This guide is for you if:

• you live in England, and
• you are a parent, and
• children’s services contact you about your children, or
• children’s services tell you they are thinking of starting care proceedings.
   

Children’s services is the name given to the department in each local council that is responsible for the safety, health and well-being of all children. Children’s services employ social workers.

This guide is for Roma parents and community support or advice workers supporting Roma parents.

Depending on where you are in the process, you can choose to read the guide from the start or choose a section that is most relevant to you. For example, if you already have a social worker involved with your family you might want to go straight to the sections called How to best help your child and family and Working with social workers and other professionals.

The most important things to do, with the help of this guide, are

• understand the process,
• understand the changes you need to make, and
• do your best to work with children’s services.
   

If there are problems on the way, you can read our other guide for help on How to deal with common problems you might face.

This is just one of our resources to help you. We also have

• a film about the child protection process made with Roma in Romanes, and
• a film about a parent’s view on their experiences of the child protection process, made with Roma in Romanes.
   

In this section we talk about professional people you may meet when you have children.

There are lots of different professionals who might work with your children at some point during their childhood. Well known examples of such people are teachers, doctors, dentists, and nurses.

All professionals who work with children have a duty to protect and help them. This duty is known as the ‘safeguarding duty’. For example, if a child appears to be hurt, distressed or injured to a teacher or doctor and they are worried this is because of something the parent did or failed to do, they will usually need to tell children’s services about their concerns.

Next, we explain some of roles you may be less familiar with.

Social worker

There are many types of social workers, but they all work to help people who are experiencing difficulties. A social worker who works with children must make sure children are safe and well with their family.

If they are worried your child isn’t safe and well, they must look at what is happening more closely and give support to parents. They must work hard to keep families together. But, if after giving support, they still don’t think your child is safe and well they can ask the court for an order that says your child must live somewhere else. This is a last resort, and social workers work hard to avoid this.  

We have another guide that explains more about how to work with social workers and what standards they must meet when working with your family. It also helps you to understand what you might do if you experience problems with social workers involved in your family.

Family Support worker

These people work for children’s services or for charities. They can give you practical help and emotional support if you are going through a difficult time.

Education welfare officer

Education welfare officers work for the local council. Their job is to work with schools and families to make sure that all children of school age (5 years and above) go to school regularly.

You may meet other professionals too if the social worker has ongoing worries about your child - here we explain a bit about what they do. We talk more about them in the section called Court.

Lawyers

The word ‘lawyer’ is often used to describe someone who is legally qualified and trained to advise and represent someone who has a legal problem. It can be used to talk about solicitors and barristers. Solicitors represent a person by advising them on the law, and if needed, will prepare the case for going to court. Either a solicitor or a barrister will represent you in court.

The Children’s Guardian

This person is an independent social worker, from Cafcass. They are appointed by the court if children’s services ask the court to decide who can care for your child. They advise the court on what they think is in your child’s best interests. They speak to your child and will tell the court about your child’s wishes and feelings. They will speak to everyone else involved too, to do their assessment. This includes you as parents and the social worker. The Children’s Guardian will have their own solicitor to represent them and your child.

Judges

The judge or judges decide what has to happen in a case if the people involved can’t agree. Their decisions become court orders that must be followed.

Experts

In some cases the judge might decide that they need help from an expert. For example, if your child has a particular medical problem, the judge might ask a doctor who knows a lot about that medical problem to tell the court about it in detail. The expert will help the judge make the right decision when there is an issue outside the judge’s knowledge and experience.

In the next section we talk about the help given to all children living in England.

All children living in England have a right to free health care services and education. These are the services children get from the health visitors, doctors or dentists who help to look after their health or the nursery workers and teachers who help to develop and educate them. These services are usually provided without social workers being involved.
You are expected to make sure your children benefit from these services. Ways you can do this include:

• registering with a local GP,
• going to health visitor clinics when your child is little,
• going to doctor and dentist appointments regularly,
• getting your child vaccinated against childhood illnesses,
• making sure your child has a place at a local school in the school year when they turn 5,
• making sure your child goes to school and is on time each school day,
• working with your child’s teachers to support your children’s learning, for example, talking to the teacher if there are problems at school with bullying.  
   

If you find you need a bit more help there is something called ‘early help’. We talk about what that means next.

Everyone needs help bringing up their children at some point. You may get this help from your family or friends or people like a health visitor, community worker or your child’s school or nursery.

Early help means providing some extra support as soon as a problem starts. The aim of early help is for you to get support before small issues get worse and turn into bigger problems.

You can get early help at any time in a child’s life. Just because you ask for help or talk to someone about your problems does not mean you are a bad parent or that you will lose your children. It shows that you are a responsible parent and want the best for your child.

It’s OK to ask for help. For example, you may need help to:

• cope with a crying baby, or
• understand why dental treatment for your child is important and how to get it, or
• understand what kind of food your child needs to grow up strong and healthy, or
  deal with your teenager’s behaviour.
   

It may be your child who needs help. For example, they may need help because:

• they have special educational needs, for example they need speech therapy, or
• they are struggling to care for a sick parent.
   

If you want to ask for help but don’t know who to ask or what to say, perhaps because English isn’t your first language, is there someone you trust who can ask for you, maybe a friend or relative or someone from your local community centre?

How early help works

You can ask for help from someone you are already in contact with, like your GP or health visitor. Or a professional who is working with your child might suggest it to you.

Step 1

One professional, such as your health visitor will take the lead and do an early help assessment with you. This involves working out what is going well in the family, what the worries are and what needs to happen to improve the situation.

Step 2 

A team of professionals best placed to help will make a plan with you about what needs to happen and when.

Step 3

The plan will be reviewed regularly to make sure the professionals are giving you the support promised and that you and your family are making progress.

If you’re not sure exactly what help is being offered or you don’t really understand what it involves, it’s good to ask questions. Have a look at the section on Working with social workers and other professionals for suggestions about the questions you might want to ask.

You can decide whether to accept the support the early help team offers you as the system is voluntary at this stage. But if any of the professionals involved in your early help plan thinks there are still problems and is worried that you have refused help they may contact children’s services.

