Rosie Lewis

Rosie Lewis is a foster carer, writer and adopter. Read her Substack here.

Friday

Rosie Lewis

It’s too easy to blame Big Tech for parental neglect

From our UK edition

If a child found Mr. Kipling cakes particularly addictive and began overindulging to the point of becoming overweight or unwell, would we be right to sue the baker? Or would it make more sense to ask whether the parent had enabled the behaviour by leaving the packets within easy reach, refusing to set limits or using them as a convenient babysitter? A Los Angeles jury has just delivered a landmark verdict against Meta and Google, finding both companies negligent for designing addictive platforms that harmed the mental health of a young user, known as Kaley. The £4.5 million awarded in damages, with Meta shouldering the lion’s share, has been hailed as social media’s 'Big Tobacco moment'.

Sunday

Rosie Lewis

Pushy parents are making the special needs crisis worse

From our UK edition

As a foster carer since the early 2000s, I've witnessed the human cost of Britain's broken SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) system at close quarters: children sent home after uncontrollable outbursts in class, or simply crumpling into a heap at the end of the school day because their needs go unmet. So when Keir Starmer took to the airwaves this week, pledging a £4 billion overhaul of the SEND system, inspired by his late brother's struggles, I wanted to believe it was the lifeline these children deserve.

Sunday

Rosie Lewis

The care system isn’t built for Afghan teenagers

From our UK edition

The sentencing this week of Jan Jahanzeb and Israr Niazal for the rape of a 15-year-old girl in Leamington Spa has reignited the immigration debate. The two 17-year-old Afghans arrived in the country by small boat, claimed to be minors, and were duly absorbed into the British care system before they committed this horrific crime. We continue to ask ordinary families, often single women like me, renting modest semis, to absorb adolescents who may speak no English, observe strict religious codes, and carry more trauma than most adults ever will But behind the justified outrage, a quieter, more uncomfortable truth has been forgotten: the care system we ask to absorb these young men was never designed for them and everyone is paying the price.

Wednesday

Rosie Lewis

The pointlessness of removing the two-child benefit cap

From our UK edition

If the leaks are correct, Rachel Reeves will use today’s Budget to abolish the two-child benefit cap. Another £3.4 billion a year will flow to larger families. On paper, half a million children will be lifted out of poverty. Labour backbenchers will congratulate themselves on a job well done, and columnists on the left will cheer that compassion has been restored. Forgive me for not joining in with the applause. Addiction, chaos, and learned helplessness don’t vanish because the monthly bank transfer gets a little fatter For 20 years I’ve been a foster carer working closely with underprivileged families, and what I’ve learned is that simply giving parents more cash won’t necessarily give those third, fourth or fifth children a better start.

Thursday

Rosie Lewis

How to get Britain eating healthily again

From our UK edition

Another week, another government offensive against childhood obesity. This time it’s a fresh round of pleas for new levies on junk food. And right on cue, out come the sympathetic pundits with a familiar lament: the poor simply can’t afford to eat well. Carrots are unaffordable and broccoli is a luxury that only the middle class can stretch to. It’s a predictable narrative. It’s also wrong, or at least, far from the whole truth. I say this having lived the messy reality of fostering, where I’ve had the privilege, and sometimes pain, of stepping into lives different from my own. For more than 20 years, I’ve cared for children pulled from homes where parenting skills are scarce and where ‘dinner’ might consist of a handful of sweets and a packet of crisps.

Thursday

Rosie Lewis

The parents gaming special educational needs

From our UK edition

As a foster carer and adopter, I’ve spent more mornings than I care to count coaxing my 13-year-old daughter into her uniform and then into the car. She has fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, the UK’s most underdiagnosed neuro-developmental condition, which leaves her with a brain wired for impulsivity, memory lapses and emotional storms that no local school can contain. Each day, I drive her across several counties to the only specialist placement that can meet her needs. Four hours a day, every week day. While I’m grinding through the traffic, taxpayers are footing bills that could fund whole classrooms. Councils and schools spent a record £2.26 billion on special educational needs and disabilities – ‘Send’ – transport last year.

Thursday

Rosie Lewis

The coming crash, a failing foster system & ‘DeathTok’

From our UK edition

45 min listen

First: an economic reckoning is looming ‘Britain’s numbers… don’t add up’, says economics editor Michael Simmons. We are ‘an ageing population with too few taxpayers’. ‘If the picture looks bad now,’ he warns, ‘the next few years will be disastrous.’ Governments have consistently spent more than they raised; Britain’s debt costs ‘are the worst in the developed world’, with markets fearful about Rachel Reeves’s Budget plans. A market meltdown, a delayed crash, or prolonged stagnation looms. The third scenario, he warns, would be the bleakest, keeping politicians from confronting Britain’s spendthrift state. We need ‘austerity shock therapy’ – but voters don’t want it.

Rosie Lewis

Phone-addicted yummy mummies are neglecting their children

From our UK edition

As a foster carer and an adopter, I know what neglect looks like. I’ve looked after children who didn’t know what a bed was. Children who arrived at my door with matted hair, rotten teeth and eyes that scanned every room for danger. Neglect smells of mildew and unwashed clothes. It is chaotic, desperate and tragic. But there is also a different, quieter kind of neglect. One that doesn’t look like crisis at all, but it has a profound effect on the children at the receiving end of it. Teachers have been sounding the alarm for years – children starting school unable to speak in full sentences or sit still for even five minutes. Some can’t feed themselves. Some aren’t even toilet trained.