Special guardianship order advice needed asap plz

[Becky]

My children live with my mother under a special guardianship order as a parent what are my rights to contact can i take my children out with out supervision like swimming the order was made in 2012 and social services are no longer involved i really want to spend sum quality time with my children they werent removed out of my care bcoz of me please help

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear Becky,

Welcome to the parents forum.

I can see that your mother has special guardianship orders in respect of your children. These orders will last until your children are 18 unless a court revokes the orders.

A special guardianship order gives your mother “enhanced” parental responsibility.

This means that unless there is a court order saying different, she can make most of the important decisions about your children (such as schooling, health and how much contact they have with you) without needing to agree anything with you or dad. Children services will not have any legal parental responsibility so it is very likely that their case is closed.

Your contact with your children

You do not say whether you have any contact at the moment.

“Contact” could include:
"Direct" contact-seeing your children face to face or by telephone or media. THis could be supervised by your mum or someone else.
"Indirect"-not face to face but via letters, cards or presents.

Is there any court order stating what contact you have?

If so, you should remind your mum about this. If she was in breach of the court order, you could consider going back to court.



If there is no court order and contact is up to what your mum thinks best then you could discuss your wishes for contact directly with her.

If she is against contact or does not want to discuss any changes then you could seek the help of children services.

For example you could ask that children services help mediate a solution or provide support to help contact to take place. (For example, travel costs and costs of a contact centre).

If your children had been “looked after”-in the care of children services under a care order or interim care order or accommodated (section 20 Children Act 1989) they MUST carry out an assessment for support if you ask them for this.

If your children were not looked after by childrens services, they “may” carry out an assessment for support. They do not have to.
However, if you do not agree with any decision they make you can challenge them.
Have a look at our advice sheet 20 Special guardianship orders.

If your mum does not agree with contact, you also have the option of going back to court and asking them to make a contact order. First, you and your mum would be asked to attend a mediation appointment to see if you could agree a plan for contact.
If this was not successful, then you could ask a court to make a decision. Clearly as things are very different for you now, the court would want an assessment to be carried out by CAFCASS or children services to look at these changes in your life and decide what is in the best interests of your children.
I hope this helps but if you have any questions or want further advice, please post back or contact our advice line for in-depth advice.

Best wishes,
Suzie