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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). Or you can ask us a question via email using our advice enquiry form.
Are you a parent, kinship carer relative or friend of a child who is involved with, or who needs the help of, children’s services in England? 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). 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 has template letters, advice sheets and resources about legal and social care processes. On Monday and Wednesday afternoons, you can use our webchat service to chat online to an adviser.
“Today’s High Court judgment on kinship care and the two child tax credit limit is hugely welcome.
The Department for Work and Pensions had chosen to penalise some kinship carers including sibling carers, who were raising their younger brothers and sisters and subsequently had their own baby after April 2017. These kinship carers were prevented from claiming child tax credit for their own child, if there were already two or more children in the household. It was a pernicious and unjust approach that was criticised by ourselves, some MPs and peers. The High Court has rightly found it to be perverse and unlawful. It is just a shame the Government did not listen earlier and that Child Poverty Action Group have had to take the case to the High Court for justice to be done.
Kinship carers are raising children, many of whom cannot live safely with their parents and who would otherwise be in the care system at great public expense. Half of kinship carers have to give up work to take on children and most are forced into poverty. Some are then hit by the benefit cap and other welfare reforms. At least now, however, this injustice in relation to the two child tax credit limit is being fixed – that is a victory.
We are extremely grateful to Child Poverty Action Group, to Melanie Onn MP who championed this in Parliament and to kinship carers and others who campaigned on this issue”.
For more information about the judgment:
http://www.cpag.org.uk/content/two-child-limit-challenge
For more information about kinship care and the 2 child tax credit limit:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/oct/01/kinship-carers-denied-thousands-of-pounds-over-two-child-cap
For more information about the financial hardship faced by kinship carers:
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/apr/08/kinship-carers-left-poor-and-homeless-by-welfare-reforms?CMP=share_btn_tw
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