We had 10 minutes to decide whether to care for our grandchild

Despite a heart attack, giving up his business and having to move house, 65-year-old Alan says taking on the full-time care of his disabled grandchild is the best decision he has ever made.

Nine-year-old Ella, who has severe learning and physical disabilities, has been living with Alan and his wife Julie since she was a baby.

Her parents were unable to care for her and Alan says social services gave the couple just 10 minutes to decide whether to become Ella‘s “kinship carers”.

He says: “A social worker said to us, ‘this place closes in about 10 minutes, we need to know if you are prepared to take her on’. ”

More than 140,000 children in England and Wales are being raised by kinship carers like Alan and Julie.

It is the term used for family and friends who take on a child because their parents are unable to care for them.

And according to the charity Kinship’s annual survey, seven out of 10 kinship carers say they had “no time to prepare” for the child’s arrival.

And four out of 10 report that they had less an hour to decide whether they were able to take a child on.

Unlike foster carers, who are paid by the local authority, kinship carers get no paid leave, no financial assistance and no social workers supporting them.

Alan had just returned from holiday when he was contacted by social services and asked to care for his granddaughter, or she would go into local authority care.

Alan and Julie, who is Ella’s step-grandmother, agreed, but because Ella was a baby and needed 24-hour care, it meant they had to give up their property maintenance business and move from Bradford to Leeds, where Ella lived.

He says: “It was a no-brainer for us.

“We would do the same for any of our grandchildren.”