Research published by NHS researchers in Birmingham has suggested that children who are made the subject of a Special Guardianship Order (SGO) could be at greater risk of abuse than the general population, despite such placements requiring carers to pass social care parenting assessments.

An SGO made in a family court places a child in the care of someone other than their parents, usually but not always a relative or someone the child already knows and has a relationship with. Many children are placed with their grandparents.

The research, published on 2 July, 2021, was carried out “to determine difference in frequency of referral for child protection medical examination (CPME) in children [in Birmingham in 2018] subject to special guardianship order (SGO), subject to child protection plan (CPP) or neither.”

The average age of the children included in the study at the time of the first child protection medical examination was 47 months (almost 4 years of age).

As well as raising concerns about abuse within special guardianship orders, the research also concludes that children subject to child protection plans might not be adequately protected from further abuse. Additionally, it found that children on child protection plans were 28 times more likely to come in to a clinical setting for a child protection medical examination.

The researchers concluded that children subject to special guardianship orders may be at higher risk of physical abuse, although less at risk than those subject to child protection plans.

The research is problematic for several reasons.

The study itself is small, and does not separate out other forms of court order, such as care orders, adoption orders, or foster placements.

It also cites bruises as the main type of non-accidental injury, which is controversial. This is because a growing number of social work academics are concerned that many bruises, particularly those found on pre-mobile children (those less than 6 months old) may be being wrongly classified as non accidental.

Distinguishing between accidental and non accidental bruising in children is particularly hard, and requires specialist knowledge. The research unfortunately does not clarify whether the professionals who diagnosed the bruises had received this training.

The researchers also note that children on a child protection plan are significantly over-represented when it comes to presenting for a child protection medical examination. Interestingly, they attribute this increase in examinations to professionals overseeing these child protection cases, who appear to be doing the referring for these examinations.

The study confirms a substantial data gap when it comes to children subject to SGOs and child protection plans, explaining as it does that the government is not required to record a lot of very significant details.

The conclusion for the study says:

“Our findings suggest that children subject to SGO may be at higher risk of physical abuse, although less at risk than those subject to CPP. At present, children subject to SGO can be invisible to services, with local authorities not required to keep records of these families. Services can only offer enhanced support if they are aware of the need.

Children subject to SGO should be considered as having additional need for support and be offered this routinely by health and social care services. At present, guardians are not entitled to the same level of assessment and support as adoptive parents, particularly if children were not previously in care.

There could be many more children subject to SGO experiencing abuse and neglect who do not require CPME. Further research is needed, detailing the frequency of SGO children presenting to social care with abuse and neglect so that the scale and nature of this problem can be accurately determined.

Only once we have a more nuanced understanding of the issues can we plan better assessments, support and monitoring for these vulnerable children.”

You can access the study here.

Many thanks to Dana for alerting us to this research.

The latest child welfare items that should be right on your radar:

• State did not make legal errors in forced adoption scandal, court rules (Netherlands)
• VIDEO: Mothers call for apology following historic forced adoptions (Scotland)
• Confronting Canada’s history of forced adoption (Canada)

We are republishing a post we shared last week inviting parents to share their experiences of care proceedings with a focus on which stages of the process they felt were unfair.

Researching Reform will show social work staff how the framework used in care proceedings sets parents up to fail and enables unjust child removals, at an event hosted by Neath Port Talbot social services.

The Public Law Outline (PLO) is a legal framework which acts as a form of guidance for the family court about how to manage care proceedings.

It contains the order of the different stages of the process; the matters to be considered at the main case management hearings; and timescales for each stage of the process which should be followed by the family courts and social work staff in order to resolve the proceedings within 26 weeks.

Initially created to prevent children from staying too long inside the child protection system, the outline has been heavily criticised in recent years.

One of the key concerns stems from its use of time limits to try and push cases through the courts in instances where more time would have allowed parents to demonstrate their ability to care for their children, and keep them in their care.

Social workers also struggle to meet the deadlines in an increasing number of cases. Extensions are supposed to be granted in cases where additional time would resolve the case fairly, but many parents say they are simply refused more time to make the changes being asked of them.

And despite a growing number of social work experts acknowledging that the system does set parents up to fail – and even using the term, which was coined by deeply frustrated families inside the system experiencing this unfairness – the system has not done anything to address the problem.

Researching Reform decided that the best way to show social work staff the problems with this guidance and its timeframes was to collect real-life experiences of the families who have been exposed to them, and we would be so grateful for your help.

We are looking to gather experiences of families and children who have gone through care proceedings and felt that the stages and time limits set them up to fail.

This post includes questions below which you are welcome to email or post your answers to if you would like to share your experience. There is also an accessible breakdown of the PLO so that you can point to which bits of the guidance affected you, and how.

