Family Rights Group | Kinship carers’ Forum

Hi
I have 2 of my grandchildren in my care(sgo) and their sibling is with his paternal grandparents.(sgo) When we were awarded the sgo in the support plan it said for the siblings to be able to see one another at least six times a year. We usually meet up in a play centre. This has been working ok until recently. The siblings have nt seen one another now for 5 months. Each time I ve asked the paternal grandmother about them seeing one another it's either been cancelled due to illness or they might be going on holiday. Contact was all arranged for 24th September at 9.30am and at 8.00am I got a text message to say that sibling and paternal grandmother had been sick in the night so they needed to cancel. I understand that people get poorly but feel that 5 months for the siblings not to see one another is a long time. Any advice on this would be appreciated. I don't want to cause any trouble or I'll feeling between us as I think it's important for the siblings to see each other. I have messaged to say when is the next convenient time for us all to meet and we ve had a message saying this Saturday usual time up to now.

Hi Thanks for your reply. We all meet up at the play centre together my husband, myself and our two grandchildren and the paternal grandparents with our other grandchild. We all seem to get on when we meet but takes a lot of hard work to get this to happen. In the school holidays I suggested for myself, paternal grandmother to meet up in the local park with the three children if they were finding it difficult to do the contact at weekends I also supervise along with the paternal grandmother the contact between bm ( my daughter) and our grandchild that's living with paternal grandparents. We don't seem to have any problems with this but not sure whether there was a cao put into place by the courts.

Dear Millie

Welcome back to the Family and Friends Carers Forum.

I am sorry that you are finding it difficult for your grandchildren to maintain contact with their sibling.

You have had a good supportive response from ied53 already.

I would just like to add that if you continue having difficulties with the contact, it is possible, because you have a special guardianship order to ask for assistance from children services. There is statutory guidance for local authorities in relation to special guardianship for the provision of support services which include ‘assistance in relation to contact between the child and their parents or other relatives’. Children services should be able to tell you what support they can offer and this can include mediation to resolve issues relating to contact.

As a last resort, it is possible to make an application to the court for a child arrangement order. You can consider whether to get legal advice about how an application could be made on behalf of your grandchildren and also yourself as a grandparent for a child arrangement order for contact.

I hope you find this helpful.

Best wishes

Suzie

Hi Suzy
Thanks for your reply. We had contact today , all went well. The paternal grandparents have said that they won't leave it so long again. Do hopefully problem resolved.