If people like teachers, doctors, health visitors and nursery staff are worried about your child, they will worry more if you avoid them. So:

• Find out what they are concerned about and let them know how you see the problem. Don't avoid or ignore the problem! 
• Be prepared to work with professionals, like teachers, health visitors and doctors and accept their help.
• If something is stopping you doing what they suggest or you don’t know how to do it, explain why or ask someone from a community group to help you. 
• Be clear about what would help you to do what they ask. For example, if a professional who is part of the Early Help team wants you to go to a parenting support group at 10am and the bus you need to catch won’t get you there in time or you can’t get anyone to look after your children then, make sure you tell them. Ask them if they can help you get there. Don’t just not turn up because that looks like you care or don’t  want help. Have a look at the section on How to best help your child and your family.
• Don’t refuse an offer of help because you’re scared someone will come and take your children away. The more you are able to work with professionals, the less worried they are likely to be about your child.
   

Working with the professionals involved at this early stage will usually help improve things and mean that they have fewer worries about your child’s safety and wellbeing. The early help team should support you and stop problems getting more serious. For this reason it is a good idea to work with them.

If a social worker gets involved and thinks that things are not improving they may suggest that your child would benefit from something called a ‘child in need’ plan. We talk more about this next.

The law in England says that a child is ‘in need’ if they aren’t likely to reach a reasonable standard of health or development without extra help or services. These extra services could be, for example, childcare for children under 5, after school and holiday care, home help, advice or counselling. Or sometimes it could involve doing one to one work with a social worker or other professional or it could be for parents to get help around a problem, such as alcohol misuse.

Development is a word that describes the process of growing up from a child into an adult and includes a child’s physical, intellectual, emotional, social and behavioural development.

The law also says that any child who has a disability is automatically a ‘child in need’. If children’s services decides your child is in need then they must try to help you to protect and look after your child’s wellbeing. If this happens - try to stay positive and ask the social worker what they think you need to do to improve things. It is really important not to ignore what the social worker is saying. Instead, do what you can to understand why they are getting involved. If you can, get help from a Roma support group.

Children’s services will develop a ‘child in need’ plan for your child. This will say:

• what works well in your family,
• what the social workers are worried about,
• what support services you and your child will get, and
• what they expect of you.
   

You can ask for help yourself if you think you need it. Or a social worker can suggest a child in need assessment. This is where the social worker looks at how you care for your child in detail and then writes a report.

Once the assessment is finished there will be a meeting where the social worker comes up with the plan of how to help your child. The social worker should talk to you about the plan at a meeting, so you understand what is happening and what help is being offered.

You don’t have to accept the help that is offered in the child in need plan. But, if you don’t, you may well find that the social worker becomes more worried about your child and gets more involved in your family’s life.

If you don’t think the plan is reasonable, you can make suggestions about what it should include. Explain which bits of the plan don’t work for you and your child and why. If you don’t feel confident to do this on your own, ask for help from your local children’s centre or a community organisation working with Roma. There is a list of community organisations who work with Roma in England in the section called Community groups who work with Roma in England.

When the plan is in place it is really important to work hard to stay in touch with the social worker and take up the help offered. Keep the social worker up to date about what is happening at home. For example, if you are planning to go away for a few days, talk to the social worker about this.

If things for your child improve a lot, with help from the social worker, a decision will be made to end the child in need plan. This would be a good outcome. If things don’t improve the social worker may say that they want to start the child protection process. Various different things can happen in the child protection process, depending on what is happening in your family. We talk about this process next.

Anyone can contact children’s services if they are worried that your child is not safe or well cared for. This could be a neighbour or people like a teacher, nurse, health visitor, police officer or doctor. You may hear social workers or other professionals call this a ‘referral’.

If children’s services get a referral the law says that they must look into your child’s situation. The law is very clear about this because in the past some children have died because nobody stopped their abuse.

The social workers aren't against you or snooping or looking to catch you out. They don't want to find problems but it is their job to look into your child’s situation. If they find everything is OK, that's a good day for a social worker.

After being contacted, social workers have 1 working day to decide what to do next. They can make any of the following decisions:

• There is no need to take any action to protect your child because your child hasn’t been harmed and they don’t think they are at risk of being harmed. They may still offer you support to help you with your parenting.
• You and your child need support as soon as possible to help you cope and to stop a small problem from getting bigger. The aim is to help make things better for you and your family.
• They want to know more about your child and your family - to find out if your child is suffering neglect or abuse which are likely to have long-term damaging effects. This is called an ‘investigation’. We explain these later. 
• Emergency action may be necessary to protect your child from danger and that, for example, they should go and live temporarily with another member of your family, or a foster carer.

Children’s services must tell you (and your child if they are not a baby) what they’ve decided and what they’re going to do next.

If children’s services or the Police believe that there is a risk to your child’s life or they are at risk of suffering serious immediate harm (for example, they have been left at home alone or physically harmed or are being looked after by someone who is giving them alcohol or drugs) then they must make sure your child is safe. ‘Risk’ means the chance that something bad or dangerous will happen.

If there is someone living in your home that children’s services believes is a danger to your child, they may ask you to get them to leave if you are able to or agree to the court ordering this person to leave your home so that your child doesn’t have to. This person could, for example, be your partner or another relative. It may be very difficult for you to agree to this. But if you don’t, children’s services will believe that you care less about the child they think needs protecting than the other members of your family.

If you are in this situation it’s very important that you see a solicitor who specialises in children law immediately. See the section called When and how to find a solicitor who specialises in children law.

If a social worker is concerned about your child’s safety and well-being in your care they might ask you to agree to your child living somewhere else for a while. They will ask you to make some changes to improve the situation before your child can come home. If this happens, it will usually be better for your child to stay with family or friends if at all possible. This will help your child stay connected to their community and culture.

If this isn’t possible, the social worker will ask you to agree to foster care accommodation provided by children’s services.

This arrangement is often used for the short term – to give you a chance to make some changes and then hopefully have your children returned to you. But sometimes this arrangement can last a long time, and it can be harder to get your child back in your care than you expected. So, getting legal advice on this so you know what you are agreeing to or not is essential.

It’s really important you get advice from a solicitor specialising in children’s law before you agree to anything and especially before your child leaves your care. You need a specialist solicitor because children law is complicated. They can explain your options in this situation and give you the best legal advice. For more information about solicitors specialising in children law see When and how to find a solicitor who specialises in children law. Legal aid (help from the government to pay for legal advice) may be available depending on your financial circumstances. You can check if you are eligible at Check if you can get legal aid.

