[Solved] I need help

Hi Kf83 and welcome 🙂

Your story is so sad and I feel for your little boy, thank goodness he has you to protect him....You are doing the right thing!

My son has Residency of his 5yr old son which he was granted in 09/11 because of the mothers neglect, drink and drug issues, with lots of parties and unsavoury people in the house with the children....sounds familiar!

As far as the C1a is concerned its probably better if you stick to the facts, there seems to be plenty of those. Mention the boyfriends and domestic violence etc, drug parties, being hospitalized when you tried to protect your son, your sons admittance to hospital for taking tablets, injuries you have witnessed on him, and the GP referral to Social Services because of psychological abuse.

Once in Court you will be able to elaborate on all of the facts, CAFCASS will again be involved and will want to interview you and the mother before the first hearing, you can discuss the current information with them and they will do all the checks, if your ex has been evicted that will come to light. I would advise you to print off the facebook evidence and tell CAFCASS everything you have written about in your post. I would also make the court aware of the issues with drug abuse and ask for the mother to be tested for both drugs and alchohol.

As far as the Nursery is concerned, I agree its best to keep him away from there for the time being, at least until you have Interim Residency in place, this should be granted at the first hearing, and I cant see that you will have any problems getting the judge to agree to this in the circumstances. It wouldnt hurt to keep in contact with Social Services, ask them if they have received the referrral from your GP, and tell them that you will be asking for Interim Residency at the first hearing and ask if they can support you in this.

The current bill for the Nursery fees is your exs responsibility, but if you continue to send him there I would think they will expect you to take over the responsibility for paying it. It might be better once you have Interim Residency to get him placed somewhere else, its a fresh start for you all then.

I think things have moved on since you were asked to attend a PIPs programme. I wouldnt worry about that but if asked just tell them you had contacted them but they hadnt got back to you.

As for contact for the mother, I would definately be asking for Supervised Contact at a Contact Centre, as there is a serious risk to your son otherwise. CAFCASS will be making recommendations and this should be one of them, speak to them about it when they contact you.

The best piece of advice I can give is to start a diary and keep a record of absolutely everything concerning your ex and your son. Try and write down in chronological order the events that have led you to the position you are in now, as you have in your post. Everytime you speak to any of the agencies involved, log it with dates and times, and whenever you telephone Social Services ask them to make a record of your call and what was discussed. Try not to speak to the ex over the phone, instead use letters,emails or txts. This will be very useful when you get to court and need a point of reference.

We are here to help you in any way we can, so if you have any concerns dont hesitate to ask 🙂

thanks

I'll ask the CCLC if they can pop on an give some advice.

Hi there 🙂

My advice would be to speak to the health Visitor again, bring her up to date with developments and your ex's demands about unsupervised contact, ask her if she has made contact with Social Services and previous Health Visitors and what the outcome of those discussions was, ask for the name of the Social worker that she is speaking to..... Keep up the pressure with these agencies, call the Social services too. These agencies are notoriously bad at information sharing so you will need to keep it to the forefront and liase between them. For instance, has anyone got back to about the GPs referral. If not chase that up too.

As far as responding to the solicitors letter, as you are self representing then you will need to respond. Just keep it brief.... something like...

For the attention of (name of solicitor)

Further to your letter of (date). I am happy to make (childs name) available for contact but I must insist that this be supervised at a Contact Centre. I will be contacting the NACCC within the next 7 days to facilitate contact and I will write to you once I have made arrangements.

I understand that this may not be what your client wants, but I sincerely believe that I am acting in (childs name) best interests. There are several safeguarding issues that need to be addressed, and whilst I appreciate this may be upsetting for (ex's name) my priority has to be the safety and well being of our son.

As (exs name) and I had previously communicated by text message, I assumed that this was acceptable. However, I will address any future communication through you so that further anxiety to your client can be avoided.

Yours sincerely

kf83

....Whatever you write, make sure you keep a copy and send it recorded signed for.As I said just something brief and to the point.

Best of luck and thanks for the update 🙂

Oops forgot to give you a link to the NACCC...this stands for National Association of Childrens Contact Centres. Lots of information on their website, theres a a helpline number you can call and they are really helpful. They will tell you where the nearest Supervised Contact Centre is to you and give you the contact details. Make sure they know its supervised contact you need not supported contact.

www.naccc.org.uk

hially helpful and i really do appreciate it

You should put together a file with all the paperwork pertaining to the case and to your son. The copies of the court forms and all letters you have written and received. It might be helpful to write down in bullet point form the facts in chronologidal order and also a timetable of the contact you would like to be put in place. You should definately discuss the efforts you have made to facilitate contact and the fact that these have been ignored by the mother.Think about what type of contact you would be happy with or more importantly what is best for your son....in my opinion it should be supervised at your mothers or supported contact at a contact centre. Supported contact at a contact centre is more informal than supervised contact in as much as there will be other families there and it wouldnt be monitored by a support worker...supported contact is just a safe place for parents and children to have contact.

CAFCASS should have sent you the report that they have prepared for court, if you havent received it, when you get to the court in the morning ask the clerk if they can let the CAFCASS officer know you wish to speak with them. If she has a solicitor they will most likely want to talk to you before going into court and get you to agree to their terms....you dont have to agree to anything, and if you feel at all uncomfortable or intimidated then you can call the discussion to a halt.

Once you have spoken to her solicitor and CAFCASS, (the CAFCASS officer will probably want to talk to you together) you will go into court, and the reports if there are any will be discussed and maybe some interim contact sorted out....if the report from CAFCASS is bad they may not award her any contact until the other reports are in at the next hearing, and the judge may order section 7 reports. It would also be advisable for you to ask for drug and alcohol tests and police reports if they havent already been asked for.

