News

• Cafcass board told to resign
• Cafcass pleads for more money
• MPs say Cafcass close to disaster

The government has accepted calls by a select committee of the former Lord Chancellor’s department to fundamentally review board membership of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, writes Clare Jerrom.

The announcement follows the resignation of Anthony Hewson this month as chairperson of the Cafcass Board, after three years in the post.

The board was heavily criticised in the committee’s report into the organisation’s performance published in July. The committee recommended changes to the board because it had failed to properly scrutinise management performance.

In its response this week, the government said the review would be carried out promptly and would “then consider what steps are necessary, if any, to help the board work most effectively”.

The Cafcass board responded: “More has been achieved than we have been given credit for, but there remain challenging issues for Cafcass to address”.

The organisation acknowledged that it was currently unable to allocate cases as speedily as it would like in all areas, but stressed that action was being taken, including joint work with the Department for Constitutional Affairs, the Courts Service, social services and the judiciary to address overall delays in the system.

Issues such as a lack of court sitting time, staffing problems in local authorities and the overall management of cases within the court system all contributed to wider delays, the board said.

It warned: “The problem is clear, without an adequate budget, we cannot reduce delays and improve the basic quality of our service”.

Meanwhile, Rob Thomas, chairperson of the National Association of Probation Officers told its annual conference that Cafcass is still experiencing “real problems”.

Accessing information, the lack of a national training strategy for staff and no systematic induction programme are all major problems. In certain areas staff had been instructed to take on 25 per cent more work, he added.

Guardians representative body NAGALRO accused the government and Cafcass of "papering over the cracks" in their response to the committee's report. It said there were continuing delays across the country in allocating guardians to children.

The government's response