Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Kate
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Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Tue Nov 01, 2005 5:38 pm



We care for our baby granddaughter every weekend and have put in writing to social services that we would, if it were ever needed, care for her fulltime. Our eighteen year old daughter has ADHD, probably mental health issues, functions at a very young-adolescent level and will not seek or accept the support she needs. She chooses to mix with peers who aren't positive for her or the baby and concerns about her capacity to care for her daughter date back to a referral to SS by the hospital midwives.

She is in her second mother and baby home now: the first one put in place the biggest raft of support plans they had ever done with any resident, but our daughter would not work with them and ultimately lost her place. We had a lot of liaison with the first hostel, but none with this one and I've stopped calling unless there is something very specific to ask about or communicate with them. They have a higher ratio of mothers and babies to workers, and workers are often young and seem less professional than at the first. Our daughter is happier at this one though - she prefers not to have to give account of herself and not to have support plans and targets.

Soon after moving into the current hostel, she had a pan fire in her room while our granddaughter was in there alone (daughter was off chatting to another resident which she does a lot) That was a huge incident at the hostel - evacuation, fire brigade, paramedics, and our granddaughter had to go to hospital to be checked for smoke inhalation. When, a few weeks later, Child Protection became involved as a result of an unrelated concern on my part, the CP worker said she could not understand why the hostel hadn't referred this to them because she had heard "a catalogue of concerns and incidents" from hostel staff relating to our daughter's care of our granddaughter.

Having investigated, CP referred the case on to a longterm team, who referred it for assessment by family support workers (FSWs) The case had literally just been allocated when the hostel contacted SS because our granddaughter had an unexplained cut. That was investigated and believed to be likely to be caused by a razor, but was logged as probably accidental in the absence of any other information. Two weeks later, she had an extremely nasty cigarette burn on the back of her hand. That was not investigated: the primary FSW, who is very on the ball, was on leave, and her colleague accepted our daughter's explanation. I've no idea how the burn happened but I didn't believe the explanation our daughter gave.

SS originally planned to assess for six weeks, then it went to eight weeks, finally a week or two longer. It's been quite intensive: two workers have been visiting twice weekly. In the past fortnight they changed from two scheduled visits to one scheduled and one impromptu -the latter seems an excellent idea to me. SS also obtained a place for the baby two days a week in the nursery adjoing the mother and baby home where they both live. The nursery is assessing our granddaughter as well as offering her a stable routine and I imagine providing positive attention/stimulation for those two days a week.

Yesterday SS held their second review. I was originally told by the FSW manager that I would be invited to any inter-agency meetings/reviews but this hadn't happened, so I asked the primary FSW why this was. She told me it was because our daughter had not wanted it and she had also vetoed our seeing a copy of this worker's report to the review, which was very frustrating to my husband and me.

Typically, once our daughter had left the review yesterday, the first thing she did was ring me from the FSW's car, as she was given a lift home. She asked me to call her back later, which I did. She then sought sympathy and support from me for all she had been through in the meeting, which is par for the course! I was very softly-softly yesterday - I learned a bit more that way! My husband and I feel very frustrated that she refuses to allow us access to any information relating to the welfare of our granddaughter, when we are involved in her care to the extent that the CP worker referred to us as "significant carers" and the FSW told me her report contained the recommendation that our granddaughter continue to come to us at weekends. She told me this was accepted by all present at the review. We have also put in writing to SS that we would wish to care for our granddaughter full time if for any reason our daughter was unable to do so herself. (I record everything too - I now take notes of every phone call with everyone related to our granddaughter's care.)

There were three possible outcomes of the review:

(1) to close the case

(2) to continue with FSWs visiting and assessing

(3) to refer back to Child Protection for referral to a long term team.

The decision was taken to continue with the FSWs visiting/assessing for another eight weeks. This seems a good outcome to us as the involvement and supervision is more intensive than a field worker could give - if anyone feels differently from their own experience, I'd be interested to have any feedback.

Our daughter told me yesterday that someone was going to be looking at the Chronology to decide whether or not our granddaughter should be on the Child Protection Register. The FSW confirmed this - although she can't pass on information, she will confirm things told me by our daughter, which is useful as our daughter chronically lies, misperceives and/or misinterprets and is adept at distorting information for her own purposes. So a great deal of what she says has to be taken on a "might be true, might not be" basis.

I'm wondering if anyone here can tell me what would be likely to be the basis for the decision which was taken, ie to prolong the FSW involvement for eight more weeks? I haven't asked the FSW as I know an explanation would most likely involve her having to give me information from the report and/or the review which she can't give. She's extremely helpful and understands the frustration I and my husband feel at being excluded, but her hands are tied by confidentiality and our daughter's right to decide who sees the report. I have, however, requested that we be allowed to see anything in the report which refers to our involvement with/care of our granddaughter and the FSW is going to ask her manager if she can post this to us.

If anyone can cast any light on the likely reason/s for extending the FSW assessment, based on the information I have shared here? Any other comments or feedback would be welcome too. Thanks.

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Robin D
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Joined: Sat Aug 21, 2004 1:58 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Robin D » Wed Nov 02, 2005 9:05 am

Hi Kate and welcome.

The rationale behind extending assessments is often not obvious, but I think is generally because the professional feel they still have insufficient evidence to make a decision.

It certainly appears as though there is cause for concern, but is there enough to satisfy the criteria for registration on the child protection register? It's impossible to tell that without having been at the meeting.

One way to get around this might be to suggest a Family Group Conference before any final decision on registration. In that way, you as family with a significant input would have to be involved.

