Councils prompted to step up efforts to improve paperwork in family law cases

John Coughlan, director of children’s services in Hampshire, said the quality of information going before courts must be vetted to a higher standard.

Under proposals set out by review chairman David Norgrove in an interim report in April, courts will no longer need to subject a child's full care plan to "rigorous scrutiny", removing checks on local authority decisions.

The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) has previously said the move could reduce the length of cases by as much as half, but the Family Rights Group has said it fears the move could result in "greater injustices and poorer decision-making".

Speaking at the annual conference of National Children and Adult Services in London, Coughlan said local authority quality assurance must be examined.

"We have got to get clearer about what our quality assurance processes are for what we put before the court," he said.

"If we send social workers into court who can’t write a good report then woe betide us. Some authorities are still struggling around capacity in the social work service, let alone the skills.

"Newly qualified social workers are coming through the system at the moment and it fills me with hope, but we need to find ways to develop what their skills are." 

Coughlan added that family court judges should not be "micro-managing" cases.

"We [the review panel] didn’t find detailed scrutiny of care plans by courts added value to the process.

"Courts have moved away from the original intention of the Children Act and have moved more and more into the pre-Children Act wardship function of trying to micro-manage what they are doing with a child."

The final report of the Family Justice Review is due to be published in the coming weeks.