You may hear social workers call this ‘voluntary accommodation’ or a ‘section 20 agreement/arrangement’. Your child can only move out of your care in this way if you agree to it. So it is very important you understand exactly what you are agreeing to and what will happen if you don’t do what it says in the agreement.

If you agree to voluntary accommodation, you can remove your child at any time but, again, it’s really important you get advice from a solicitor specialising in children law before you do this. This is because, while you can end the agreement at any time, children’s services may still have serious concerns about your child being in your care and you ending the agreement might mean they then start court proceedings.

The social worker must work with you and your family to reach an agreement about what is going to happen. If your child is going to live in accommodation provided by children’s services, you should ask for a written agreement explaining this voluntary arrangement. You should ask for the document to be in your first language if you’re not confident about reading English. This agreement should tell you where your child will be living and where and when you’ll be able to see your child and make it clear that you can remove your child from the accommodation at any time.

Children’s services should give you time to look through the agreement and get advice about it from a solicitor specialising in children law, or from a community organisation working with Roma, who can help you find a solcitor. 

An ‘investigation’ is when people ask questions and collect and look at evidence to find out the truth. An investigation helps people to make up their minds about what is true.

‘Evidence’ is information that helps prove that something is or is not true. For example, school attendance records provide evidence about whether and when a child has missed school.

When social workers investigate whether your child is safe and well looked after they should always do the following things.

• Respect your family structure, your culture, your religion, and your ethnic origins. For example, social workers may talk to you about whether it would be helpful for them to contact your Embassy. Your Embassy may be able to explain any differences in how your country of origin and England protects children. But respecting your culture does not mean that social workers will accept every way you prefer to live and bring up your children.
• Arrange for an interpreter if necessary.
• Try to understand your family life and show a real interest in your child.
• Speak to you in a respectful way, make eye contact with you and not look at their notes or their computer while they speak to you.
• Establish trust with you before they ask personal questions. In an emergency, social workers or other professionals may have to ask you difficult questions quite quickly after they first meet you if they think they need to do this to stop your child being harmed.
• Help you understand what they say and any letters they send you.
• Value your strengths (for example, your ability to make changes in how you look after your child and your ability to protect your child from someone who might cause them harm.)
• Take account of any support that you have, for example, from grand-parents, or other family members.
• Be aware of the effects of racial harassment and discrimination – so they shouldn’t treat your child less favourably than another child when it comes to getting access to the services your child needs.
   

If you feel social workers are not working with you respectfully and fairly you can complain to the social worker’s manager or speak to your solicitor for advice on what to do.

A social worker will ask questions to collect information about your child and your family, for example, from your child’s nursery or their teacher, your doctor, your health visitor and the police. The law says that all these people must work together and share the information they have about you and your family with the social worker if this might help to protect a child. This is because, in the past, failing to pass on information has contributed to the death or serious injury of children.

A social worker will normally want to see your child, at home, in school or in the community. Depending on their age, they will probably want to see your child alone, without you. This is because they need to hear what your child has to say for themselves when you are not there.

The social worker will also want to ask you questions. You may be frightened about giving information to non-Roma people, because you may worry that any information you give will be used to discriminate against you. The problem with saying little or nothing in answer to their questions is that they will probably worry more about your child. If you just nod or say what you think they are expecting to hear that’s not the best way to help your child.

Have a look at the section on How to best help your child and your family and then the section on Working with social workers and other professionals for suggestions about how you can respond in a way that will help you and your family.

Social workers may also look at your Facebook page or other social media to see what information you’ve put on the internet about you, your family and your child – assuming it is publicly available. If you have applied privacy settings they would need a court order to get access.

‘Assessment’ means the process of considering all the information the social workers have collected about you and your family. Social workers do an assessment to:

• work out what your child needs,
• find out what your child thinks and wants (which may not be the same as what you want for them),
• decide how well you can respond to and meet your child’s needs and protect them (this part is sometimes called a parenting assessment),
• understand the impact of your behaviour on them and their development,
• understand the impact of your child’s wider family and community on your child’s needs,
• decide whether your child is a child ‘in need’ or is suffering, or might be at risk of suffering, significant harm because of abuse or neglect (we explain what the words ‘harm’, ‘abuse’ and ‘neglect’ mean in the next two sections),
• work out the type and level of any risk or harm your child is suffering, and
• decide what services and support your child needs to improve their health and well-being.

This helps the social workers get a picture of what you’re good at and what you’re finding difficult so they can help you improve how you care for your child and decide what to do next.

It is the social worker’s responsibility to tell you (and your child if they are not a baby) how they will do this assessment.

They also need to give you or your solicitor a copy of the assessment report when it is finished. You can ask your social worker to explain to you what is in the report. It is really important that you understand everything in this report, especially things that the social worker thinks you need to do and when. You can ask for the assessment report and other letters and documents to be translated into your first language.

Harm is what happens when someone treats a child badly or damages their physical or mental health or development.

A child can also be harmed by seeing or hearing someone else being treated badly or ‘ill-treated’. For example, if one parent is abusive to the other this can cause their child harm even if the parent isn’t shouting or hitting the child. A child can be emotionally harmed by hearing and seeing some they love being abused.

A parent or anyone else who spends time with a child or who looks after a child can harm them by the actions they take or don’t take, or by failing to stop something bad happening to them. We explain the different types of harm in the boxes below.

To work out if the harm is ‘significant’, the social worker has to compare the health and development of your child with that of a similar child.

In the next section we talk about different types of harm. 

Neglect

This is when someone doesn’t look after a child properly.

For example, they:

• don’t feed the child enough or give them enough to drink so they are hungry or thirsty a lot of the time,
• don’t give the child breakfast before taking them to school,
• are drunk or under the influence of drugs,
• don’t make sure the child goes to nursery or school regularly or on time,
• don’t make sure the child brushes their teeth or sees a dentist regularly so the child suffers from tooth decay,
• don’t get the right health care for the child,
• frequently leave the child dirty,
• frequently leave the child without adequate or clean clothes to wear,
• don’t supervise the child adequately, for example by:
  •  leaving a young child on their own at home. You can find useful guidance about how to decide when it’s safe for your child to be at home alone.
  • leaving young children in the care of another child who isn’t old enough to be looking after them. This is common in many Roma families but people in England think this is neglect because it gives too much responsibility to the older child,
• allowing a young child to smoke cigarettes or vapes,
• allowing a child to climb onto a kitchen work surface while hot food is being prepared,
• allowing a young child to run a hot bath, cross a busy road or play outside on their own,
• don’t pay attention to the child, for example by not listening to them or noticing their feelings,
• don’t express positive feelings to the child, for example to praise them for something they have said or done,
• don’t protect them from danger, for example from getting burned, from drinking cleaning products, from hurting themselves with a kitchen knife or taking medicine by themselves,
• don’t step in to prevent the child from being physically or sexually abused by another person,
• don’t show their children that they love them.
   

