Social services have taken my Nephew

[socialserviceshelpplease]

DN is almost 11, he has been taken out of my sisters care because of serious neglect and abuse spanning over his whole life.

There is going to be a court case on Monday and I don't know what to do, what to expect. Will he be there? Will his parents be there?

Everything that's come out is pretty horrific and he isn't taking it well. He is staying between a few family members and has been for a few weeks but it's been deemed very likely that he can't go home ever and they have asked whoever can to do some sort of Fostering assessment?

My mind is blown and I cant process anything. I'm googling but it's all quite long winded and I'm not sure what type of assessment or even what type of court case there will be.

We will also be having mediation (I think) where my nephew will be seeing his parents through an outside party rather than through me or family members. We have asked for this because sis and bils behaviour is difficult and they have taken him forcefully before and we almost lost the chance to have him back.

I won't be even able to have him as I have my own children and his behaviour is putting my own kids at risk of serious harm.
My other sister is considering it (but she works and there are a hundred other factors) she is saying she will put her life on hold but it will likely cost her her career (overseas, lots of travel)
I just don't know what to do or what to even ask the social worker (who is being quite vague, to the point I don't even know what to Google to get the correct type of court proceedings info or anything really) and it's really hard to get hold of the sw anyway.

We will be having a quick chat for questions hopefully tomorrow, maybe Monday and i just want to ask here first so I have an idea of the questions I need to ask.

For example if the aunties can't have him, will he go to a Foster carer or a care home?
What happens if the assessment/ application is rejected?
How will we pay for his food/ bus pass/ other expenses?
Can we say no to the parents visiting property if their child lives there?

Was he in foster care on previous occasions before he went back to parents? Was the family approached back then?

Ok…so the local authority (LA) are probably applying for an Interim Care Order (ICO) it means that they can share PR with the parents and the LA will place him with either a foster cared or a family member. As a family member of your sister wants to get paid and have LA support then she needs to ask for a Regulation 24 assessment. They can turn these around in 24-48 hours and she would be a registered foster cared for that child. There are positive and negatives of this approach but Google it. If she looks after him under a no order agreement the LA can still give her financial support under 17 regulations. So push for that.

An 11 year old SHOULDN’T be placed in a residential until (care home) BUT if his behaviour is unmanageable then they may not have a choice. I would say that any support you can offer him will help him to settle into which ever placement he is in and will remind him that his wider family love him. He is not the one in the wrong his parents are.

min the longer term family members can be assessed at Special Guardians or they can remain foster carers. Again there are positives and negatives of both.

In court only the LA, mum, dad and your nephews Guardian (a SW appointed on his behalf) are allowed to attend and have representation BUT if you don’t think you are being told the truth or given a clear picture by the LA then ask for the Guardians number (or get it from your sister). I cannot count the times the LA have said “the family aren’t interested in offering a short term placement” and the Guardian says “hang on I spoke to them and they are. They just have a few questions”. Please ask specific questions and I will see if I can help further.

@Jellycatspyjamas

Are you a parent of a child with special needs. They will fund it but the family have to put up a bit of a 'fight'. It most certainly is not a 'last resort' option. It is an option. But there would be a lot of ground work. I don't think there's any harm of OP bringing this up at this stage due to his trauma and what he is going through, particularly his age and nearing adolescence. It would be very helpful if the OP hires a clinical psychologist, whi is experienced at writing tribunal/courts and specialises in trauma to argue for such a placement for her nephew.

Although a foster family who is experienced in trauma etc would be great. How realistic is this for the OP's nephew to have such a family. Not only that, whether a foster family who is experienced in trauma etc. What will be most beneficial for the OP son is to have counselling, CBT, Art Therapy, play therapy, Animal Asstistive Therapy etc to deal with the trauma and his behaviours as a result of the trauma he has undergone. You can get some of these therapies on the NHS but this is eye watering expensive, and don't get me started on the long waiting lists which could take up to two years!

Op at the end of the day, it's up to you. It's your life. You have to do what's best for you and your family.

The OP’s sister may not be expecting money to rescue and look after her nephew.

Foster families are usually all experienced in trauma, especially long term placement foster careers.

You have no clue, it’s laughable you call Jellycats experience into question since she has a lot of personal and professional experience in this area

@Jellycatspyjamas

Sorry to hear about your daughter and the fight you had to take on to get CAMHS on board. You are correct, evidence is needed as to what I suggested to the OP. But they are other options to get support which I was merely advising the OP.

This. Shame on those who stood by and did nothing all these years!!!!

