Aileen Nicol, Head of Improving Protection and Permanence at Celcis, a member of Stand Up For Siblings, has written a blog about the new National Practice Guidance ‘Staying Together and Connected: Getting it right for sisters and brothers’. Click here to view.
From Monday 26 July 2021, the law is changing on what local authorities and Children’s Hearings have to do to support brothers and sisters. Clan Childlaw – a Stand Up For Siblings partner – has created a helpful guide to the changes on their website, covering:
Click here to view.
Fellow Stand Up For Siblings member, SCRA, has also published information about the changes. More information is available here.
A pilot initiative is underway to map the relationships of siblings.
The map is a visual aid to help social workers prepare reports for Children’s Hearings or to help panel members make more informed decisions in Hearings about siblings.
The pilot has been launched in four Local Authority areas – Clackmannanshire, Falkirk, Stirling and West Lothian.
Hazel Oliver, Area Support and Improvement Partnership from Children’s Hearings Scotland, is leading the pilot, along with support from social work, SCRA and Stand Up For Siblings.
Hazel explained: “We know how critical sibling and some sibling-like relationships are to children and young people in care. With the introduction of the new legislation and the imperative to make improvements in this area, we wanted to try something different.
“We are developing a visual template which allows social workers or panel members to fill in. It includes the names and ages of siblings (full and half biological siblings) the households in which these siblings usually reside. Information such as forms of contact between siblings can also be added to the map.”
The completed map is then included with panel papers, so children, young people and relevant persons get to see them, as well as the panel members.
Initial responses to the visual map have been extremely positive.
Hazel added: “People seem to find a visual aid like this really beneficial.”
The pilot is just in its infancy, but it will be evaluated in a few months time.
Karen Morrison from STAR, Siblings Reunited, has won a Pride of Scotland award.
Karen received the Special Recognition award for all her work with the Fife-based charity which reunites brothers and sisters and allows them to spend time together.
The awards have been running for more than 20 years now and recognise the country’s unsung heroes.
You can read more here.
Congratulations to Karen and the team from everyone at Stand Up For Siblings.
Next week will see really important changes to the law come into force which are designed to respect brothers and sisters’ right to family life.
The changes are the result of a long campaign to protect the brother and sister relationships of children with experience of care. They will be fundamental to helping achieve the Independent Care Review’s Promise.
Until now there has been a lot of variation in Hearings when it comes to including measures for contact with regard to siblings, and with regard to what happens when a brother or sister asks to take part in a Hearing.
From 26 July 2021, Children’s Panels will have a duty to consider contact with any siblings and relevant persons the child isn’t living with every time they make, change or continue a Compulsory Supervision Order (CSO) for a child (section 14 of the Children (Scotland) Act 2020).
In addition, brothers and sisters who meet the criteria below will have a new specific set of rights which should allow them to properly have their say in their sibling’s Hearing when the Hearing is likely to make a decision affecting their contact (section 25 of the 2020 Act plus changes to the Rules of Procedure).
The criteria an individual must meet to be afforded an opportunity to participate are: they are living/have lived with the child; they have an ongoing relationship with the character of a relationship between siblings (whether or not they have a parent in common); the hearing is likely to make a decision significantly affecting contact or the possibility of contact between them and the child; and they are capable of forming a view on contact.
Brothers and sisters who meet the criteria should be contacted by the Scottish Children’s Reporter Administration (SCRA). Brothers and sisters can also request to participate in this way.
A person ‘afforded the opportunity to participate’ will have the following specific rights: the right to be notified of the Hearing, to attend the Hearing, to receive relevant papers, to submit papers to the panel and be represented at the panel.
There is a formal mechanism to allow a review process if any of the steps are not followed in allowing a brother or sister to participate. A person with participation rights will also have the right to call a review Hearing after three months, in the same way as a child or relevant person.
New duties for local authorities towards siblings
Alongside the changes for Hearings, local authorities will have significant new duties to:
All this means panels will have much fuller information about a child’s brothers and sisters and their views.
Sibling relationships are among the most important and long-lasting relationships in our lives, that should be cherished and protected. Taken together, these changes mean we should soon see far fewer brothers and sisters separated and sibling relationships given far greater priority and consideration in all decision-making for care experienced children.
Thanks to Janet Cormack, Legal Policy Manager at Clan Childlaw for writing this piece.
Stand Up for Siblings has submitted a response to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child Day of General Discussion on “Children’s Rights and Alternative Care” which takes place from 16 – 17 September 2021. Read our submission here.