Physical abuse

This is when someone deliberately hurts a child or treats them badly.

For example, they:

• hit, slap or smack them,
• shake them,
• kick them,
• slap them,
• pinch them,
• scratch them,
• burn them,
• pull their hair,
• throw things at them.

Hitting or slapping children may be common in many parts of Eastern Europe including in Roma families but people in England now think that punishing children by hitting or slapping them isn’t a good way to discipline children. This is because ideas about the best way to bring up children have changed and we know more about the effects of physical punishment on children.

Hitting or slapping a child can:

• make them resentful and angry,
• damage your relationship with them,
• get out of control, so that you injure them,
• lead to them treating other people in the same way because they think it’s OK to behave like that.
   

You can find helpful ideas about how to discipline in a way that works at Positive parenting.

Emotional abuse

This is when someone doesn’t do things that are important for a child’s healthy development, like show love and care, listen to what they say or talk to them.

Emotional abuse is also when someone upsets or frightens a child, for example, by:

• telling them they are worthless or unloved – again and again,
• calling them bad names, picking on them or damaging their things – again and again,
• frequently frightening them, perhaps by shouting at them, pushing or shoving them or threatening them or letting them witness this happen to someone else,
• making fun of or criticising them – again and again,
• letting them see or hear domestic abuse between parents or other people living in the home.
   

Sexual abuse

This is when an adult touches a child’s body or their private parts or makes the child do sexual things like touching someone else’s body or private parts.

Sexual abuse also includes actions like allowing a child to look at films or pictures of a sexual nature or getting them to send pictures of themselves with no clothes on over the internet. You can find more detailed information about sexual abuse at What is sexual abuse.

Child sexual exploitation is a type of sexual abuse. It can involve a child being given food, somewhere to live, drugs, affection, presents, status or money in return for doing sexual things or having sexual things done to them.

Domestic abuse and violence

Domestic abuse is not only about one person being physically violent to the other. It happens when one person controls the other in a family or intimate relationship. There are many different types of abuse including:

• emotional,
• psychological,
• economic, including financial,
• physical and
• sexual.
   

It can happen at any time and can often get worse when you split up, when your ex may try hard to keep controlling you. Abuse can happen online too – if you use a smart phone your ex may use social media or tracking apps to control your behaviour. If you think your ex has been or is being abusive to you, start by speaking someone from your local community group who works with Roma. Or go to Refuge for help and support.

Children and domestic abuse

Social workers take domestic abuse very seriously. Even if children aren’t physically harmed it is still really damaging for them to grow up in a home where their parents are in an abusive relationship.

Seeing or hearing parents fight or argue violently at home can cause a lot of harm to children and is one of the most common reasons for social workers getting involved in family life.

Children who witness their parents fight may:

• become withdrawn,
• become aggressive,
• behave badly (they harm or lack consideration for other people),
• suffer from depression or anxiety or
• not do well at school.
   

If you are in an abusive relationship it is really important to get help. If you don’t, the social worker might decide you are not managing to protect your children enough from the harm of witnessing domestic abuse.

Social workers can make a range of different decisions after they have thought carefully about all the information they’ve collected about you and your family.

They can decide:

• they don’t need to be involved anymore, or
• that you need help but not from them, or
• you need a bit more help and support to improve things for your child (see the sections called Services for every child in England and Child in need), or
• that your child is or may be at risk of suffering significant harm (we explain what ‘harm’ means in What is 'harm' and when is it 'significant'?)
   

If they think that your child may be at risk of suffering significant harm they may decide they need a special report to help them work out whether this is true or not. For example, from a child psychologist about how your child is developing and how well you can meet their needs or a physiotherapist about how to improve your child’s physical fitness and your ability to help make those improvements happen.

If the social work team are still worried about your child, they will organise a meeting between them, you, other members of your family and other people involved in your child’s life, like a teacher and a doctor. You may hear this meeting called a ‘child protection conference’. The people at this meeting will make decisions about your child’s future safety, health and development.

Some or all of the following people will take part in the meeting:

• social workers,
• someone from your child’s school,
• health care professionals working with your child such as the GP or health visitor,
• the police,
• probation,
• any other professionals who are involved.
   

The person in charge of the meeting is someone called an ‘independent reviewing officer’. They are not part of the social work team. They are there to make sure that the meeting is run fairly and you get a turn to speak.

If you are a parent you will normally be invited to this meeting unless social workers think you will disrupt the meeting or intimidate someone else or prevent them focussing on what your child needs.

It is important that you attend this meeting as this is your chance to explain things to the social workers and other professionals and help shape the plan for the future. As a parent you should be consulted and kept up to date about the child protection conference and what happens next. This is so you can get legal advice and prepare for the meeting.

The meeting usually takes place at the children’s services office but since the Coronavirus pandemic, these meetings have taken place by video call. This way of having these meetings may carry on in the future as it helps lots of busy professionals get the chance to join in more easily, to help your child. You can join by video or phone call. If you think this will be hard for you it is important you explain why to the social worker. For example, you might need an interpreter and it is easier to be in the same place for you both.

Have a look at the section on Working with social workers and other professionals for suggestions about how to talk to the people at this meeting.

Ask the social worker (or your solicitor if you have one):

• what they are planning to talk about at this meeting,
• who will be there,
• how the room will be set up or how will the video call work,
• what you can do to prepare, and
• how you can take part in the discussion.
   

You are allowed to take an advocate, friend or supporter with you. This does include a solicitor but sometimes some local authorities say that solicitors are not allowed. Check with the social worker beforehand if you want a solicitor to go with you.  

You may need to pay for a solcitor to come with you legal aid (help from the government to pay for legal advice) doesn’t usually cover paying for them to go to these meetings with you.

