Dear KJY88
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 sorry for the delay in responding to your post due to the service closure over the holiday period.
You are being or are waiting to be assessed and hopefully approved as a
temporary kinship foster carer. As you know, this is known as a
Regulation 24 assessment.
A child can be placed with a kinship foster carer under a Regulation 24 placement either with a parent’s consent, as a
voluntary section 20 arrangement or if the local authority has obtained an
interim care order for the child.
You refer to a court hearing so children’s services are initiating
care proceedings. They will then apply for an interim care order (ICO). If they obtain the ICO they will then share parental responsibility with the child’s parents and will be able to make decisions for the child including where/with whom they should live during the court proceedings. If they have an ICO they can place a child with a relative who has been temporarily approved and who will go on to be fully assessed and, if the assessment is positive, to be approved as a kinship foster carer. Legally they can only place a child for whom they have an ICO with a relative if they have been fully or temporarily approved as a foster carer.
The court hearing is not a ‘regulation 24’ hearing as such but as described above, if children’s services obtain an ICO they can make a regulation 24 placement. Children’s services must submit an interim care plan to the court when they apply for an ICO; this can include recommending that a child is placed with a temporarily approved relative.
You can find out more about the specific hearings that take place during
care proceedings, including the
case management hearing,
here.
And you can find out more about interim arrangements and plans for children during care proceedings
here.
Prospective kinship foster carers are not automatically
party to the court proceedings.Please see
this table which explains who the key parties in care proceedings are. However, you may be invited by the court to attend one or more hearings, to hear the discussions. Care proceedings are held in family courts and may be heard by magistrates or a judge.
We have a detailed advice sheet which explains the kinship carer assessment process
here . I hope it will be useful to you.
Please post again if you would like any further advice or information. You can also get advice by calling our freephone advice line on 0808 8010366, Mon to Fri, 9.30 am to 3.00 pm (except bank holidays), by using our
advice enquiry form or
webchat facility.
Best wishes
Suzie