The conference takes place at the beginning of February, so we would welcome as much input as you can offer over the next two weeks. We will keep sharing this post as well, so that you can come back to it whenever you would like to.

Questions we would love the answers to:

• Did you feel you the care proceedings process/ PLO was setting you up to fail, and if so, why?
• How did the timelines in your case affect your ability to carry out tasks, courses and assessments ordered by the court?
• Did any of the courses run over any of the time limits and prevent you from showing the results to a court?
• Were any of the timelines extended?
• Which part/s of the PLO do you think should be scrapped and why?
• Which parts of the PLO do you think are useful, and why?
• Was some of the PLO ignored or not carried out at all during your case?
• Was some/ all of the PLO wrongly carried out during your case?

Breakdown of the Public Law Outline:

Stages

• Pre-proceedings Checklist – submission of documents, evidence and records to the court
• Stage 1: Issue and Allocation – On day 1, a local authority files the application form, then 24 hours later a court must consider an application and give directions
• Stage 2: Case Management Hearing – advocates meet including litigants in person, no later than 2 business days before the case management hearing. Not before day 12 and not later than day 18  is a further case management hearing to be held only if necessary, and must listed as soon as possible and in any event no later than day 25.
• Stage 3: Issues Resolution Hearing – advocates meet including litigants in person, no later than 7 business days before the issue resolutions hearing. Court identifies key issues and evidence, and gives final case management directions including the filing of the final evidence and care plan, skeleton arguments and a listing for the final hearing.

If you would like to see the PLO in full, you can access it here.

There is also a good page explaining the PLO and the documents related to it on the Family Rights Group website.

You can post your comments below (we review comments before publication to ensure we don’t publicly share any confidential information) or you can email Researching Reform at Sobk13 at gmail dot com.

Researching Reform has not accepted any payment for taking part in this conference.

The latest child welfare items that should be right on your radar:

• Women forced to give up babies asked to share experiences (Scotland)
• Major study to examine lives of children in care and adults who were in care as children (Ireland)
• ‘I grew up in care alone – why did no-one tell me I had siblings?’ (England)

Welcome to another week.

These are the child welfare stories that should be right on your radar:

• Children’s hearings system ‘not fit for purpose’, says social worker (Scotland)
• ‘We were robbed’: Alaska couple loses custody of kids after erroneous abuse diagnosis (US)
• Domestic violence survivors urge more judicial training (US)

A recently published judgment from a case in which a mother was accused of causing injury to her child finally acknowledges the importance of addressing serious procedural errors in family court cases.

LexisNexis has produced a very good summary of the case, an extract of which we’re adding below:

“A fact-finding hearing took place in early 2021 in care proceedings involving a girl, S, then aged 6½ years of age. The principal issue arising in the hearing was the cause of injuries sustained by another child, J, a boy then aged 5½ years of age. Other findings sought by the local authority related to allegations of domestic abuse by the father, Y, towards S’s mother, X, and J’s mother, A’s misuse of ketamine. The judge found that J’s injuries had been sustained accidentally but some had been inflicted by A. A appealed on the basis of, amongst other things, a serious procedural irregularity contending that she had cognitive difficulties which were unidentified. She filed a redacted cognitive and psychological assessment to support the appeal.”

The summary also explains that:

“The failure to identify A’s cognitive difficulties and to make appropriate participation directions to ensure that the quality of her evidence was not diminished as a result of vulnerability had amounted to a serious procedural irregularity. As a result, the outcome of the hearing was unjust.”

While the appeal has been allowed on the ground that the mother, who was found to be vulnerable because of her cognitive difficulties, did not have a fair opportunity to present her case (among other grounds), the LexisNexis summary mentions that any subsequent hearings might not alter the original outcome of the case.

However the judgment itself says:

“In the period between the fact-finding hearing and the appeal, S, who had been removed from her parents’ care, is living with family and is apparently thriving in their care. Meanwhile, in part as a result of the findings, the local authority has started further care proceedings in respect of J and his brother, although they remain at home under an interim supervision order. The future of all three children may therefore be affected significantly by the outcome of this appeal.”

You can read the judgment for free on BAILII.

Another judgment to note this week stems from an abduction case in which the father took his three-year-old daughter to Switzerland. The court ordered the daughter’s return to her mother in England.

The father alleged that he was a victim of the mother’s bullying, and had taken his daughter to Switzerland to protect them both.

Justice Hayden, who oversaw the hearing, rejected the father’s allegations and said the move would cause the child to suffer significant emotional harm:

“This was a cold and meticulously contrived abduction which required a great deal of careful planning. It not only separated A from her mother but from her siblings too. I am told that she is brought up to speak French which her mother does not speak. She is entirely deracinated from her maternal family with no recognition by F of the extent to which that will cause her lifelong harm and, ultimately, come to corrode her relationship with him too… By contrast, I feel confident that M, for all the challenges she faces, has an instinctive warmth and understanding of her children which, properly supported, will enable her to provide a more secure emotional base for A,” Hayden said in his judgement.

