Contact suspended until after final hearing.

[charmed1]

Really need some advice. I am seeing my solicitor Wednesday but I am worried. Final hearing is scheduled for the19th and 20th December. It has dragged out since end of January so no guarantee it will end there. The social worker told the carer in front of my husband and I that there is no contact arranged after the 17th December as she's waiting for outcome at court. This is week before Christmas. Their care plan is adoption with reduced contact. We currently have two 1 hour sessions a week. This has been extended to 2 hours in the holidays. We have had two sessions cancelled after contact should have started. The first being the contact straight after children were removed so you can imagine we are very concerned we won't see them over Christmas. They are 4 and 6. Our 6 year has learning disability.
Is it procedure for the social worker to in fact "suspend" our contact like this? Paternal grandmother has been given contact in our place on the second contact of the week as we aren't likely to be back from court in time. That being the 19th December. We want to spend quality time with our children, give them presents and everything we can to make it special for them. We can't if she won't give us dates and times. We always leave the children saying we will see you Tuesday/Thursday depending. We can't do that if we don't know. The carer asked for dates as they need to know when the kids need to be available for contact too. Is social worker doing this off her own back as she looks to have forgotten who is important here and that's the children. Any advice is welcomed. Thank you.

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear Charmed1

In terms of good practice, it would be reasonable to ask the social worker for a provisional contact plan to cover the period immediately leading up to and after the school holiday period.

This way, all parties can be clear what is being planned, and the children can be aware of who and when they will be spending time with over the holiday period.

I see this as the best way forward, so the children, in particular are not left hanging about key aspects of the care plan.

In the event these plans are changed by the court, at the final hearing then appropriate arrangements for contact can be made.

I hope that helps.

Best Wishes


Suzie

[charmed1]

Thank you Suzie. Unfortunately the social worker's response to an email asking her to reconsider her position has been ignored. She chose only to respond to another query I had in the same message. She didn't even go as far to acknowledge that she had fully read my email. I will be seeing my solicitor Wednesday. Thank you again.

[ange301126]

dear charmed, when there is a care-order (interim or full) , I believe the local authority shares parental responsibility for your children with you. By the terms of the care-order BEFORE not AFTER any decisions regarding the welfare of your children are taken ,issues should be discussed with parents.That is the correct procedure and it applies to contact decisions.You should be allowed input to decisions along with the social worker. Usually if parents and the social worker disagree after a fair discussion , the Local Authority has the final say.That is the LAW which is in force. Decisions are expected to be joint ones and made in the paramount interests of the children involved.
In the real world I am afraid social workers often flout the law and the care-orders issued by the court. Once they have the children at their mercy in care you are more or less at their mercy too and they appear to do what they want. Unless you have the right type of support such as the FRG who will tell you what your rights are and advise you what to do if you don't get them,you are powerless.So I advise you to stay in close touch with the FRG. Do not give up on your children yet even if the final hearing decides on adoption.
Of course,you know your children best and you will know how much their emotional stability will be affected by the decision. They will miss Christmas with you and will have to go without presents.
They are likely to get very little love or festive spirit as foster children.The care system can never replace the love of natural parents.
The FRG may advise you that you have a right to complain under the official procedures.
Unfortunately ,the complaints procedures take a long time and it will be too late as regards this Christmas contact.Next Christmas may well have come and gone by the time the process is complete.If you want to change the decision in time for this Christmas, may I suggest that you get your solicitor to contact the Guardian with the complaint. She may get it changed especially if the social worker has failed to discuss it with her either! Clearly the social worker did not discuss the issue before making her decision with you as she should have done by law.She knows full well she should have discussed it with you but ,of course,she also knows you can't do anything about it .I am sorry you have difficulty with this but it is common (spanish) practice for them to behave illicitly like this.
Alas,the Local Authority make inhumane decisions which are in fact mental cruelty to children and parents.

These decisions are not in the paramount interests of children but in their own and foster-carers .
In our case ,the children were so disturbed they both developed epilepsy in care which can be ascribed to severe emotional disturbance at their hands. Our son developed behavioural difficulties he did not have before and our daughter began to have tantrums lasting several hours and started to self-harm. None of these behaviours occurred before the children went into care.

My case is similar to yours in that one of the children has special needs ( autism). When her behaviours deteriorated radically in care and she started to self-harm, rather than admit it occurred in their care ,the social workers ascribed it to the autism ( without an expert opinion).
Just watch out for emotional disturbance in your children in care and make sure they do not put it down to YOUR care of the children.THEY HAVE FAILED TO TAKE DECISIONS CORRECTLY NOT YOU OR YOUR HUSBAND.