@DrWhitWho

I may not have professional experience but I have personal experience. Not only am
I a parent of children who all have special needs and 2/3 receive specialist provision which are funded by the LA. My cousin has has adopted her niece, with a similar background to the OP, and with my help- alongside professionals, we were able to get her a placement at a specialist SEMH residential school (not the one I provided up thread). There are OPTIONS, you just have to know how to get around it,

This is excellent advice and spot on. A lot of the other advice on here is right-ish, but this post tells you what you need to know. Saved me a job writing it!

No, you had options

Not everyone has the same options, residential placements are vanishingly rare, and not something many LAs will support.

Stop thinking your individual experience can be extrapolated to the norm

Your sister saying she'll put her life on hold but it'll cost her entire career...if she really cared about her nephew she wouldn'tbe treating him as this massive inconvenience and "sacrifice". She would have just stepped in.

This was an unbelievably shitty thing for someone to say. And naive. It's completely right that someone very seriously considers if fostering a child, even if it's a child they know and love, is something they are able to commit to. For the sake of the child mainly. It's awful, and frankly cruel, to suggest someone is somehow unloving if they don't immediately foster a child already in their life.

@DrWhitWho

Excuse me. It is not rare to get a residential placement. May families I know have residential placements. You just have to know the system. Stop having a deafest attitude. Even though you are a stranger on the internet and I have no knowledge of your personal life, but just because you didn't push for things or get what you want and kept on listening to the others that you 'can't. Don't take your anger out on me and stop me from telling OP that she has other options.

Not everyone has the same options, residential placements are vanishingly rare, and not something many LAs will support

So just because the LA does not support it that means that the OP should not ask. Just like the saying goes, 'if you don't shoot. You don't score'.

Do you think that a family member just rings around secure units and picks one and asks the SW to put the child there?

There is a very high threshold for a care plan to include a secure setting. There needs to be a long history of dangerous behaviour occurring outside of the home to be considered. There needs to be evidence that the setting would make the changes necessary. The director of Childrens Services needs to agree to a search. There needs to be an exit plan - where would the child go after coming out. The LA then need to apply for a secure order which are not always issued.

Outcomes are poor quite often. Its very difficult to find places for children who have been in secure. The idea of this option for an 11 year old his hugely inappropriate. Any therapy that starts in those units ends abruptly, its difficult to put together a package which can have an 'ending' because of the way the court orders work. Once the decision is made that threshold is no longer met, the child cannot be placed in the unit, necessitating them moving quickly back out into the community.

There are usually around 40-50 children referred at any one time and usual vacancies run at about 5-8 vacancies across England and Scotland (although Scotland run their own system). Its not a 'waiting list' as such, units will pick children according to their needs and the match with the other residents.

We have had young people with a secure referral for months and months to no avail and some of our young people with the worst outcomes have been in secure settings, it was a complete waste of time.

A residential private Boarding School was what “ Saved” Friend who adopted the severely traumatised 4 yr old ( Now an adult)
friend is an excellent parent, kind, boundaried and patient- And experienced- but adopting pushed the family close to the edge.

The young adult now was definitely helped by the school, and friend had to learn how to fight for her child.

Funding now would be much thinner on the ground.
Boarding school gave everyone breathing space.
However- with adoption, it isn’t just til a child is grown- You are their parent for life, it’s not 18 and off they go!
It’s an ongoing worry, very often.

However-
To the adoptive/ foster parents out there who can somehow navigate through a child’s traumas and stay calm and focussed- All power to you.

It is a very emotionally tough job to see children so hurt.- Not to mention frustrating and upsetting when they lash out , or do daft and risky things.

The judge may order that he goes into a secure children’s home. I work in one (education side) and the children get so much nurture and are well looked after.

what a sad situation for you all.

Edit : Therapeutic boarding school was secondary school age.

Apologies for not reading the entire thread but is CAMHS (including NHS Individual Requests for funding) an option for your nephew if he did come and live with you or your sister? Including family therapy?

I know everyone’s family circumstances are different and so is every traumatised child, but he’s only 11 so could be supported by CAMHS services for another 7 years. The above NHS funding is for when an NHS service will pay for private treatment, even out of their trust area.

Op, I’ve been involved in this.

social workers will look to family taking on your nephew, likely as SGO (2 yrs of weekly payments then means tested, so could be little or nothing financially), other support though and social workers can support contact with parents if deemed suitable,.

SGO means those who have the sgo hold majority of parental responsibility, and can make all decisions for child (usual exceptions are - cant remove from country for more than 3 months, can’t change name or circumcise). Contact with parents is about best for child, and it will be challenging for all family.

it’s not easy,

if you can put your needs to one side and child’s needs in front of you then sgo can work.

its hard work, often thankless, complex needs of child, secondary school, neglect, rejection, so tough.

even if child goes to care you can stay in touch.

a child in this situation needs consistency for a long time.

court is likely to be about removing child from parents and placing in temporary foster care.

grandparents plus, kinship care both helpful resources.

