Smash hit

The Government does not like care proceedings. Nor do local authority managers. The reason is cost, both to the legal aid fund and to authorities, who are ordered to carry out comprehensive assessments that have been needed for years but never done.

Each care case is a mini-inquiry into the welfare of the child, his development and needs, his family circumstances, the ability of his family to care for him, and the amount of support and assistance they have been offered or would accept. Judges are often critical of local authorities’ failure to intervene sooner and more effectively, even where the family has been known to them for years. In case after case, one reads of the alarm being raised by health visitors, schools and neighbours. After short-term intervention, there is the constant refrain “case closed”.

Children will come on to the child protection register, and then, when things improve slightly, come off. Support and monitoring is withdrawn. This is the trigger for another crisis, within days or weeks. But local authorities are now set targets to reduce the number of children on the register for more than two years, and to avoid children being put back on the register once they have come off. This source of protection for children is also actively discouraged. The ministry research has established that more than 90 per cent of families in care proceedings are already known to social services, and more than 45 per cent for five years or more, before proceedings are taken.

Care proceedings can also have an impact on parents who may have been lulled into a false sense of security by years of ad hoc and intermittent intervention. When they find themselves in a courtroom they know they are in serious trouble. They get automatic access to legal advice and robust advice from an experienced lawyer can change their understanding of the concerns. Finally, many parents will listen to a judge when they will not listen to anyone else.

Children’s social work is about managing risk. It is a complex and skilled task, requiring close observation, the ability to talk to people, time spent with the child and his parents in their home. It is extraordinary what a difference a good social worker can make. Good social workers will use the court process to share the responsibility with the judge and get help and resources for the child. But these social workers often achieve what they do in spite of, and not because of, their managers. Their judgments are often overruled by managers chasing targets who have never met the child or his family. They are under pressure to complete paper work assessments, churning out low-grade checklist documents. Time spent talking to the parents and observing the child is devalued.

Children need to be protected from harm, and parents need to be protected from the improper interference and the unjust exercise of power by public authorities. The judges, guardians and lawyers help to ensure that the child is protected, against further abuse, against social workers unable to see the danger in the plausible but deceitful mother, and also against the promotion of government targets over the interests of the individual child.

The author is a child law barrister at Coram Chambers and member of the Family Law Bar Association

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