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We asked for views on the primary cause of delays in the court process affecting care proceedings.

To read a recent Community Care article on the subject click here

These are the responses we received:

"I perceive the primary cause for delays in care proceedings is due to:

a)  Identifying and timetabling expert witnesses.

c)  Identifying of a guardian.

Where a child has a disability there appears to be greater delay."

Sue

"Guardians and their solicitors wanting more and more expert opinion

Experts asking for further specialist opinion and recommending another
expert

Its a gravy train and it doesn't protect children and it isn't fair to parents"

Andrew

"I write in my capacity as director of the adoption and permanence taskforce. Increasingly we are encouraging councils with social services responsibilites and hence for care proceedings to work with local legal services, CAFCASS and the courts (at FPC and county levels) to take a wider systems perspective of the processes through which a child travels from initial referral through to final order.

We are facilitating events for all the stake holders, including established adopters, to do three things: 1. A representative from each of the stakeholders to explain their role ( ie to ensure all those involved understand each other's roles) 2. Invite stakeholders to describe what makes their task unnecessarily difficult because of the behaviours/demands of other stakeholders. 3. To agree a work programme to tackle some of the issues.

The main topics which emerge are:

1. lack of understanding of the 'whole system' 2. assumption that only 'they' have problems with staff shortages 3. failure to recognise how changes in one place affect other parts eg increases in sitting days in the court and the pressure this generates 4. separate briefings of scarce specialists 5. unacceptable behaviour of some barristers towards social workers in court  6. repeated request/coyping of the same information 7. re-starting the process when the case reaches court  8. lack of confidence among social workers 9. YES staff shortages/skills, but this is common across the system and there are ways of improving performance which can ameliorate some of the effects of staff shortages."

Mike Lauerman

"The primary cause of delays is the fact that the social worker responsible for taking the care proceedings does not have sufficient credibility. This means that despite the fact she/he will have done everything possible to avoid taking proceedings, the whole process usually has to be gone through again for the benefit of the court."

Deb Harvey

"I am the mother of a daughter, aged seven, who went into care on the 20 February 2003. It was amicably agreed in court, the day before.

I feel that there have only recently been advancements in our case. The main reasons for this are:
a) the lack of a guardian to represent my daughter's interests. The one we have started a month after the case originally went to court.
b) the lack of a psychiatrist that could start work in a reasonable amount of time. The preferred person couldn't begin work until September, the second choice can begin in June, but is having a break in August and not able to give his report until October.

It also hasn't helped that we have had to have a change of social worker as ours has a long term illness.

The period before she went into care was actually very stressful for me and my daughter. Knowing that if she had the slightest mark she would be snatched away into care had a profound effect on both our health and her behaviour in school and at home. Now that she appears to have settled into a foster family her behaviour seems much improved and my daughter is much happier.

It is also really important for social workers to make sure that the relevant reports are sent to solicitors so that they can be discussed before court. On two occasions this has not been done. The initial appearance at court was less than a week after the first documents were faxed to my solicitor. There appeared to be a conspiracy of silence.

A week before court my social worker actually told me that she would have preferred to take her into care before court, but there were no homes available. This would have been very traumatic for both my daughter and myself. I am relieved that it was not possible, and that we could do it in a more amicable manner.

I hope there are some facts here that can help."

Anonymous