisis. If you feel you are not receiving adequate support, your Link Social Worker is your first point of contact, and the IFCA can advocate on your behalf if needed.

The Emotional Reality of Kinship Care

The practical aspects — the assessment, the finances, the legal framework — are important, but they only tell part of the story. The emotional reality is where kinship care differs most profoundly from general fostering.

You Are Parenting Within a Family Crisis

When a general foster carer takes in a child, they have emotional distance from the circumstances that led to the placement. A kinship carer does not. The parent who lost custody is your daughter, your brother, your niece. You are grieving the breakdown of their life while simultaneously trying to create stability for their child. This dual role — mourning a family member's crisis while being the solution to it — is exhausting in ways that are not well understood outside the kinship care community.

Divided Loyalties

Children in kinship care often have complicated feelings about their situation. They may love you and resent you at the same time — grateful for the stability you provide, but angry that you are not their parent and that their parent is not there. They may idealise the absent parent, which can be painful when you know the realities that led to the placement.

For you as the carer, the loyalties can be equally divided. You want the best for the child. You also want the best for their parent, who is your relative too. When those two things conflict — when the child's best interests require reducing contact with a parent who is not yet stable — the emotional cost is real.

Boundary Setting Within the Family

One of the hardest aspects of kinship care is setting boundaries with the birth parent. When your sister asks to see her child outside the agreed contact schedule, saying no feels different than it would for a general foster carer. When your mother disagrees with how Tusla is handling the case, managing that disagreement is complicated by years of family history.

The Foundations in Fostering training touches on these dynamics, but many kinship carers find that peer support groups — specifically for kinship carers rather than foster carers generally — are where they find the most useful practical advice. The IFCA has a dedicated strand of support for relative carers and is the most useful first point of contact for anyone navigating a kinship situation in Ireland.

Taking the Next Step

If you are already caring for a relative's child, or if you expect that you may need to in the near future, the most important step is to contact your local Tusla office and ask about the formal kinship assessment process. Getting into the system formally protects both you and the child — financially, legally, and in terms of the support you receive.

For a full overview of how the fostering process works in Ireland, see our guide to foster care in Ireland or the step-by-step guide to becoming a foster parent.

The Ireland Foster Care Guide includes a dedicated section for kinship carers that covers the adapted assessment process, financial planning specific to crisis-entry placements, and strategies for managing family dynamics during what is often the most difficult period of a family's life.

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