The ex-EastEnder is charming, open and excellent in this documentary on the harrowing lack of support for looked-after children. The same can’t be said for the evasive children’s minister
‘They don’t come to us skipping and singing, with backpacks on.” So says the actor Joe Swash’s mother, Kiffy – who became a foster parent 15 years ago when her own daughters and son were leaving home – of the children who find themselves part of the care system. It’s a system that, as her son discovers by meeting some of its inhabitants and graduates in Joe Swash: Teens in Care, is sometimes barely worthy of the name.
Swash considers her last foster child, Daniel, to be a brother; the family is bursting with pride that he is about to start university. At the same time, they are aware that Daniel is a rare success story – and emerging from a time (just) before the cost of living crisis and other factors pushed the system past breaking point.