If you can’t take a solicitor with you, it’s a good idea to take someone else to help you explain your opinion. Your supporter could be someone from a community organisation working with Roma. It is a good idea to check with the social worker before the meeting if the person you would like to have there as a supporter can join in the meeting too.

If your supporter doesn’t know anything about children law, they can talk to the Family Rights Group - an organisation that supports parents when social workers make decisions about their children – on your behalf. The Family Rights Group runs a free and confidential telephone advice service on 0808 801 0366 which is open Monday to Friday 9.30am-3.00pm (excluding bank holidays). It also has lots of useful information on its website.

You can find tips to help you get ready for a child protection conference at Tips for getting ready for a child protection conference.

If the people at this meeting think your child is at risk of significant harm, the social workers will prepare a plan and decide whether they need to go to court. You may hear this plan called a ‘child protection plan’. If your child doesn’t have leave to remain in the UK, the social workers will also think about whether they should inform the relevant Embassy that they are making a child protection plan for your child.

The plan should set out:

• The concerns about your child that have led to the decision to make a child protection plan for them,
• what help you and your child will get,
• what you need to improve or change,
• what will happen if you don’t manage to make the changes they are asking you to make,
• what the social worker and other professionals will do to help protect your child and by when,
• what the professionals expect to come out of the process in terms of your child improved wellbeing, and
• who will review your progress and how this will be done.
   

Your social worker should try hard to make sure you understand everything in your child’s plan. If you don’t understand it, it is important to say that and ask for them to explain it more carefully.

It is very important to follow the child protection plan and make the most of the help offered to your family. Try to keep in touch with the social worker and let them know how things are going at home.

The social worker and other professionals will be looking out for evidence that you are improving how you care for your child quickly enough and that the changes and positive effects for your child will carry on into the future. For example, if your child has tooth decay, they will want to see evidence that you are following the advice of your child’s dentist about how to care for your child’s teeth and gums and that their dental health is beginning to improve. They also need to be confident that you will make sure your child’s dental health continues to get better and better.

If your child is missing school a lot and is falling behind in their learning the social worker will want to see that you accept help from their school to improve their attendance at school.

If you need help or don’t know how to make the changes the professionals want to see, you can ask for support from your social worker or a community organisation working with Roma.

All the professionals involved in the child protection conference will review the plan every 3 to 6 months after the first meeting. In between, a smaller group of professionals who have most contact with your child will meet regularly to help everyone make the plan happen. It’s very important that you attend all these meetings. You might hear these called ‘core group’ meetings.

For the whole time the plan is in place it is really important to try and be as open as possible with the social worker. For example, if you plan to go on holiday with your child make sure you talk to the social worker about this. You should not try and leave the UK, even for just a holiday, without talking to the social worker. If the social worker does not agree to you leaving the UK then make sure you get legal advice before going anywhere.

If the social workers decide your child is not at risk of harm but still needs extra support they can prepare a different kind of plan – a ‘child in need’ plan. This is a positive change and a less serious process than child protection. For a reminder of what happens when the social worker says your child is a ‘child in need’ go to the section called Child in need.

If the situation for your child still doesn’t improve after the plan is put in place the social work team will get legal advice from their legal team and decide whether or not they should ask the court to make an order so that your child is removed from your care and is looked after by someone else. If this happens you need to read the rest of this guide, and especially the sections called Before going to court and Court.

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You can watch two helpful videos about how child protection conferences work, through Anne and Terry's story. 

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In this section we suggest how you can best help your child and in doing that help your whole family.

If children’s services get involved with your family, the last thing they want to do is to take your children away from you. This is because generally, it is much better for children to stay with their family, with support, if needed, than go into foster care or, as a last resort, be adopted.

What they will try and do is to work with you and support you to make changes so that your child is safe and well looked after. Like you, they want what is best for your child.

It might help to understand that social workers get involved with many families but few cases end up with a child being removed from their parents.

You can watch Keeping our children safe - a guide for Roma parents. This is a really helpful film that explains the most important things you need to know about keeping your child safe when you live in England. The film is in Romanes, with English subtitles.

It is really important to get a solicitor as soon as you can to help you through the process.

• If you try and avoid people like social workers, teachers, doctors and nursery staff because you are frightened that your child will be taken away from you, the more likely they are to worry that there is a problem.
• Don’t close the door on them.
• Don’t ignore the situation.
• Be prepared to work with them and accept their help.
• Don’t stop taking your child to nursery or to school.
• Don’t stop taking your child to the doctor or the dentist for check-ups or any treatment your child needs.
• Be open about any difficulties you have caring for your children. Social workers and other professionals can’t support you properly if you don’t help them understand what the problems are.
• Be open and honest about who lives with you as part of your child’s family, other family members your child has, where they live and how you get on with each other.
• Be honest. If you lie, even about something small or just once, it is very likely that the social workers or other professionals will find out. And that will make them question other things you say - things that may be true.
• Tell the social workers or other professionals if you don’t understand what they say. It’s OK and important that you do this. If you don’t feel confident to do this on your own, ask for help from your local children’s centre or a community organisation working with Roma.
• If you don’t understand what they say because you don’t speak English well, or because social workers are using complicated words, make sure you or your support worker asks for an interpreter. Tell the social workers or other professionals what language you need the interpreter to speak. If your first language is Romanes, you can ask for a Roma interpreter. This may not be available in your area but they will try to find one. You may also find our film Keeping our children safe helpful. This film is in Romanes with English subtitles. 
• Tell the social workers if you don’t understand the interpreter or the interpreter doesn’t understand you.
  It’s OK to ask social workers to get a different interpreter if you don’t feel comfortable with your current interpreter.
• You may be stressed and afraid, but if you shout at the social workers or become aggressive this will not help the situation because they may think that this means you behave like this at home in front of your child.
• If social workers ask you to change something about how you look after your children, don’t say that you will but then never do it or do just enough to get them off your back. Social workers are usually much more worried by parents who say they are doing something when they’re not than those who are open about any difficulties they have making the changes the social workers want to see. It is important to make sure you know why they want you to change what you are doing - if you don’t understand it will be hard to make the change.
• If something is stopping you doing what a social worker or other professional asks you to do, tell them. Be clear what would help you do what they ask.
  If you don’t agree with what the social workers or other professionals are asking you to do or you think they are wrong about something, it’s best not to get into an argument with them. Instead, get some advice from your solicitor about how to respond.
• See if you can get help from a support worker. This may be someone from your local children’s centre or a community organisation working with Roma. You may also hear this person called an ‘advocate’. An advocate’s job is to help you understand what’s going on and to find the confidence to speak for yourself where possible so you can better take part in the child protection process. They are also there to encourage good communication and a positive working relationship between you and the social workers.
• You can talk to the Family Rights Group. They are an organisation that supports parents when social workers make decisions about their children. They can advise you about your rights and options when social workers or courts make decisions about your children. They run a free, confidential telephone advice service on 0808 801 0366 which is open Monday to Friday 9.30am-3.00pm (excluding bank holidays).

