Spouse sister died leaving her son with us.

[AD0325]

My wife's junior sister who is on a 3 year working visa to UK with her only son died after living in UK for over 2 years. She left her son who is staying with us behind. What are the procedures i have to follow to legalise her son's staying with us either as a kinship carer, foster parent or adopt him and what should we do to extend his visa which expires in December 2025. He has no father from birth and my spouse was the one who facilitated his mum's migration to UK and the only family the boy has in this country. My wife has a citizen status.

[Robin D]

How awful for her son and indeed for your wife and yourself.

You do not say how old the lad is which could have a huge bearing. Also , was there a will indicating what should happen to her boy?

Assuming he is relative young, you need to advise your local authority Childrens' Services Dept that he is staying with you as they might argue that you are 'privately fostering' meaning they have to be notified. They are likely to talk to you about future options. I would be surprised if there was any discussion about fostering as the child is safe in your care. I regret on the financial side I can offer no help whatsoever except if your sister-in-law was receiving Child Benefit, contact the DWP to get it transferred. @Suzie, the FRG advisor here, may have some better advice on this and the legal position. Please take her advice over any I give.

I further suggest you need to contact the Visa and Immigration team at https://www.gov.uk/contact-ukvi-inside-outside-uk for advice and hopefully they will be sympathetic and helpful.

I wish you all the best of luck under what must be an emotionally difficult time.

Robin

[AD0325]

Thanks Robin. He is 15 years old and there was no will from her mum before she died. My sister in law was not qualified for any benefit before she died.

[Robin D]

At 15 his views must be taken into account. I still suggest calling children's services for advice and to let them know of the situation.

I suspect adoption is probably off the table now as they usually complete before the child is 16 and its a lengthy process. @Suzie may disagree.

No will means you probably have nothing showing his mothers wishes. the intestacy rules I think means he is the sole beneficiary of the estate. https://www.gov.uk/inherits-someone-dies-without-will gives lots of advice if you are also having to deal with that. Although it can be difficult to get through, the Probate Office are vey helpful.

Hopefully this is of some, if limited help.

Best wishes ... Robin

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear AD0325

Welcome to the kinship carers’ discussion board. Thank you for your post. My name is Suzie. I am Family Rights Group’s online adviser.

I am very sorry to hear about the bereavement your family has experienced. Your sister-in-law has died, leaving a 15-year-old son. You explain that your sister-in-law was on a 3-year working visa to the UK. Your nephew’s visa expires in December 2025. You and your wife are caring for your nephew as he has no other family and, I believe, no father with parental responsibility for him. You are querying how to formalise your care of your nephew and how to extend his visa.

I know this must be a very difficult time for you all. It is good that your nephew has his aunt and uncle to care for him. I am attaching a link here to bereavement services so that your family knows where to access this support if you need it.

You have already had helpful advice from another kinship carer, Robin.

Unfortunately, I am not able to offer any advice about your nephew’s visa or immigration situation. However, I would suggest that this is the most urgent matter to resolve. As a young person, his right to remain in the UK needs to be established. Robin has already sent you a link to government website and immigration advice and information which I hope has been helpful to you. There are several services who offer specialist advice to young people (and their carers) about these issues which I will signpost you to below. I hope they will be of help to you.

• KIND UK – please see this link for how to contact them for help.
• Children’s Citizenship Pro bono legal centre
• Migrant Children’s Project Advice: immigrationadvice@ coramclc.org.uk
• Seek advice from visa / immigration adviser; find a solicitor website.

As I understand that your wife is your nephew’s natural (blood related) aunt then she should be able to continue to care for him. This would not be a private fostering arrangement as Robin mentioned, because they are close blood relatives, so it is not an arrangement that children’s service would be required to monitor.

There are several ways that a relative can care for a child which are set out in more detail here . The table here provides a useful quick reference guide. As Robin suggested, adoption is not a likely option for a 15-year-old.

As your nephew has no parent with parental responsibility for him, you could request that children’s services assess you and your wife as kinship foster carers for him under a voluntary section 20 arrangement . You would need to be assessed (please see this advice sheet about being assessed as a kinship foster carer) but if approved would be paid a fostering allowance. However, you would not have PR for your nephew and would not be able to make any legal decisions for him, you would also be visited by a social worker and have statutory meetings regularly. You can find out more about this arrangement here. I agree with Robin that children’s services are likely to encourage you to apply for a court order to give you parental responsibility for the child rather than treat him as a looked after child.

There are two orders that you could consider applying for to give you parental responsibility for your nephew. These are a child arrangements order (CAO) or a special guardianship order (SGO). We have advice sheets about DIY CAO applications and SGO applications. A CAO is the simpler and quicker process.

Please see our welfare rights and education advice sheets for kinship carers too.

Please see a link here to legal advice services. If you are applying for a court order without a solicitor, then Support through Court may be able to help with the process but they cannot provide legal advice.

I hope that this is helpful.

If children’s services become involved and you have any queries about this, please post back or contact the advice service via one of the options linked to here.

Best wishes

Suzie

[AD0325]

Thanks Robin and Suzie for the detailed advice. I appreciate.