Contact

[CL0526]

Hello I have 2 children in care I haven’t seen my daughter for 3 years and get 1 hour with my son in the community however my contact was stopped in April saying he had a nightmare about his dad (who he doesn’t see) what are my rights please. I’ve emailed sw but had no response thanks

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear CL0526,

Welcome to the parents’ forum and thank you for your post. My name is Suzie and I am the online adviser here at Family Rights Group. I hope that the following advice and information is helpful to you. You can click on the links to take you to more information on our website.

I am sorry to hear that you have not seen your daughter for three years, and that your contact with your son was stopped recently. You say that you have emailed the social worker about this but haven’t heard anything back.

Regarding the contact with your son which has recently been stopped I would suggest that you do the following:

1) Email/call the independent reviewing officer (IRO) and ask to discuss this with them. There should be a looked after child review meeting to discuss the change in contact arrangements with your son. You should be invited to attend this and share your views. The IRO is responsible for overseeing your children’s care plans (which includes their contact they have with you) so they should be aware of the change to your son’s contact sessions and they should discuss this with you.

2) As well as speaking with the IRO I would suggest that you email/call the social worker and their manager and ask to discuss this with them. You should ask them to explain why the contact was stopped, and to discuss with you what the plan is going forward.

3) If you don’t have the email addresses or phone numbers for the manager or the IRO then you can call the main number for children’s services in your area and ask them to share these with you.

4) If you are unable to get hold of the social worker, manager or IRO then you could make a formal complaint via the complaints team. This will get sent to the social worker’s manager and they will have 10 working days to respond to you. We have advice and information about making formal complaints HERE.


I am sorry to hear it has been such a long time since you have seen your daughter. If you would like contact to re-start then it would be best to have a conversation with the IRO and the social worker about this. If your daughter is willing to have some contact with you then the IRO and social worker should discuss this with you and with your daughter and then come up with a plan. It is likely that any contact would start off as indirect contact (for example letters or text messages, and then if it goes well it may progress to phone calls or face to face contact). You don’t say how old your daughter is, but her wishes and feelings will be very important and children’s services cannot ‘force’ her into agreeing to contact if she does not wish to have any.

If you are unhappy with the level of contact that children’s services are offering for both or either of your children (and you have followed the advice above) then it is possible to apply to court for a section 34 contact order. This is a court order which says how much contact a child should have with an adult. Under section 34 of the Children Act 1989, children’s services must allow a child to have ‘reasonable contact’ with their parents. If you feel that the contact that children’s services are allowing is not reasonable, and you have tried to discuss with the IRO, social worker and the manager, and have made a formal complaint but are still unhappy, then you may wish to make an application for a section 34 contact order.

We have advice and information on our website HERE about contact when children are in care under a court order. This may be helpful for you to read through when you have some time.

I hope that you have some emotional support as being separated from your children may be very difficult for you. If it is helpful you can contact MATCH MOTHERS who offer non-judgemental support to mothers who are living apart from their children. You can call them for free on 0800 689 4104.


I hope that this is helpful. Please post again if you have any further queries or you can call our free, confidential adviceline on 0808 801 0366 (Monday to Friday, 9:30am – 3pm). We also have a webchat which is currently open on Monday and Thursday afternoons.

Best wishes,
Suzie