Case study

Social workers became concerned about Robert, Adrian and Anna, the children of a Roma family from Poland. They were worried about the children’s dental health and because they kept missing doctor’s appointments.

After a community organisation got involved, it turned out that the family sometimes missed a doctor’s appointment because, for example, a child had recovered quickly from a simple cold. The parents, Claudia and Stanislaw, didn’t understand that they should cancel the appointment if they no longer needed it.

The community organisation recognised that this family spoke and read only limited English, had difficulty understanding how public services operated, and didn’t understand what was expected of them when bringing up their children in England. By repeating information, explaining difficult words using everyday language, using pictures to support information, for example when discussing a healthy diet – they were able to improve Claudia and Stanislaw’s understanding of the changes they needed to make and how to change.

They were also able to explain how to cancel an appointment and that if they missed doctor’s appointments, professionals might become concerned that they weren’t taking enough care of their children’s health. Their attendance at health appointments improved.

The children had very poor dental health. All of them had to have fillings. Watching her children being treated by the dentist was hard for Claudia but it helped her realise just how important it was that her children ate and drank less sugar. She started going to cooking sessions at the community centre and accepted early help from social workers.

In this section we talk about the ways you can work with the social worker and other professionals to help your child. It won’t always be easy to work with people you don’t know who want to get involved in your family life. But remember that even if it feels really hard, you need to do it for your child.

Lots of professionals could be involved in the case about your child – people like social workers, doctors, health visitors, and teachers.

Here are some tips to help you work with the social workers and other professionals you may meet.

Visits from social workers

Social workers can make either pre-arranged or unannounced visits to your home – depending on the reason for their visit. They should show you their identification badge but if they don’t, ask to see it.

Sometimes a social worker may want to visit unannounced because they have reason to believe that your child is at risk and so they need to investigate. Part of that investigation may involve visiting your home without giving you any warning. For example, a social worker would do this if they are worried about the conditions your child is living in at home.

You might feel uncomfortable about the social worker coming into your home, for many different reasons. But the social worker will feel more worried about your child if you don’t let them in when they come. This is because they will think you are hiding things. They are only doing their job which is to protect children. It is fine to ask, politely, the reason for the visit and what they are looking for so that you can understand what’s happening and why.

It is better to try hard, even if this is very difficult for you, to show them what they ask to see. This way, they will see you are willing to work with them, even if it is difficult for you. This will help to show them you are putting your child first, even when it might be hard for you.

If you are worried about unannounced visits, then contact a solicitor who specialises in children law as soon as you can and explain what has happened. You can find information about how to find this kind of specialist solicitor in the section called When and how to find a solicitor who specialises in children law.

Social workers will also call you to see how you are and give you updates or let you know when a meeting might take place. Make sure you let them know if you change your number and be sure to answer their calls or call back soon after if you can’t take a call.

Getting ready to meet a social worker or other professional

It’s OK to ask questions - make a list of the most important ones. Or get someone else to write them down for you. Ask the social worker what you should bring along to the meeting and if there is anything you could do to prepare.

Ask a friend, family member or support worker to go to the meeting with you. If you have a faceto-face meeting make sure you are on time or better still, early! If your meeting is by video call, make sure you have everything ready and set up before the meeting starts and if possible, a quiet and private place to be while you are on the call. If you can’t find a quiet place, headphones might be helpful.

If your friend, family member or support worker can join the meeting, ask them to write down the most important things the professional says. 

In this section we explain the process that the social worker must follow if they still have serious concerns about your child.

It’s important to understand that if children’s services go to court, the court has significant powers over:

• where your child lives,
• whether they should live with you or not,
• whether you should see them or not, and
• whether they should live permanently with someone else.
   

But the court won’t want to limit or end your involvement in your child’s life unless it has to. It will try and make sure that your child continues to be brought up in your family – as long as this is safe for your child.

This means you need to be open and honest about any difficulties you are having and accept the support services you are offered, so that your child gets the care they need.

If you only give the impression that everything is OK and can’t show or accept that you understand that there may be difficulties, the social workers and other professionals may think you are unable or unwilling to help them to help your child. If they think you can’t recognise what the problems are or won’t try and improve, they will look at other options for your child like foster care.

Unless things are very urgent, children’s services must organise a special meeting with you before they go to court. This meeting is usually your last chance to talk to the social workers about how they want you to care for your child and the changes they want you to make before they decide to go to court and ask for permission to remove your child from you. If you can make the changes that children’s services want, then you may be able to stop them going to court.

In this section we explain what happens if you can’t make the changes that Children’s Services want you to make. If they are still concerned about your child, Children's Services can ask the court for a ‘care order’.

A ‘care order’ is a decision of the court giving Children’s Services ‘parental responsibility’ for your child (which means they will share parental responsibility with you) and allowing them to decide where your child lives and who they see. If the court makes a care order, Children’s Services will be able to make decisions about your child which you may not agree with. The process of asking the court for a care order and going through the court proceedings is called ‘care proceedings’.

The court should make its final decision within 26 weeks (6 months) of the case starting.

A case starts on the date when the court receives the application for an order from Children’s Services. This means you usually have around 6 months from the start of the case until the judge makes their final decision. This time is really important - you need to use it to make the changes the social worker has asked you to make so that you can keep your child in your care.

During the six months the court has to make a final decision, the court will often make short-term or ‘interim’ orders about how your child should be looked after and what contact you can have.

The social workers must show the court how they have tried to support you and your family to make the changes they think that your child needs.

What is ‘parental responsibility’?