Ah, that is sad. I gave up university to be guardian to my nephew when he was four, my sister was a drug addict and my dad and I fought to get my nephew. Between myself who was 19 at the time and my 60 year old dad, we were able to manage. I hope your nephew gets through this bless him.

So just because the LA does not support it that means that the OP should not ask. Just like the saying goes, 'if you don't shoot. You don't score

The OP is at the stage of considering who might be able to care for her nephew. That decision needs to be made with good consideration to the needs of the child and whether they can be realistically met within the wider family. Caring for a child who has been traumatised for the 11 years of their short life is challenging work that makes huge demands on the carers and the wider family - it is life changing for all concerned which is why there’s such thorough assessment of foster carers and adopters. The decision needs to be made assuming limited support because that’s the reality for most kinship carers.

It would be lovely if specialist residential settings with appropriate therapeutic support were readily available but that isn’t the case and anyone deciding to take on parenting a child on the basis that it is would be naive and short sighted.

“Some of our young people with the worst outcomes have been in secure settings, it was a complete waste of time.”

It all sounds incredibly tricky and difficult- and grossly underfunded.

What is depressing is how parent/s can have repeated children removed from them , yet get pregnant over and over again, having each child removed.

What surprised me initially was that the mothers often had grown up in care themselves- and knew the pain of it, yet were unable to safely nurture a child to the extent the child was removed soon after birth.

What kind of counselling can break this cycle that sees pain go down the generations …

Hi,

Given his age he will not be adopted. He is probably too old for a permanence order (I'm in Scotland). If this is his first incidence of care, SW will have a duty to assess if there is anyway that he can be rehabilitated back to his parents, if they can make and sustain change, if they could manage his care with additional supports and that is assuming that his parents desire to resume his care. While this assessment is ongoing, a judge/Sheriff/ children's panel can make a legal order that he resides elsewhere or his parents can give their voluntary consent for the local authority to make arrangements for his care.

Now interms of fostering/ kinship. It may be that he might spend a short period of time with emergency Foster carers, while SW get a handle on what he needs, I.e it could be a more specialist foster carer to support him by offering a high level of therapeutic parenting, or it could be a kinship arrangements. If it is a kinship arrangement then the carer will be paid (how much depends on your LA). If considering this yourself you need to think very carefully about what you can offer, how this will impact your own family and any children you have, and how and if you can meet his needs. You need to be really realistic, abused and traumatised children need a special kind of care, and unfortunately just loving them will not fix the issues they will experience. If you find that you cannot care for the child then you can still be a valuable part of their recovery by offering them consistent, stable and good quality links to their family. They will need someone who holds "their story" , i.e all those little things that non care experienced people take for granted, like what you where like as a baby, what your favourite toy was like, when you did things developmentally, or even stories about that time you went on holiday and this happened..... these moments and memories often get lost for children in care.

Going to a foster carer or just one kinship carer doesn't have to be an all or nothing approach. You can discuss with the SW/ courts/ children's hearing the possibility of maintaining a high level of contact at whatever level you can manage, although this will always need to be in the child's best interest. If another family member is contemplating offering to be a kinship carer, think carefully about how you can support this arrangement so that the child has a secure network around him and the kinship carer is not left without adequate support. Ask your LA if they offer a family group decision making service (lots on Google about this).

Google kinship and also look to see how your LA support kinship carers.

In answer to your question about seeing his parents, a judge/Sheriff/ children's hearing can place legal orders around any contact, they can stipulated frequency, duration, who it is with and if it should be supervised or not.

Are you a parent of a child with special needs. They will fund it but the family have to put up a bit of a 'fight'. It most certainly is not a 'last resort' option.

I have long personal and professional experience in this area, the local authority will look for the most cost effective way to meet any child’s needs. Which is one of the drivers behind SGOs, kinship care placements etc.

At this stage they’ll be predominantly looking for somewhere safe for the child for the immediate future, and not be too concerned about his recovery etc, because securing safe care for the immediate and medium term is a priority. Once the child has a safe, stable living arrangement it will be more possible to establish the kind of ongoing support he might need - that’s very unlikely to be residential care/residential education placement, which tends to be for children with the highest level of need, by which time the care placement is pretty much in danger of breaking down.

Assuming that level of care is available isn’t a good basis for deciding you can care for a child.

This charity can advise you and your family.

frg.org.uk/

Please listen to @Jellycatspyjamas and @LadyFushia , they know what they are talking about.