My latest article in The New Statesman : In child protection cases, healthy scepticism too often turns to dangerous distrust
My latest article in The New Statesman : In child protection cases, healthy scepticism too often turns to dangerous distrust
Healthy scepticism may turn to dangerous mistrust which may in turn change to foolish reliance on ,and trust in, a flawed system in which thousands of adherents make their living taking children into care away from their law abiding uk parents !
Numbers of kids taken must be kept up to ensure the smooth functioning of an industry that costs the State around £2 billion per year !
still anonymous “g”? why?
A very good, balanced read. As a social worker and a manager of a duty team I can share some of the frustrations that you highlight but perhaps not to the same degree. Perhaps the local differences in practice may account for that. In my local authority we have seen the number of children open under child protection plans drop and proceedings applications reduce quite substantially. We haven’t had significant changes in our structure but we have tried to change our perspectives and focus much more on the relationship between the social worker and the parent. I regularly tell my social workers that they have two ears and one mouth, so if they are speaking more than they are listening they are doing it wrong.
As a result we have found that we are more likely to get realistic solutions in place because we come from a similar platform of understanding than the parent. We need to work in an environment where challenge from the parent is respected and welcome. I should be able to phone any one of the parents of the children open to me and have them tell me exactly whey a social worker is in their lives and what the worries are. If they cannot, then we are doing it wrong as well.
Finally, I would however encourage you to consider (or make more explicit) though that your experience of social workers is fairly narrow as most of what we do does not go near the courts. Perhaps you may like to spend time with social workers in a different environment to court or MBA’s to see the stark differences between the two worlds and that may help you understand why you encounter such differences in competence.
Hi A social worker,
It sounds really positive and encouraging in your neck of the woods! I am happy to say explicitly that my experience is quite narrow – ie is limited to court work and this only a sliver of the broader social work population. I am sure there are differences between different environments – I’d be interested to know why you think that those differences in competence may emerge as between social workers involved in court processes and those who are not??
Private and Public Law environments and the inherent cultures the occupy those environments are not intrinsically part of the social work landscape. I understand that it should be but the reality is that very few people sign on to social work courses with an understanding that they will be made to practice in an adversarial legal environment. They simply have no idea. The university courses do dip into it but it doesn’t prepare social workers adequately for what is expected of them.
The difference in practice between a social worker in court and in the community is significant. Most of what we do is working with families openly but firmly with the fundamental aim of “closing down” our involvement because we don’t need to be involved. A minority of what we do is going to court where you will find a very competent social worker possibly thrust into a world that they are ill prepared for. They go from being left to work with the family with the occasional oversight of their manager to a situation where what they do is up for scrutiny by senior managers, their own legal team, their barristers, parent’s, guardians (and their barristers) and a judge. They are then faced with competing demands and frankly often do not have the time to focus on the legal side of things and present things in the best way to court.
We do not have a single agency social worker in my local authority. Retention is high and this allows us to build professional competence and allows us to simply focus on our practice and improving that. I would encourage you to find a good local authority in your area and ask to spend time with a social work team and I am sure you will come away from that experience with a more favourable and balanced view of the reality of social work. Those local authority’s that worry you the most will, I am quite sure, have significant numbers of agency workers.
Judges and lawyers deliberately deceive parents !
My advice to readers directly concerned is as follows:-If at the conclusion of the case the family court judge as says the usual “I refuse leave to appeal”that is not final at all though both the judge and your lawyers would like you to think it is .They rarely tell parents the truthful position and later judges remark that the parent FAILED TO APPEAL as though this mean’t they accepted the loss of their children. Do not hesitate therefore to ignore the judge’s initial refusal. Just go back to the court and apply for an oral hearing asking for permission to appeal
“g”. you are a regular commenter on the blog. I am not going to allow you to comment further unless you identify yourself.
