Legal Update: Legal O&A

A: A child arrangements order is an order made by a court under Section 8 of the Children Act 1989, which regulates arrangements concerning who a child is to live with, spend time with or otherwise have contact with. Child arrangements orders were formerly called residence orders and contact orders, but this changed following the coming into force of the family justice sections of the Children and Families Act 2014. Existing contact and residence orders are deemed to be child arrangements orders as of 22 April 2014. An application for a child arrangements order can be made by: a parent, guardian or special guardian; a step parent who has acquired parental responsibility; any party to a marriage or civil partnership in which the child is a child of the family; any person who has lived with the child for at least three years; any person who has the consent of a person named in a child arrangements order; any person with the local authority's consent (where the child is in care); any person who has the consent of each person who has parental responsibility; and a child's relative or foster carer, where the relative/foster carer has cared for the child for at least one year immediately preceding the application. In making Section 8 orders, the child's welfare is the overriding consideration and the court will seek to make an order which it considers is in the child's best interests.