Everyones court experience is different and the outcomes can vary widely, as I've often said before, the case will be determined by the judge on the day, if you are lucky you will get a good judge who will be thorough and take the right steps, but be aware that there are a few not so good judges out there that often seem to be biased in favour of the mother.

Best of luck for tomorrow and please do come back and let us know how you got on 🙂

Thanks for the replies again they were very helpful 😀

So i went to court yesterday and my sons mother had a solicitor cafcass had not been able to get hold of her prior to court so spoke to her then in a private room. I got a copy of the report from them and they had suggested supervised access & drug and alcohol testing, i was disgusted with some of the things that were in the report they were absolutely shocking.

Anyway long story short got into the court, woman judge, woman cafcass officer and sons mother and her female solicitor i really thought i wouldnt stand a chance of getting even shared care. But i proposed supervised contact and her solicitor twisted and turned everything wanted overnight contact said i was bullying sons mother and jealous of her boyfriends i stood my ground. the judge wouldnt even look at any of the evidence i had of what had been going on around my son and she gave my sons mother 2 week days 10-4 and every other saturday 10-4 shes not allowed to drink alcohol 24hrs before contact and not allowed him around her boyfriend and we are back in court in August they judge also asked for background checks on her boyfriend but didnt order drug testing on my sons mother. The judge also said she didnt want me turning up to court next time with a file full of evidence she just wanted a draft of why my son is better off living with me and that was it. So now im thinking i need legal help for next time but i really cant afford it is there any alternatives that are just as good??

So first contact was today sons mother was 10 minutes late picking him up and 5 minutes late dropping him off he cried when she brought him back and was very tearful until bedtime as his mum hadnt made him have a nap my first thought was to write all this down but im thinking is it pointless because the judge didnt seem to care. I didnt question my son when he came back and he said he had fun at his mums and hadnt been touching knives and hadnt seen her boyfriend which i thought were random things for a yound child to say.

Any advice and help is greatly appreciated as always it could have been a lot worse and im glad my son is seeing his mum again and there are restrictions to what she can and cant do but im also slightly disheartened based on the things in the cafcass report as i would of expected them to protect my son better.

also does it have to be a solicitor to help me in court or are there other options to get help??

...It was the same at my sons last hearing in March, female judge, solicitor and CAFCASS officer whio was standing in for the one that had done the report as she was sick. The judge completely ignored the recommendations made in the report and the concerns about safeguarding issues that had been highlighted....I know how you must have felt! 🙁

Thats the issue isnt it...."I would have expected them to have protected my son better" saying that you have hit the nail on the head. However, we must work with what we have and as you say it could have been worse.

I think you should continue to keep a diary of events regardless of what the judge said....it could well be another judge at the next hearing, unless she has requested that the next hearing is listed with her, which she would have declared at the hearing. I'm hoping thats the case for my son too at his next hearing, as the judge didnt request that his next hearing be listed with her....she was awful! When you get the letter from the court giving you a date for the next hearing it will have the name of the judge that will be sitting.

Did the judge use the word draft or did she ask for a position statement. My son was asked to dpo a position statement for the second hearing and this is usual. There is an example of this in the sticky by Yoji called "How to Represent yourself in Court" which is at top of the Legal Eagle section.

I feel so sorry for the children caught in the middle of this and your son is obviously feeling the strain, they pick up on a lot...just give him lots of reassurance. You are right not to question him, he'll open up about it in his own time, just let him know he can tell you anything and that you will always be there for him....its difficult when they are so young isnt it.

You might like to consider a McKenzie Friend. You would still need to pay them but its a fraction of the cost of a solicitor....my son had one attend with him and it cost £150, he was there for 3hrs and he liased with CAFCASS and her solicitor, gave advice about what to say and he sat with my son in court to support him. They cant speak for you but a good McKenzie Friend has lots of experience of court proceedings. The one my son used sent me templates for the position statement and when I'd completed it he looked over it and made some suggestions to improve it. You could also employ a barrister just for the final hearing but that could cost anything from £500 - £2000+ I think.

i

since you don't have a solicitor, you could give the CCLC a call - I think they should be there on Tuesday, which means you'd have that day to get it sorted out and then filed.

sorry to sound stupid but what is CCLC??

CCLC is the Coram Childrens Legal Centre and can provide you with legal advice and support. I dont think they can actually help you with your statement though.

I think its shocking that you cant bring up the problems that led up to this...it doesnt make sense! 😡

I know i just dont understand it either i mean the Cafcass report makes an interesting read plus my concerns i just feel like they are ignoring genuine cause for concern 🙁 and it didnt help that her solicitor felt the need to overtalk me everytime i opened my mouth i just hope they see my son is safer and better off with me.

...Its wrong not to be able to refer to the mothers history, its what has caused all of this! How can you comment on the effect without referring to the cause!!!

Some of these judges should be put out to pasture! The trouble is they are completely independent of any regulatory body except the Lord Chancellor, and can do pretty much as they please 😡

When you are asked to file and serve a statement, does it say position statement or not? Is it up to you to serve a copy of it to her solicitor and CAFCASS? I've read on here that solicitors rarely file on time, perhaps others can comment on this.

It just says a statement on the order, but when I was in court the judge said write a draft of bulletpoints why my son would be better off with me and not his mother so to be honest I don't have a clue what I should be writing :-/

I'll email you.

how do i delete threads

Would you like this topic deleted completely?