Section 7.

[Pebbledashery]

Posting for traffic.. Sorry.
Has anyone ever had an social worker whose supervised contact be asked to write the section 7 report? I know it's usually cafcass or the local authority.. But is it possible for an independent whose just supervising contact with child and father to write the section 7?

Unlikely as the independent social worker would need to be commissioned and paid by someone to complete it and the court wouldn’t do that when CAFCASS already deal with those things. Children’s Services wouldn’t do it either unless the child was already open to them

@Ilovedacake if my ex partner offered to pay for her to do it would the court order it? Cafcass are really trying to fight for us as they really can see my ex is the violent abuser I am showing him to be.. But the court isn't listening to them so far. They've written to the court twice to try and stop contact. I'm worried they may never be involved if my ex pays for this independent social worker. My DD had local authority involvement from the area we left but not the area we are in now.

The independent social worker could probably provide a written statement if the court requested, but not the s7

Just to clarify, when I said the independent social worker would need to be commissioned to do the report, I meant by Children’s Services, it couldn’t be paid by your ex, and this would be highly unlikely when they have staff available who could do it.

Are you completely sure? My solicitor said that the other side could make a request but he'll have to pay and it is very expensive. The court could order it though. I'm scared because it would be very biased.

It’s incredibly unusual if Cafcass are involved for the court to request that an ISW complete a s7 instead of them. Your ex could request that it be the ISW, you could request that you want it to be Cafcass. Your ex would likely have to pay around the £1000 mark, possibly more for an ISW to do it. Who is currently funding the ISW to supervise contact?

@Ilovedacake he's paying for the sessions it's once a week. It's all so biased. It's like the courts aren't listening to cafcass at all. They wrote a very detailed safeguarding letter that clearly showed how dangerous he was then they wrote to the court again asking them to suspend contact because its dangerous and puts predominantly me at risk. Nobody has responded yet. I spoke to the cafcass advisor last week and she said she'd write to the court again. Just feel so frustrated. His solicitor and barrister are complete bullies.

I’ve never ever had a case where an ISW has written a section 7 report. For the court to order that the judge would have to take the view that the Local Authority or CAFCASS couldn’t do it because it was outside of their expertise which is clearly ridiculous. And who would pay for it? It is ‘possible’ a court could order it but that sort of decision would be appealable. Never heard anything like it.

@Aminuts23 do you work in the family court? The independent social workers are absolutely awful. It's some phoney firm that can't even get names right in their reports. They don't seem to care about my safety either. If the social worker has been supervising the contact is it not inappropriate for them to write the section 7?

@Pebbledashery yes I do, have for 16 years. If your local authority are not involved then CAFCASS will do the section 7. To be honest after they wrote to the court your solicitor should have been making an application to also get an urgent hearing. The contact sounds totally unsafe for you. The court is under a duty to protect your child but also the resident parents safety.

@Aminuts23 would you mind if I pm'd you just to explain what's happened. Its outing if I post on here in case he ever was to look. I just need a bit of advice on what to do next because my solicitor got bullied by his solicitor last week and I don't know how to proceed.

@Pebbledashery of course