I always explain to clients if permission to appeal is raised that they can ask the judge making the decision and if that is a no (it almost always is unless there is an obvious point of law), we can ask the appellate court – but that we must have arguable grounds to appeal. I usually explain whether or not I think at first blush that there may be grounds of appeal, and give it more thought before making a decision about whether I can secure public funding to draft that appeal (it is usually necessary to give advice to the Legal Aid Agency on the strength of an appeal in order to get funding). This is standard practice and what I would expect any lawyer to do if the client is indicating they wish to appeal or if I think that there is a valid challenge to be made. Sometimes when a difficult decision is made it is not possible to have that conversation on the spot as the client is upset or can’t absorb the information. And sometimes a client needs a simple explanation due to learning needs.
The reality is though that it is impossible for most to pursue an appeal without public funding and that is difficult to obtain if the prospects are poor. I’ve not seen any evidence though that lawyers deceive parents about how the appellate process works. Judges often tell litigants that if they want to appeal further they must ask the judge above.
I have no idea why the computer labelled me as “g” and I am more than happy to identify myself as ian josephs /forced adoption !
Surely an honest judge should when refusing permission to appeal also tell t hapless parents that they have the right to ask for an oral hearing for permission to appeal? But the don’t…………….
I think when the judge below (Who is being appealed) refuses permission they often do say that if the litigant wants to take it further they must ask the court above. I think beyond that you are going into the realms of the judge dispensing legal advice which is really difficult territory. If a person is represented their lawyer should tell them, if not the rules are there and publicly available even if many litigants would not find them.
When an application to the appellate court for permission to appeal is refused on paper it may be that the notice of refusal contains a reference to the right to seek an oral hearing (not sure).
As it happens there is no longer an automatic right to seek an oral hearing. the rules now provide :
FPR 30.3
(5) Subject to paragraph (5A), where the appeal court, without a hearing, refuses permission to appeal, the person seeking permission may request the decision to be reconsidered at a hearing.
(5A) Where a judge of the High Court or in the family court, a judge of the High Court or a Designated Family Judge refuses permission to appeal without a hearing and considers that the application is totally without merit, the judge may make an order that the person seeking permission may not request the decision to be reconsidered at a hearing.
(5B) Rule 4.3(5) will not apply to an order that the person seeking permission may not request the decision to be reconsidered at a hearing made under paragraph (5A).
(Rule 4.3(5) is the right to apply for set aside or variation, which is disapplied).
I’m sorry, Lucy, but I am extremely concerned to see the allegations in an article in a national magazine, [you mean my article? what allegations are you referring to?]
The reason parents are increasingly angry and organising is because the Family Court is a corrupt system with those working within it unable to recognise this because they make a living there, and powerful bureaucracy are involved in it.
American style Family Courts should never have been introduced in Britain. [what do you mean American Style? Our system is very different from the American system?]
The secrecy is because of huge scandal 27-21 years ago. If you wih I will give details of some of these scandals.
Judges do not listen to the family’s evidence, defence legals will not mount fighting defences and you are told you can’t appeal. [I mount “fighting defences”, but where appropriate I also caution against fighting losing or dangerous battles. Most of my colleagues do the same. It is the role of a lawyer to advise on the prospects of successful appeal – I often advise that there are no / poor prospects of appeal, and will say if I consider there are no proper grounds – this is surely not objectionable is it? Or do you mean that lawyers advise there is no right of appeal when there is? An appeal must have arguable grounds or it is doomed to failure.]
Dubious discredited theories are used to bring cases, even if consultants have given diagnoses against them [which theories?]
The most corrupt area of the court is expert witnesses, who since they want further commissions will make diagnoses and conclusions that NHS and private psychs and psychologists will not support.
The Family Court rules clearly state that EW’s should be working for the NHS or private clinics. [Where do they state this? I do not think they do.]
Only exceptionally should they be working from home. [Not sure what relevance venue has?]
In short the F C is run like a 17th century witch trial or the Holy Inquisition.
They can’t abandon secrecy; Sir Mark Potter arranged this five years ago and they have been fighting it like fury ever since. [I think that many are embracing or at least adapting to a relaxation of privacy rules – still a work in progress, and some are resisting, but things are moving.]
Oh one lat point, reporters, including Christopher booker are usually accurate in their reporting, there is no conspiracy theory, it is fact. [Reporters have been repeatedly shown to report inaccurately – not always, but enough to be concerning. See Pink Tape previous posts for details]
For ease – my comments are in square brackets alongside the relevant bits of yours.