Parental responsibility is how the law describes the rights and responsibilities that go with being a parent. If you have parental responsibility you are responsible for your child’s care and well-being.

Mums have parental responsibility from the moment their child is born. Dads who are married to their child’s mum automatically have parental responsibility too. Unmarried dads have parental responsibility if they are named on their child’s birth certificate. If not, there are things you can do to get parental responsibility.

We have a separate guide about parental responsibility - what it is and how you get it. It explains how to make a parental responsibility agreement and how to apply for a parental responsibility order. You can find this at How to apply for parental responsibility without the help of a lawyer.

The people involved in care proceedings

Children’s services, your child and anyone who has ‘parental responsibility’ for your child is involved in care proceedings. Each of them will usually have a solicitor to advise and represent them. The social worker will have a solicitor from the local authority, often called the ‘council’ to represent and advise them.

Your child will have a Children’s Guardian. This is a social worker who does not work for children’s services. The Children’s Guardian and their solicitor represent your child’s interests in the case. It is possible, if your child is old enough and doesn’t agree with what the Guardian thinks should happen to them, for your child to have their own separate solicitor.

The Children’s Guardian is often very influential in the case and it’s important that you make a real effort to get along and work with them. You can find more information about the role of the Children’s Guardian at Cafcass’ role in care proceedings - children's guardian.

How the court makes a decision about your child

The court has to decide whether there are enough reasons to justify making a court order. A court order is what the law calls the decisions that judges make.

The court makes this decision in 2 stages. A case only gets through stage 1 (the law calls this the ‘threshold’ test) if the court agrees that things have happened which:

• have already caused significant harm to your child, or
• pose a serious risk that your child will suffer significant harm in the future, or
• show that you can’t influence and control your child’s behaviour.
   

Next a case has to pass stage 2. The law calls stage 2 the ‘welfare’ test. The welfare test is about trying to decide, usually in difficult circumstances, what is in your child’s best interests. What the court decides is in your child’s best interests may not always be the same thing as what you want or what you think is in your child’s best interests.

The law gives the court a checklist explaining what it must think about when it decides what is in the best interests of your child. You may hear this called the ‘welfare checklist’. The court must think about:

• Your child’s wishes and feelings

This does not mean that the court will do whatever your child says they want. But if your child is old enough to understand the questions they are asked and the court can find out what they think, then it will consider what they say. The court will want to know that your child’s wishes and feelings are their own and not influenced by their parents (or anybody else). The court will pay more attention to the wishes and feelings of a child the older they are. Sometimes the judge may want to meet your child, or get a letter from them so that your child feels listened to. Your child can also ask to meet or write to the judge. The court will decide whether, where and when this will happen, if at all.

• Your child’s physical, emotional and educational needs

This includes your child’s need for love and affection as well as for education, a home and food. It also includes things that can affect your child’s emotional health. For example, if you and your partner argue or fight, the court will take this into account.

• The likely effect of any changes on your child

Change can be disruptive for children. The court must think about the effect of any proposed changes such as who they live or spend time with. Do the benefits of any change outweigh any possible negative effects?

• The age, sex, background and any relevant characteristics of your child

This includes any cultural, religious or language needs as well as any disabilities. For example, if your child is going to be looked after by other people, the court may be concerned if there is no plan to try and place your child with Roma foster carers – because such a placement would better meet their cultural, religious and language needs than being placed with non-Roma foster carers. The court might ask the social workers to re-work their plan for your child but if they can’t find any Roma foster parents it doesn’t mean that the court won’t make an order.

• Any harm your child has suffered or is at risk of suffering

Harm can mean ill treatment or damage to your child’s health or development. It can also mean the impact caused by them seeing or hearing parents arguing or fighting. The court will look at what the evidence tells them about whether you can protect your child from harm. We explain what ‘harm’ means in the section What is 'harm' and when is it 'significant'?

• How capable you and the child’s other parent are of meeting your child’s needs

The court will consider whether you have the skills to look after your child and meet their needs, and support from family or friends to help you. If, for example, you have drug or alcohol problems or you are struggling with your mental health and these problems affect your ability to look after your child then this is something the court will take into account.

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If the court decides that there are enough reasons to justify making a court order, then your child will either:

• go home - if the safety and quality of your parenting has improved, or
• go and live with a relative or another person, such as a family friend, or
• go and live with a foster carer, or
• be adopted.
   

If the court makes a care order it is sometimes possible to go back to court later to ask for the court to end the order, but only if all the changes that the court wants to see are carried out. Very occasionally, it might be possible to appeal the court order made about your child. This is something you could ask your solicitor or barrister about.

The Family Rights Group has a helpful chart explaining the different orders a court can make at the end of care proceedings and what each order will mean for your child called What options for a child's long term care might be looked at in care proceedings?

If you have never been to court before, it will all be new. New experiences can often be worrying, even when they are much less important than a court deciding who can care for your child in the future.

It is important to be prepared and get as much support as possible.

Top tips - if you are involved in a court hearing

• Make sure you get a solicitor to advise you and help you through the process.
• Make sure you get advice from your solicitor before, during and after any court hearings.
• If you need an interpreter make sure you explain this to the solicitor - politely and firmly.
• Do not be afraid to say if you don’t understand something during any meeting or during court hearings.
• Sometimes, solicitors and judges use complicated legal language and if you don’t understand what they mean it is really important to say so.
• If you have to speak in a court hearing make sure you are polite. Try to stay calm even if you don’t feel it.
• Try hard to be open and honest about what has happened. This will help the social worker and the judge see that you are listening and want to make changes that will help your child.

You need to get legal advice from a solicitor who specialises in children law as soon you can after children’s services get involved with your family. It is good to get early advice and guidance on what to do, even if the social worker isn’t saying they are going to court straight away.

You need to get legal advice immediately in the following situations.

• The social worker gives you a letter called a ‘pre-proceedings’ letter.
• The social worker asks you to agree to your child living somewhere else for a while - get advice before you sign anything!
• You get a letter saying the social worker and their solicitors at the council are applying to the court for an order about your child. This is called ‘care proceedings’.
   

Some councils give parents a list of local solicitors who can help them. If you are given one of these lists it is a good idea to call the solicitors on the list to see if they can help you, or ask anyone supporting you to do it for you.

Don’t worry if you aren’t given a list - there are other places where you can find a solicitor.

