sgo

[kylawendy]

just wondering if any 1 can help ive had my granddaughter nearly 2 yrs shes 2 an half altho she has lived with me since she was 8wks old with her parents till she was 3 mths then just with her dad an we both had parental responsibility but her mum hasnt bothered to see her since sept 09 her 1st birthday and her dad hasnt seen her 4 the yr the thing is i need to get her registered 4 nursery can i do it thanks 4 any replys x

[Kate]

Hi and welcome to the forum [:)] Do you still have parental responsibility? I'm just wondering what happened when we registered our granddaughter for nursery. She came to us aged 13 months and I got her a local nursery place within two weeks. I'm pretty sure her mother didn't have to sign anything and we didn't have PR at the time - we got a residence order 5 months later.

Are you receiving Child Benefit for her? I would hope so because if not, you are entitled to it given the time she has been living with you. I think it would help to have the paperwork confirming you get the Child Benefit, to show to nursery if so. I'm sure you'll get some more replies, but if you need the information quickly you could call the FRG helpline.

You titled this SGO so presumably you want to get an application for an SGO in motion? It sounds as if this would be a good thing, given that both parents are so out of touch. Have you had any contact with social services or has the arrangement that you care for your granddaughter been just between you and the parents? If social services are involved, would they support an SGO application?

[kylawendy]

thank u yes i have a residence order the babys mum hasnt seen her in 18ths an her dad my son is in jail an looking at a 3 yr sentence who hasnt seen her 4 a yr so i was thinking about going 4 an sgo my gd came to me on a section 20 an was on the at risk reg the babys mum has had another baby which she is allowed to keep not related to me just wondered wer i stood really thanks 4 ur replys x

[Kate]

kylawendy I'll be interested to see any replies about going from an RO to an SGO. We will have had our RO for 5 years this summer, and intended to apply for an SGO once we'd had the RO a couple of years, to provide greater security for her. The most important part would be being able to name our son as her guardian in the event of our deaths or incapacity to care for her. We've not done it because we haven't been able to face starting the whole stressful process, and having to convince our daughter that this was for the best (she does see g/d regularly but has never done anything about trying to make it possible to have her back)

I hope you are successful with it. Good luck [:)]

[kylawendy]

i wish i cud say the same about my son an gd mum they havnt had any contact dad coming on a yr an mum 18 mths an like u said i need something with a bit more security 4 gd as im not getting any younger lol dads in jail an mum i havnt got a clue wer she lives an if an emergency does occur do we all have to b contacted to agree im just confused to b fair its been great no drama 4 nearly 2 yrs but then the picture gets bigger wer comig up 4 nursery an i have to put on the form all the people who have pr does that mean any 1 can just come an get her thanks 4 all ur help i do really appreciate it x

[Help 1870]

How would the parents feel about you applying for an SGO?

At the moment they seem to be pretty much absent, once you begin the process for SGO they will need to be tracked down to serve the papers and to get their views/agreement. Is that likely to fire them up to start making demands in respect of contact/residence? You could find yourself thrown back into a number of battles so think carefully.

If the RO is working and you are not getting any interferance maybe it would be best leaving it alone. Yes the parents should be consulted but thats difficult to do if they cant be contacted. Only one person with PR needs to sign for anything. As long as you have the order with you as proof of PR you should be ok.

[sonny1966]

Hi,
Just because you have to give the details of others with PR on the forms, it doesn't mean that they can go to the nursery and "get" your GD.
When I registered our LO for Playgroup, I put the names of her Mum & Dad on the forms and stated that we had no contact details for them. I also made a note that thay were not allowed unsupervised contact and that if anyone other than me or my husband ever turned up to collect her, the staff must phone us!!
They also have a photocopy of our SGO in her file, just in case any questions regarding PR arise.

Mumof5

[Kate]

Sonny is right. Our g/d's nursery knew that her mum (our daughter) could not just turn up and pick her up. In the early months after g/d came to live with us her mum would come over sometimes and pick her up with me, but one time when she arrived a bit early, the nursery wouldn't let her in until I arrived.

Only named people who had a password known to nursery could collect g/d, which was ourselves (grandparents) and our son and his girlfriend. Our son was quite cross one day when the nursery manager called me to check it was ok that he'd arrived to pick up g/d, but he hadn't been for a while so they were being extra careful. There should be a similar system in all nurseries I would think.

[Kate]

Kylawendy, I agree with Help in the sense of "if it ain't broke, why fix it?" That's why we have stuck with the RO, which our daughter signed consent to and now takes for granted, rather than go for an SGO with all the stress involved, including as Help says the possibility of rocking the boat with the parents. BUT the real concern is what happens to the child if those with the RO become incapacitated or die, and I do worry that we're letting our g/d down by not trying to make provision for this.

I wonder if others with an RO here have been able to resolve the issue of future provision for the child if anything happens to them? Is there any agreement within a family for other relatives to take on caring for the child, which would be acceptable to the authorities? I'm not sure there is anything which would stand up in law with an RO.

[Nana]

Even with an SGO and naming a Guardian in the event of our deaths isn't as straight forward as it seems....this is a question that I have raised previously. When we die whatever order we have dies with us which means PR would fall back to birth parents and so any potential testementary guardian could welll find themselves having to go to Court to gain PR themselves....it could potentialy open a can of worms if the 'parents' wanted to rock the boat so to speak!