Foster carers needed in Fareham
South Coast Fostering is recruiting foster carers in Fareham, Portchester, Titchfield, Stubbington, Locks Heath, Warsash, Park Gate, Sarisbury and Whiteley. Children from Fareham who come into care are placed by Hampshire County Council. Fareham Borough Council says as much on its own site: local government here is split between the borough and the county, and children's services sit with the county.
Hampshire had 1,711 children in its care in May 2026. At the Department for Education count of 31 March 2024, 370 of the county's 1,917 children in care were living outside the Hampshire boundary and more than 20 miles from home. Each of those placements began with nobody nearer having a spare room.
Fareham borough went from about 111,600 people in 2011 to 114,500 in 2021, a rise of 2.6 per cent at the Census. That figure covers Portchester, Titchfield, Warsash and the rest of the borough as well as the town. North of the M27, outline permission granted in 2021 allows up to 6,000 homes at Welborne, and the first residents moved in during 2025.
Sharron is the supervising social worker for Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. She visits at least every four weeks and sees the child at least every eight. The phone is answered 24 hours a day, all year round, with a dedicated team out of hours.
Payments are £479.50 a week for a child aged 0 to 10 and £507.50 from 11 upwards, per child. Additional needs placements pay £550 to £850, parent and child £987, and there is £330 to £1,500 a year towards council tax. Most fostering income is untaxed under HMRC's qualifying care relief. Ofsted inspected us in January 2026 and rated us Outstanding in all three judgement areas. Phone 023 8235 2020.
What do you need to Be a Foster carer?
Two things are not negotiable. The first is a bedroom that belongs to the child and to nobody else, which rules out the box room with the ironing board in it and rules out doubling up with your own teenager. Babies get a temporary pass, since they sleep in a crib beside your bed at first, but the room has to be there in the plan.
The second is time, and in Fareham a good deal of it is spent on the road. School at nine and again at three. Six weeks of summer. A clinic appointment at eleven on a Tuesday in Portsmouth, booked when the clinic had a slot rather than when you did. Shift patterns bend around that. A job you cannot walk out of at short notice usually does not.
The assessment covers everything else and goes further than most applicants expect. How you were parented. How you argue. Why the last relationship ended. What your bank statements say. It is intrusive on purpose, and nobody is grading you on a tidy life, only on an honest account of one.
Support you'll receive from us
- 24/7 support from your supervising social worker
- £507.50 a week in fostering allowance and fees to foster
- Intensive training program to help you be the best you can be
Where are we recruiting?
Across the borough: Fareham town, Portchester, Titchfield, Titchfield Common, Stubbington, Hill Head, Warsash, Locks Heath, Sarisbury, Park Gate, Swanwick, Funtley, Wallington and Whiteley. Wickham and Botley sit just beyond the boundary and are well within range.
Fareham has a station, and Hampshire County Council’s transport strategy for Fareham and Gosport is candid about what it is for. Fareham, Swanwick and Portchester carry over two million passengers a year between them, and the strategy describes Fareham’s main purpose as an origin station for people commuting out of the two boroughs. Trains run to Southampton, Portsmouth, Brighton, Bristol, Cardiff and London. Portchester and Swanwick still lack step-free access to every platform, which counts if you travel with a buggy.
That commuting pattern is the recruitment problem stated in one line. A town that empties in the morning has fewer households with an adult free at three in the afternoon. If you are one of them, or your hours can bend that far, call 023 8235 2020. The rest of our county coverage is on the Hampshire fostering page.
Fareham
Next Steps
Depending on where you are in your fostering journey, we have a few suggested next steps.
Download Our Guide To Fostering
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Six thousand homes and a busy junction
North of the M27, on the far side of junction 10, outline planning permission granted in 2021 covers up to 6,000 homes at Welborne. The scheme has been in Fareham’s local plan since 2015, junction 10 is being remodelled around it, and the first residents moved into the Chesterfield neighbourhood in 2025. Over the plan period it changes the size of the borough.
New housing brings families, and families bring children who need school places and doctors. A few of them need somewhere else to live. Hampshire had 1,711 children in its care in May 2026. Growth is not what creates that need, but it does mean the number of local carers has to keep pace with a population that will not stand still.
Traffic is the other half of the picture. The M27 became a smart motorway in 2022 and the county’s transport strategy names junctions 9, 10 and 11 as the points where the borough joins the network. The same document records congestion as significant on the A27 and A32, with pinch-points at the major junctions. For a carer that is the difference between arriving at a review meeting on time and apologising at the door.
HMS Collingwood sits on Newgate Lane, the Royal Navy’s largest training base and the home of its warfare and weapon engineering training, with the Defence Diving School alongside. Service families move often. That mobility is part of why a settled local carer is worth so much to a child who has already been moved once.
Down at the coast, Solent Airport at Daedalus occupies a 369-acre site the council bought in 2015 inside the Solent Enterprise Zone, with 35,000 flight movements recorded in 2022 and the Fareham Innovation Centre on the site. The council credits it with bringing forward a £12m college and the Stubbington bypass.
From April 2028 Hampshire County Council stops delivering children’s services, and a new authority covering Fareham, Gosport, Havant and Portsmouth takes them on after elections in May 2027. The children on the list do not change on that date. Neither does the shortage of people in Portchester or Locks Heath with a room going spare. Call 023 8235 2020.
book a call about fostering:
We’d be happy to give you a 15-20 minute call to tell you about fostering. Don’t worry, there’s no pressure from us – it’s honestly a chance for you to ask us any questions you have about fostering, and your suitability. Just complete this short form