There is a very good summary of the case on LexisNexis as always, for those with subscriptions. The judgment itself can be read for free on BAILII.

These are the latest child welfare items that should be right on your radar:

• Adoption Agencies vs. ‘Roe’: The Invisible Hand Stirring the Pot (US)
• Tusla to review child abuse case (Ireland)
• Family of poorly Mathew plan to take Walleys Quarry case to Supreme Court (England)

The latest child welfare items that should be right on your radar:

• ‘Forgotten Scots’ made to give babies up for adoption in 1960s (Scotland)
• Understanding the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on families involved in the child welfare system (US)
• Yorkshire families face fines if they clog up the court (England and Wales)

Welcome to another week.

As promised, we are republishing a post we shared last week inviting parents to share their experiences of care proceedings with a focus on which stages of the process they felt were unfair.

Researching Reform will show social work staff how the framework used in care proceedings sets parents up to fail and enables unjust child removals, at an event hosted by Neath Port Talbot social services.

The Public Law Outline (PLO) is a legal framework which acts as a form of guidance for the family court about how to manage care proceedings.

It contains the order of the different stages of the process; the matters to be considered at the main case management hearings; and timescales for each stage of the process which should be followed by the family courts and social work staff in order to resolve the proceedings within 26 weeks.

Initially created to prevent children from staying too long inside the child protection system, the outline has been heavily criticised in recent years.

One of the key concerns stems from its use of time limits to try and push cases through the courts in instances where more time would have allowed parents to demonstrate their ability to care for their children, and keep them in their care.

Social workers also struggle to meet the deadlines in an increasing number of cases. Extensions are supposed to be granted in cases where additional time would resolve the case fairly, but many parents say they are simply refused more time to make the changes being asked of them.

And despite a growing number of social work experts acknowledging that the system does set parents up to fail – and even using the term, which was coined by deeply frustrated families inside the system experiencing this unfairness – the system has not done anything to address the problem.

Researching Reform decided that the best way to show social work staff the problems with this guidance and its timeframes was to collect real-life experiences of the families who have been exposed to them, and we would be so grateful for your help.

We are looking to gather experiences of families and children who have gone through care proceedings and felt that the stages and time limits set them up to fail.

This post includes questions below which you are welcome to email or post your answers to if you would like to share your experience. There is also an accessible breakdown of the PLO so that you can point to which bits of the guidance affected you, and how.

The conference takes place at the beginning of February, so we would welcome as much input as you can offer over the next two weeks. We will keep sharing this post as well, so that you can come back to it whenever you would like to.

Questions we would love the answers to:

• Did you feel you the care proceedings process/ PLO was setting you up to fail, and if so, why?
• How did the timelines in your case affect your ability to carry out tasks, courses and assessments ordered by the court?
• Did any of the courses run over any of the time limits and prevent you from showing the results to a court?
• Were any of the timelines extended?
• Which part/s of the PLO do you think should be scrapped and why?
• Which parts of the PLO do you think are useful, and why?
• Was some of the PLO ignored or not carried out at all during your case?
• Was some/ all of the PLO wrongly carried out during your case?

Breakdown of the Public Law Outline:

Stages

• Pre-proceedings Checklist – submission of documents, evidence and records to the court
• Stage 1: Issue and Allocation – On day 1, a local authority files the application form, then 24 hours later a court must consider an application and give directions
• Stage 2: Case Management Hearing – advocates meet including litigants in person, no later than 2 business days before the case management hearing. Not before day 12 and not later than day 18  is a further case management hearing to be held only if necessary, and must listed as soon as possible and in any event no later than day 25.
• Stage 3: Issues Resolution Hearing – advocates meet including litigants in person, no later than 7 business days before the issue resolutions hearing. Court identifies key issues and evidence, and gives final case management directions including the filing of the final evidence and care plan, skeleton arguments and a listing for the final hearing.

If you would like to see the PLO in full, you can access it here.

There is also a good page explaining the PLO and the documents related to it on the Family Rights Group website.

You can post your comments below (we review comments before publication to ensure we don’t publicly share any confidential information) or you can email Researching Reform at Sobk13 at gmail dot com.

Researching Reform has not accepted any payment for taking part in this conference.

The latest child welfare items that should be right on your radar:

• Proposed law to enable adopted people to access birth data (Ireland)
• Record levels of child sexual abuse online in 2021, internet watchdog finds (Worldwide)
• Why judge rejected Prince Andrew’s bid to have sexual assault civil lawsuit thrown out (UK and US)