Bannister gaps!

[Fakinit03]

So we had our introductory meeting with our stage two social worker the other day and she has sent us the paperwork, one being the safety checks. She said to us there won't be much you need to change as you already have a child. (3.5yr old bs) well it turns out we are not very safe parents! We would definitely fail at the moment on quite a few areas! One being the gaps in or bannister railings on the landing. How have other people dealt with this? Will they accept the safety guards you can buy or will we need to replace the whole thing?

We have just replaced our stair banister as it was below regulation height. This was flagged by our social worker and even in the first meeting prior to stage 1 starting. To be fair, she just suggested we put a handrail on there but we just replaced the whole thing as long term we were planning to anyway. So im sure they will be ok with a guard being in place though if it's just the spacing that's an issue.

Our gaps were about 2cm too wide (at the widest point, each of the upright pieces is curved so goes in and out a bit) according to the H&S checklist - but otherwise they are 'normal' in terms of height etc. This was noted in the initial H&S check (but maybe only because we were being a bit over-zealous with the tape measure!). We did get placed with a child under 2 which is what the restriction related to, but we had a very pragmatic agency and we didn't have to make any changes to the bannisters before placement. They were generally pragmatic on the H&S stuff - we were quite overwhelmed by the list of things that were identified in the initial checklist! So for example for some of the plants in the garden we agreed that supervision of the child/children was appropriate rather than having to remove whole trees! But other agencies/LAs might take a different approach.

We had the same issue. We were going to put Perspex along the stairs over the banisters but we just filled in the gaps with more wood. Both solutions our social worker was happy with

I’d suggest you keep a note of the things you need to change and reload at them when you’re actively thinking about placement because with a specific child in mind you may actually have very little to change. You’ve already raised a child in your home so it’s clearly safe enough. I’d talk through the guideline with your SW and take a pragmatic view particularly about structural changes.

When we adopted the first time our 1890's house banisters weren't even mentioned. The second time they was flagged up as being too wide (even though the first child we adopted was 6 months old when he came home, and it was never an issue.... ).

This came up on ours too as we have horizontal banisters which is easy to climb apparently...
It hasn't been mentioned since but we are thinking of perspex as we can remove it when then are older?
Did anyone else get picked up ok glass in doors potentially not being shatter proof...?

I ended up replacing the whole staircase but it had open treads and wide gaps. I was planning to do that any way - on the day before I applied to adopt I hosted a family party where my cousin's 5 year old daughter was able to swing right out of the staircase and around.

Oh we had this ! Seemed ridiculous as our LO wasn’t even crawling when he came home so there was no chance of him being near the stairs / bannisters. We got a net in the end and our SW was happy with that. It was the most unsightly thing ever but great to take off once the adoption order was approved. I can’t add a link but they are on amazon called balcony and stairway safety net - you just tie it on

@BFJAdopter our SW picked up on glass doors of a cabinet we had. We put a special film over it and the SW was fine about it

We had to replace glass in our greenhouse with plastic.
I don't remember anyone looking at gaps in bannisters!

I wonder if we'll have a problem. Our staircase is enclosed by walls and we dont have any handrails at all as it makes it much harder to move furniture.

We're booked on our information evening on Friday so far away from most of this but I keep thinking if all the things they'll say no to if we do go ahead.

We never got questioned about gaps in the bannisters or glass in one of our doors. We didnt even have stair gates up but showed them the new ones in boxes and said we'd do it. Tbf, we did put the stair gates up during intros and it's been really worthwhile as DD is always trying to go up/down if she gets the chance.

I'm fascinated by the things that get picked up.

An acquaintance of mine who adopted told me that he deliberately made no improvements before the check so that they could then demonstrate that they have made big improvements off the recommendations as they knew people who had done all they could beforehand which meant they got caught out on much more obscure things which were really difficult to deal with.

It seems like a bit of an underhanded way to go about it but it worked for them.

We have the same problem, going up the stairs the gap is fine but across the landing the gap is 1cm too wide

Our SW is very pragmatic and said we could simply put a piece of plywood across the entire length of the landing for now and it would only be temporary. She admitted it's a bit of a box-ticking exercise in most cases and as soon as we have the adoption order we could take it down as SS have no right then to tell us what to do in our own home. I don't think plywood would look great but we'll paint it white so it fits in better and it will be the last thing we do so hopefully won't be up for too long.