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Guardians have warned that cost-cutting measures to keep them out of court and reduce their role in private law cases will harm the representation of vulnerable children.

Professional association Nagalro condemned the moves by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service and the family division of the High Court at its spring conference this week.

It passed a resolution rejecting calls by Cafcass chief executive Anthony Douglas and family division president Elizabeth Butler-Sloss in a memo last week for judges to minimise Cafcass practitioners' "unnecessary attendance" in court.


The move is designed to free up staff for other work, but chair of Nagalro Alison Paddle said there was no way of knowing in advance which court sessions guardians could afford not to attend.

"The child [will lose] the person who stands for them," Paddle said. "We are very unhappy that people who should be really concerned with children's rights are diminishing the capacity of practitioners to actually protect children."

There was also condemnation of a Butler-Sloss ruling last month. She ruled that, from this April, district judges will not be permitted to appoint guardians under rule 9.5 of the family proceedings rules 1991, which covers sensitive or complex private law cases.

There has been an explosion in cases under rule 9.5 over the past year, and the interim measure is designed to reduce "an intolerable strain on an already overstretched Cafcass" and reduce pressures on the legal aid budget.


Under the ruling, district judges would have to transfer cases to circuit colleagues if they believed a guardian should be appointed.
But, stressing that there was no evidence that district judges were making rule 9.5 appointments unnecessarily, Paddle said: "There is no recognition of those children who will need a 9.5 guardian and will not get it under this system."

Lamorna Wooderson, a corporate director at Cafcass, said the move was not designed to prevent children getting necessary representation but to ensure appointments were only made when absolutely necessary.

"It is too early to predict whether number of appointments will change," she said. "But if demand remains high, then all partiesÉ will need to adjust resource commitments accordingly."