You can find a specialist solicitor by searching at Find a solicitor in England and Wales. Choose ‘Family public law – legal aid’ in the drop-down menu offered under the heading ‘Area of practice’ and ‘Children’ in the drop down-menu offered under the heading ‘Second area of practice’.

If you find it difficult to use the internet, ask a community organisation to help you by doing this search for you or call the Law Society Support Centre on 020 7320 5650 (line open Monday to Friday from 9am to 5pm) and ask for help to find a solicitor specialising in child protection.

Many solicitors who specialise in children law have an out of hours emergency number you can call if, for example, social workers contact you in the evening or at the weekend or you suddenly find out you have to go to court the next day. They will usually provide a limited amount of free advice before you can get legal aid. Check the solicitor’s website for details of the firm’s emergency number.

Family Rights Group may be able to help you find a solicitor who specialises in children law. They are an organisation that supports parents when social workers make decisions about their children. They run a free advice line on 0808 801 0366 which is open Monday to Friday 9.30am-3.00pm (excluding bank holidays).

There is no need to worry about how you will pay your solicitor if children’s services organise a ‘pre-proceedings meeting’ or go to court. This is because if you are the child’s parent you will automatically get free legal aid (help from the government to pay for legal advice) whatever your financial situation. If you have a court order that says the child who the social worker is involved with must live with you, you will also get legal aid.

If you want legal advice at an earlier stage, perhaps when children’s services first contact you then legal aid may be available depending on your financial circumstances. You can check if you are eligible at Check if you can get legal aid.

Your solicitor is there to represent you and your views and no-one else’s. It’s important you listen to what they say and ask questions if you don’t understand.

You can ask if the solicitor is on the Law Society’s Children Panel. This means that they are specially accredited to do this type of work and that they have a lot of experience. If they are not on the panel, you can ask for another solicitor in the firm who is.

Your child will have a different solicitor. This is because your child has rights of their own.

Your solicitor is there to support you and make sure you understand the legal process. They will do various things for you.

• Your solicitor will explain your legal rights, the options you have and ask your views and answer your questions. 
• They will confirm what they advise you in a letter. This letter should summarise the case and the action they are taking for you. If it is hard for you to read or understand this letter, you can ask them to explain it.
• If you have urgent questions, they should come back to you quickly but also do remember they have lots of clients.  
• Your solicitor will keep you updated. For example, they will pass on copies of all letters and reports they get about you, your child or your family. You need to read these carefully and get help from your solicitor to understand them.
• Your solicitor will talk to and write to children’s services on your behalf so you don’t need to do this – but only to say what you want said.
• Your solicitor will speak for you in court. Through them, you will be able to challenge what children’s services and their witnesses say.
• Your solicitor will present evidence to support your case, including relevant information about Roma culture.
• Your solicitor can ask the court if your child can be placed with Roma foster carers or Roma adoptive parents, if your child can’t live with you anymore.
• Your solcitor can ask that children’s services make sure that your child stays in regular contact with you, their family network and other Roma friends.
• When it comes to any court hearings your solicitor will let you know who will represent you. This might be them or someone called a barrister.  
• Your solicitor should sure that if you haven’t met the person who is going to speak for you at the court hearing, this person comes to court early enough so you have time to speak with them without feeling rushed.
   

Before every hearing ask your solicitor or barrister ‘What is going to happen at this hearing?’ Don’t be afraid to tell them if you don’t understand what they say. It’s OK to say something like: ‘I’m sorry, but I still don’t understand what you are telling me’.

Ask your solicitor or barrister how you can raise things with them during the hearing. For example, is it OK to whisper in their ear or would they prefer you or your support worker to pass them a note?

Tell your solicitor or barrister about anything you find difficult or that seems unfair. For example, if:

• your interpreter isn’t helpful,
• you don’t understand what the social workers or the judge are saying,
• a social worker or other professional doesn’t treat you fairly or with respect,
• someone asks you to sign a document you don’t understand.
   

Although you can complain about a social worker or other professional, it is best to check with your solicitor before you do this as it might not help your case. The Family Rights Group has useful information on complaining about social workers. 

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Disclaimer

The information in this guide applies to England only.

The law is complicated. We recommend you try to get advice from the sources we have suggested.

The cases we refer to are not always real but show a typical situation. We have included them to help you think about how to deal with your own situation.

Acknowledgements

This guide was originally written and produced by Advicenow thanks to funding from the Tudor Trust in 2018. It was updated thanks to additional funding from the Tudor Trust in 2021. This update was also funded by the Tudor Trust.

Advicenow would like to thank all the Roma families who shared their experiences of the child protection system with us - both positive and negative - in Derby, London and Rotherham and the community organisations that made that possible – Roma Community Care, Roma Support Group and Clifton Learning Partnership.

We would also like to thank the people who provided advice and/or feedback on this guide, particularly Noel Arnold (Coram Children's Legal Centre), Vince Beckworth (A&N Care Solicitors), Sally Halls, Andrea Hopkins (Family Rights Group), Helen Robbins (Helen Robbins Solicitors), Donna Brooks and Marek Potocki (Derby City Council), Helen Littlewood, Sophie Wright, Martina Stipakova (Clifton Learning Partnership), Brian Foster (Brian Foster Education), Ruth Richardson (Roma Community Care), and Gabriela Smolinska-Poffley (Roma Support Group).

We would also like to thank the people who came to the key stakeholders group meeting in addition to those already mentioned above: Mihai Calin Bica, Mania Malik (Roma Support Group), Margita Cechova, Michal Daniel (Roma Community Care), Margaret Greenfields (Buckinghamshire New University) and Yvonne MacNamara (Traveller Movement).  

Thanks are also due to Szymon Glowacki for kindly providing us with the artwork. The photos in this guide were provided by Clifton Learning Partnership and Roma Support Group.

In addition, we would like to thank all those who gave feedback and advised us on the updated versions of the guide: Amanda Sawyer (Simpson Millar LLP), Natalia Schiffrin, Paul Sayers and Crina Morteanu (Luton Roma Trust), Gabriela Smolinska-Poffley (Roma Support Group), Joanna Kostka (Lancaster University), Allison Hulmes and Chris Kidd (Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Social Work Association), Cris McCurley (Ben Hoare Bell LLP), Parents, Families and Allies Network, Kate Williams and Elspeth Thomson of David Gray Solicitors.