Ministry of Justice (MoJ) family court data shows it took 30 weeks to dispose of a care or supervision case during April to June this year. This is two weeks longer than the same quarter in 2017 and the highest average since 2014.
Under the Public Law Outline, care and supervision proceedings should be completed within 26 weeks.
But from April to June this year, just 48 per cent of cases were disposed of within this target, which is down eight percentage points over the same period in 2017.
The increase in the average length of care proceedings comes as the number of children in care rises at its fastest rate in five years.
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