[charmed1]

Thank you so much ange. So much of what you said rings true. Our little 4 year old developed a patch of dry skin at the top of his leg a month or so before they were taken from us. I was dragged over hot coals even though I had put sudocrem on it. Now the poor little might has severe dry hands to the point of bleeding we have seen at a recent contact. Now thankfully after making a fuss he has GP prescribed emollient for them. His Dad suffers with eczema and he may have inherited it. His "anxiety" states the social worker due to "regression" from the neglect he suffered while in our care. Our daughter's global development delay is also caused by our parenting. Her behaviour too has been up and down but again we are the cause of course as always. Awaiting the result of her genetic test is torture. Having been blamed for her delay all these years it has taken until now for their arm to be twisted by both our barristers and the guardian to get the genetic testing carried out.

The social worker has made no attempt before or since to discuss contact. The appointment with my solicitor has been rearranged for Friday so I have time to make more notes. Thank you for your reference to the Guardian. I will be sure to raise that with the solicitor. I am strong and will fight this hard.

[ange301126]

dear charmed, I'd just like to mention something else as our cases are similar.Do your best to prevent them getting away with their own false diagnoses. My girl had special needs and had a statement for it which said she had moderate global development delay.The social worker refused to make correct enquiries with us or anyone else and wrote in the so-called core assessment that she ' had severe learning difficulties' for which she had a special needs statement. Totally untrue. I found out after the case( too late) that he had received a letter from my daughter's consultant paediatrician particularly informing him that our daughter did not have learning difficulties rather that she had special educational needs due to her autism.Therefore what the social worker wrote was false and whatsmore if he read the letter he must have known it was.
Later the lawyers had to compile a document entitled 'Summary of Facts and Matters to Satisfy the Threshold Criteria.'
I suppose they consulted the core assessment first because they stated as number one on the list that our daughter had severe learning difficulties for which she had a special needs statement. The clear implication was that it was our neglect.
The important thing is that we demanded that as she was autistic she should have a specialist paediatric assessment and the Judge commissioned one.It stated that none of her symptoms or condition could be put down to parental neglect.

Beware the social workers may also state falsely as they did with us that our two children had improved dramatically in care when the opposite was true. They deteriorated badly as I have already told you.When I pointed it out the judge stated that she preferred the social worker evidence to mine! After the case( too late again) I found medical assessments stating that our son became seriously disturbed 'since being in care' and other contradictory material evidence which they conveniently forgot to mention.

CHARMED,DO NOT GIVE UP. warthhog, a mother on these boards ( see getting your voice heard') recently had an adoption reversed at the placement order hearing. Read the latter part of her lengthy thread and you will be cheered up.You must have someone who will point out falsehoods in the placement order application.

[charmed1]

Dear ange. Omg how many similarities can there be here? My daughter finally got onto the children's disability register in august this year even though they are in the same building as the social worker. Her "Primary Disability" is communication difficulty. "Other Disabilities/Diagnosis" is learning difficulty/disability and development delay. She has been statemented since May 2011. Took that long to put her name on the register. No help to us as she was removed end of May this year. The then social worker didn't even support my daughter when her case went to panel. They are in denial that it could be anyone else except us that caused her delay. Our little boy is meeting his targets though he went to speech and language therapy because they were convinced same parents had to be same issue with him. He was discharged end of 2011! His reception teacher stated in his PEP meeting recently that he has no delay but the social worker kept pushing. The genetic testing I hope opens a can of worms as both children will also have had a full paediatric assessment as the LA have been relying on a skeleton one for both children up until now. I have read Warthhog's thread and I can't believe what they try and get away with. It does give me hope and I will make sure my solicitor knows that I want to see all reports, blood, paediatric, everything even contact notes.

[charmed1]

Just to update. My solicitor chased the LA about my daughter's genetic test results and they do not appear to know what she is talking about! We have been given an hour contact on the 23rd December (a goodwill gesture it appears) by the social worker then nothing until the 6th January 2014. No doubt when she is back from her holiday. No one else can manage the contact by looks of it as she has also requested to change team to remain involved with them.

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear Charmed1

You have probably had your meeting with your solictior by now. I hope this went well.
It sounds as if they have a good grasp of the complex issues involved in your case, so will be in a good position to provide you with the best possible legal advice at this time. Therefore, try to work closely with them, and keep them aware of any new developments.

I am not sure what the Independent Reviewing Officer and Children's Guardian's view is, but along with yourself, they should be consulted about any significant changes to the care plan, outside the Looked After Review.

This meeting can be brought forward so any key decisions are formally noted, and agreed . If there is not one due, a separate meeting should be held between you and all the key parties so that your views and opinions can be shared.

It is important that you ask for an updated copy of the care plan if you do not have one already.

I hope this helps


Suzie

[charmed1]

Thanks Suzie. This is the problem, the care plan has remained the same. Adoption for both children. The social worker is rigid and refuses to change the plan in light of our changes. She has even blamed us for our son's dry skin and light sensitivity. Putting it down to anxiety fro our parenting. There is a LAC review on the 21st January. There are seven points my solicitor is asking the LA for even at this late stage. She is up to date on everything so I hope to hear something very soon.