Good luck ...... Robin

Grandparent carer in Suffolk [:)]
Former F&F carer, foster carer, adopter and respite carer for umpteen children. Now retired and when with kids, making sure they 'go home' at the end of the day.

Kate
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Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Wed Nov 02, 2005 1:37 pm


>One way to get around this might be to suggest a Family Group Conference before any final decision on registration. In that way, you as family with a significant input would have to be involved.<


Many thanks for your response, Robin. I hadn't heard of Family Group Conferences. That sounds a good idea. Can you tell me a little more about them?


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Robin D
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Joined: Sat Aug 21, 2004 1:58 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Robin D » Wed Nov 02, 2005 2:40 pm

Kate.

If you look at http://www.frg.org.uk/FGC/FGC.asp it gives you a lot of information. Note that many LA still do not use them, and also circumstances could preclude in your case, but it doesn't hurt to get the LA to consider it. [;)]

There are lots of other links on the left of that page to more information.

If you are still left with questions, please post back.

best wishes ...... Robin

Grandparent carer in Suffolk [:)]
Former F&F carer, foster carer, adopter and respite carer for umpteen children. Now retired and when with kids, making sure they 'go home' at the end of the day.

Kate
Posts: 2444
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Fri Nov 04, 2005 1:58 am

Many thanks for the link, Robin. The info's very useful and I rang FRG too, and found that a great help. I'm going to mention the idea of an FGC to the family support worker. I'm sure our daughter wouldn't be at all happy if it came from us so it would probably be self-defeating at this point. But if SS decided on it, I think she'd go along with it. So we'll see ..

Kate
Posts: 2444
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Tue Nov 15, 2005 1:50 am

Just an update.

Our granddaughter had a shallow cut on the back of her thigh when she came to us the weekend before last. Four of us (family) saw it and were concerned about it, believing it to be a razor cut. It was totally straight and appeared to have been cleverly placed between the fold of the back of the knee and a baby-fat crease just above the knee. She previously had an unexplained cut on her leg, referred to SS by staff at the mother and baby home, which SS investigated. At that point I was kept informed (mainly because the worker rang me to try to locate our daughter and baby so she could visit) I was told it was probably caused by a razor. SS were given no explanation for the cut, and finally logged it as probably accidental.

As a family we agreed this recent cut should be referred and on the Monday I did so, asking for it to be logged as anonymous to avoid a showdown with our daughter.

The primary worker was on leave and her colleague visited our granddaughter in the nursery, then visited our daughter. I can't fault SS on that - the aim was only to have this logged on file so it would go on the Chronology. The cut was healing over the weekend and was unlikely to be easy to identify two days later, when it was seen by the SS worker. However, we weren't happy that this worker said she had no cause for concern, especially as she did the same with an extremely nasty cigarette burn which I referred to her, the primary worker being on leave then too. A more appropriate response re this recent cut would I think have been to say that it was not possible to identify the scar as it was so faded, but that the referral had been logged. I have now spoken to the primary worker and told her we were satisfied that SS did all they could, but that we would like it to be logged that we as a family remain concerned about the cut.

One other thing for now: we are still out of the loop regarding information, due to our daughter not wanting me at the reviews and refusing to let us see the reports. I asked the primary worker two weeks ago if my husband and I could be told what was in the report that referred to ourselves. She had for exampl told me she had recommended in the report that we continue to have our granddaughter at weekends, and that that had been accepted by everyone present. She said she didn't see any reason that she couldn't extract any parts referring to ourselves from her report and mail it to us, but would clear it with her manager.

I queried this with her today and she said her manager had said there was nothing of significance in the report about us, and that it would be inappropriate for us to see it. I have the FRG Section 5 information sheets here (Access to social services records) but don't think the information in it applies to us but to those who are the subject of reports, files etc? We find it unacceptable that we can't see data, however little, relating to ourselves, when we are not even SS clients but are involved in caring for the baby on whose behalf they are working. If it's in the report that the worker believes it's in our granddaughter's interests for us to care for her at weekends, we would like to read this for ourselves. Can anyone advise?



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Robin D
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Joined: Sat Aug 21, 2004 1:58 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Robin D » Tue Nov 15, 2005 10:18 am

The best bet is to call the advice line and ask their view of the legal position. If they think you have a right to see it, they will if requested draft you a letter to send to Social Services.

Robin

Grandparent carer in Suffolk [:)]
Former F&F carer, foster carer, adopter and respite carer for umpteen children. Now retired and when with kids, making sure they 'go home' at the end of the day.

Kate
Posts: 2444
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Tue Nov 15, 2005 2:25 pm

Many thanks Robin. I called the advice line and it was a great help. The worker advised that we should put in writing to the SS manager that we want to see anything that refers to us on the file. This would include anything in the recent report to the review. She told me we are entitled to this.

jscadden
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Joined: Tue Jun 22, 2004 10:16 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by jscadden » Sun Nov 20, 2005 1:53 am

Under the Data Protection Act, you have a right to see any information referring to yourselves as long as you request it under that act. Should they refuse, you can ask the Data Protection Office to intervene. They would then be required to give specific reasons why they had witheld the information.

It may be that that is what the SS are waiting for to cover themselves under the act.

John
John

Kate
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Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:33 pm

Re: Review yesterday re our daughter/granddaughter

Post by Kate » Sun Nov 20, 2005 2:42 am

>Under the Data Protection Act, you have a right to see any information referring to yourselves as long as you request it under that act. Should they refuse, you can ask the Data Protection Office to intervene. They would then be required to give specific reasons why they had witheld the information.<

Thanks a lot for this information, John.

>It may be that that is what the SS are waiting for to cover themselves under the act.<

I'm not sure what you mean by this, could you explain? Thanks again.

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