How to contact us for advice
We provide advice to parents, grandparents, relatives, friends and kinship carers who are involved with children’s services in England or need their help. We can help you understand processes and options when social workers or courts are making decisions about your child’s welfare.
Our advice service is free, independent and confidential.
To speak to an adviser, please call our free and confidential advice line 0808 801 0366 (Monday to Friday 9.30am to 3pm, excluding Bank Holidays). For Textphone dial 18001 followed by the advice line number. Or you can ask us a question via email using our advice enquiry form.
Our online advice forums are an anonymous space where parents and kinship carers (also known as family and friends carers) can get legal and practical advice, build a support network and learn from other people’s experiences.
Our get help and advice section describes the processes that you and your family are likely to go through, so that you know what to expect. Our webchat service can help you find the information and advice on our website which will help you understand the law and your rights.
The legal process where children’s services apply to the family court to become involved in a child’s care. They may do this if they are concerned that a child has suffered or is at risk of suffering significant harm.
Children’s services can ask the court to make an order to protect the child. This includes an emergency protection order or a care order. If children’s services consider that the child may need protection whilst the proceedings are ongoing, it may ask the court to make an interim care order. These orders give children’s services parental responsibility for a child. The parents do not lose their parental responsibility when the order is made. Children’s services must seek the parents’ views when making decisions relating to the child. However, children’s services will have the final say in decision-making.
Children’s services may also ask the court to make a supervision order (including an interim supervision order). This order does not give parental responsibility to children’s services, and the child is not placed into care. A supervision order places a duty on children’s services to ‘advise, assist and befriend’ the family. This means that children’s services will ‘supervise’ and support the parent in caring for the child.
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