Yesterday judges in the Appeal Court stood up for social workers throwing out a mother's claim that she was denied a fair hearing before her disabled daughter was put up for adoption by Nottingham City Council. The mother said that she had been let down by the council and the "secretive" family justice system. She was backed by Birmingham MP John Hemming but Lord Justice Wall, sitting with Lord Justice Thorpe, said the family justice system was frequently accused of secrecy, corruption and malpractice but this case "offered an opportunity to demonstrate just how ill-informed those criticisims can be."

I may be being cynical but I think it is unusual for the courts to stand up for social workers so strongly (and if they do you oftern don't hear about it due to the family courts being conducted behind closed doors) and thought I would alert people to this as it is quite reassuring.

Note that the mother has not had an opportunity as yet to put her side of the story in court.

Erm.....how do you know that? 

Yes I agree it's very unusual for a Judge to make such a statement, therefore, the mother's voice has surely already been heard?

In addition, this was an Appeal Court I understand?  Therefore, 40+ weeks of care proceedings would have gone before the appeal; surely sufficient time for the mother to have a fair hearing?

I'm sorry, but in all of the care proceedings I have ever been involved with, parents are always party to them and ex-parte applications are extremely rare.

Yes it was the appeal court so I reckon you are correct.

Hi Aimes,

Thanks for that, no doubt that there will be some counter 'evidence' posted on here soon, proabaly by a certain MP which will 'prove' that the mother got a raw deal.  Do people honestly believe that parents aren't involved in care proceedings at all??!

I think (but may be wrong), t6hat the issue was that the Official Solicitor did not put forward the client's viewpoint.

It's shocking to hear a Judge say anything to Social Workers, in my experience we are often part of the decoration, just there, sometimes looked at but not seen as much use.

 The solicitors take over the whole process, don't read the Local Authority  Core Assessment apart from to say it is  baised and can they have an "Independent Social Worker to complete another.  I don't think that many solicitors actually get what we write about.

Can they have a Psychologists report, further assessment..... and so on.

 It is all very distasteful, In my expereince parents do "get there say" and it is often at the detrement of the child/ young person as they wait for plans for their lives.

Judges need to work in Social Work Offices for a day at least  to understand what we do, maybe they could be seen as decoration.

Julie

I have met social workers who say they regularly experience parents' solicitors successfully persuading the courts to agree to assessments being redone by independent social workers at great cost to the council and the tax payer. I have also heard social workers say they feel that the courts see them as below the children's guardian and any experts even though the latter may have only met the child once.

Your idea about judges spending a day in social work offices is inteteresting and I don't think would be a bad thing.

Judges need to be independent and social workers reports need to be clearly evidence-based, comprehensive and demonstrate a clear and in-depth understanding of the issues.

 I have encountered far more problems with Magistrates than Judges - and especially High Court Judges. Judges are right to be hard on local authorities when required - often social workers reports are not comprehensive and detailed enough.

Whilst the current adversarial system remains we will have to put up with what we think are, at times, unfair criticisms and defending Barristers will try every 'trick' they know to defer matters and one way is certainly trying to discredit local authroity social workers and call for independent reports. We need to reclaim our professionalism but we need to demonstrate that we are credible, experienced, reliable and do the tasks required of us in detail.