I would very much agree with your comment:-
”But most of the time … it is because the social workers have … closed their mind to a particular outcome or option (confirmation bias affects social workers too).”
I have noticed this with CAFCASS in private law cases as well. It has very much been the case, as you observed:-
”And so one occasionally sees cases in which social workers reach conclusions as to what is best for a child, and then work back from those conclusions, selecting and de-selecting evidence to suit the objective … – presenting their reverse workings in place of the analysis that ought to have informed their decision making along the way.”
Unfortunately, I think that this happens more than just ”occasionally” with CAFCASS.
Social workers want to win their cases; so do cafcass,and so do the guardians!
Naturally they bring all the evidence they can that is favourable to them and omit everything that is notUsually all three sing from the same hymn sheet so on the balance of probabilities the judge is more likely to believe them than the hapless parents who nearly always lose.Sad for them and their kids………….
so do parent’s lawyers…
I am afraid you are right ! Even the parent’s lawyers take the side of social services and advise their clients to accept whatever the social workers say ! What chance do these parents have? Very very little…………
as you well know that is not what i meant. what i meant was that the lawyers representing parents also want to win their cases.
As a barrister with more than 10 years experience in the family courts remarked:-
My clients were like “lambs to the slaughter”;
Pretty apt don’t you think?
one barrister’s view. i fight for mine (whilst also giving realistic advice). i do exactly the same when acting for other parties.
Ministry of justice :- Official Judicial statistics
In 2011, there were 32,739 children involved in disposals of public law cases, including 31,515 orders made, 792 applications withdrawn, 350 orders of no order and 72 orders refused. What chance did those parents have as (to quote L.J.Thorpe) “parents are so prejudiced in proceedings” ??
Ian, I’ve had this VERY SAME CONVERSATION with you so many times. I really can’t be bothered to rehearse it again. So not many applications were refused. That is either because the court is on auto pilot, or because Local Authorities generally don’t ask for orders that are completely coo coo, or a bit of both. Your stats don’t of course set out how many placement orders were refused, how many care orders were substituted for supervision orders, how many were contested and how many agreed etc etc. Misleading, boring tendentious nonsense. Can’t be bothered.
So sorry familoo that as a responsible barrister you dismiss official judicial statistice as “misleading,boring tendentious nonsense” .
It must be the New Moon or something…………………
I am neither dismissing nor questioning the statistics. I AM querying the weight they will bear and the interpretation placed upon them.
Dismissing women who challenge you with new moon put down’s is a bit Donald Trump for you isn’t it?
Yes I apologise for the “new moon comment” (though I never thought of it as applying to women more than men)
I still maintain however that those who compiled these official stats saw no need to elaborate as you have done since the overall message clearly confirms already what we already know.Parents very very rarely win in cases where they oppose social services in the family courts so they nearly always lose their children when the very fact that they love them enough to go through the ordeals of court hearings shows they love their children so surely they should win more often;
I just don’t agree with your logic Ian. You can use those stats to argue either that social services almost always “win” therefore they are almost always right. Or you can use them to argue what you argue. Or you can acknowledge that stats in a vacuum don’t tell you much at all.
I think if you examine your own stats as a family court barrister you would have to admit that very few of your client parents faced with the possibility in court of an interim care order return triumphantly with their children and the LA defeated.
This shows that the courts are biased against parents or as L.J Thorpe put it “the parents are so prejudicedin proceedings thereafter that it is very difficult to get a child returned once it has been taken.
Surely most of the parents enduring the court processes for their kids must love them dearly and deserve to have them returned but in practice very few do
I don’t keep stats, and I’m not sure how helpful they’d be as each case is so different – but from memory the last two ICOs I did the children stayed with mum, and the last final hearing I did they stayed with mum. In one of those two sadly the mother subsequently did exactly what I’d advised her not to and the children were subsequently removed as a result. But I’m not going to suggest I have a hundred percent hit rate – I certainly don’t. Sadly, in many cases removal is amply legally justified (which is not to say I give up, but I do advise).
Perhaps you are one of the “good guys” but do read Booker in today’s Telegraph !
I have. It looks like a rehash of his article in Feb 14. And no better evidenced.