Maypole I know it looks as though sws "pander" to parents but that isn't really the case. The law requires social workers to work "in partnership" with service users, and that includes birth parents. All social workers know that they must be able to prove to the court that they have done all in their power to attempt reunification between the child and birth parents. This is the reason for the lengthy assessments of birth parents. It is the same with contact - they have to prove that they have given the birth parent every opportunity to have contact with their children.
Birth parents are represented by their own lawyer in court (which is fair enough) but these lawyers will pick on anything they think will make the judge think that the social workers haven't been fair to the birth parents. They will cross exam the sws (and anyone else supporting the recommendation for a Care Order or Parenting Order) for hours on end and this is why it is so important that social workers can prove that they have acted fairly and given opportunities for contact to take place on a regular basis. Believe me most social workers feel much the same as foster carers do about contact.
The important thing is that the LA get the Care Order or Placement Order. If the judge thinks that there are other things that the sw should do, he will not make the Order. This is very unusual because sws know what they have to prove and lawyers acting for the LA also know this and they have to be satisfied that the sws can evidence what they are saying about the parents in their reports.
You say it should be easy for sws to work out whether parents are trying hard and willing to co-operate. The duty of the social worker is to keep families together where ever possible, and thus a lot of time goes into supporting the family (quite often for too long - as was the case with baby P) but again the sw will have to prove to the court that sufficient support was given to prevent the child being removed. There are just so many hurdles to jump through.
Once the child has been removed, the parents still have to be given the chance to prove that they can change and so the sw has to give them the opportunity to change and learn to parent their children in a safe way. Sometimes this means parents and children being admitted to a Family Centre where they live with their child and are supervised and sometimes this can be for as long as 3 months.
Once it has been decided that there is sufficient evidence to make an application for a Care/Placement Order, then there are numerous reports to be filed in court, from all the professionals involved in the case. I do agree with you that for a child to be in foster care for 2.5 yrs before reports are filed is just far too long. It could be because of lack of experienced social workers, as this is usually the reason for drift.
You mention care proceedings coming before custody battles. The thing is care proceedings are public law and custody battles are private law and I can assure you that public law cases do take priority.
I agree that social workers try too hard and too long to support families, rather than come to the conclusion that the child needs to be removed. However they are damned if they do and damned if they don't. There are many who think that social workers "snatch children" too early and then their is criticism if social workers don't remove the child quickly enough as with baby P.
I do know how frustrating it is for foster carers Maypole and I think social workers should explain more clearly to f-cs why the things that they have to do to be sure they can satisfy the court that the Care/Placement Order is granted at the final hearing.
I understand why you feel so strongly as leaving a child in limbo for over 2 years is not an acceptable state of affairs.