CAFCASS – What to do?

Thank Goodness for that – the new(ish) President of the Family Division has decided not to renew the guidance and may scrap the duty guardian scheme. See this article extracting an interview reported fully in Family Affairs. On another note, a proposal to scrap CAFCASS and to reallocate it’s responsibilities to local authorities. Clearly something [...]

F4J Relaunch

Pootling around on the internet in the light of this weeks horse painting shennanigans I came across Matt O’Connor’s new blog Father4Justice, the new F4J website (be warned, it looks nice but plays annoying music which won’t turn off) and facebook group for the recently relaunched Fathers 4 Justice. Matt O’Connor’s first substantive blog post explaining [...]

ISWs throw in the towel

Community Care reports on the prospect of Independent Social Workers quitting over the fees cap to be introduced by the LSC in October. What the article fails to disentangle (in fact it rather adds to the confusion) is the distinction between ISWs contracted by CAFCASS on a self employed basis to carry out Guardian or [...]

Reformed Meat

So the Government has published its Families & Relationships Green Paper in which it proposes a fundamental review of the Family Justice System and a number of other reforms. Like John Bolch at Family Lore I’m not sure what this really adds up to. There are a number of press releases from the relevant departments: [...]

Wishes & Feelings Reports – No Panacea

I attended the FLBA Annual Conference in Bath today and was struck by a really interesting talk by Dr Kirk Weir, Consultant Child, Adolescent & Family Psychiatrist. He presented statistics based on his work as an expert reporting in High Conflict Contact Cases over a number of years, in support of the proposition that an emphasis [...]

Radio 4 Reports on CAFCASS Crisis

PM today ran a piece on the Crisis at CAFCASS, inolving comically disguised voices of Guardian’s and a teeny but undisguised snippet from yours truly. Sad that CAFCASS employee’s feel unable to identify themselves without repurcussions. It does not speak of a happy working environment. Listen here on BBC iplayer for another 7 days – it [...]

Coming Soon to a Court Near You…

I should avoid the obvious opportunity to make a sexist remark about the inherent improbability of some men doing anything remotely useful with a hoover but it’s just slipped out. Apparently Batman and his specially modified hoover will be visiting the family courts soon to help clean them up. Excellent. I can’t tell you how much I am [...]

The Economics of Dysfunction

It frustrates me that, whilst care proceedings are sometimes a spur for parents to recognise the significance of their own past experience, personal issues and their pressing need for therapy to enable them to parent better and to lead more productive fulfilled lives, there is often no route through to achieve these goals because of ‘resource issues’. As [...]