Mr B complained that Cafcass failed to follow a court order to allow him to see his children. He said that its response to his concerns was inadequate because it just endorsed its own actions. Mr B said that Cafcass was partly responsible for his loss of contact with his children.
What happened
A court ordered that a Cafcass officer (the officer) should meet Mr B's children and supervise one session of contact between them and Mr B. However, before that meeting took place, the officer became aware that it was likely the children had witnessed Mr B assaulting their mother. The officer discussed the case with her manager and they decided that the officer would see the children to establish their wishes and feelings before she arranged the supervised contact session. The contact session did not take place.
Less than two months later, the court ordered that supervised, weekly contact should take place between Mr B and his children. Contact started but broke down soon after.
Mr B complained to Cafcass. In its response to the complaint, Cafcass reported the views of the judge, who said that she did not think the officer had acted unprofessionally.
What we found
We partly upheld this complaint. It was the officer's professional judgment that she should not supervise a contact session between Mr B and his children. This was an opinion she was entitled to hold and one that could have been challenged in court. The officer tried to clarify the court order with the court and the judge. However, when it became clear that she was unable to do this quickly, the officer should have recognised that the correct procedure was to apply to the court to vary the court order. The officer did not do so; she did not get this right.
While Cafcass accurately reported some of the information from the judge in its response to Mr B's complaint, it did not disclose all of the judge's comments – some of which were critical of Cafcass. Cafcass did not acknowledge that the officer should have sought to vary the court order, as the judge had stated. We did not consider that Cafcass was open and accountable.
However, we did not believe that the officer's decision not to arrange one contact session between Mr B and his children resulted in contact breaking down. The court subsequently ordered contact and some contact took place between the children and Mr B. However, this contact was not without its difficulties. We noted that Cafcass's recommendation in a report to the court was that further contact should take place, and the court ordered such contact. We also noted that the officer tried to facilitate contact between Mr B and his children by giving them reassurance and support both in person and by email.
From the evidence we saw, it seemed that contact broke down because the children no longer wanted to see Mr B. It appeared the children's views persisted, despite the court suggesting mediation and psychotherapy. There was no evidence to suggest that the children's views were formed as a result of missing one supervised contact session with Mr B.
We concluded that, while the officer should have applied to vary the court order, we could not say what the outcome would have been had she done so. We could not reasonably say that her failure to vary the court order led to the breakdown of contact between Mr B and his children.
Putting it right
We recommended that Cafcass apologise to Mr B for the officer's failure to follow the correct process by applying to the court to vary the court order and for its failure to be open and transparent in its complaint response to him. But Mr B did not want Cafcass's apology so we did not follow up with this.
Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass)
UK
Not applicable
Not applicable