Professionals support calls for Care Review to examine supervision orders

Just under half (45 per cent) of professionals who took part in a survey by the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory (FJO) said they support calls for a review of such orders, which can be put in place during care proceedings to ensure the child is kept safe where the court decides that a child should remain with, or return to, their parents.

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The same respondents said they also think some changes are needed to make them more effective.

The survey comes following the publication of a report by the Public Law Working Group – which was set up by the president of the Family Division to investigate steep rises in public law cases – which recommends that the government should review supervision orders with the aim of providing “a more robust and effective form of a public law order”. 

It states that this review could be carried out as part of the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care in England.

“The government should review the components of a supervision order with the recommendation that they be revised to provide a more robust and effective form of a public law order. This might best be considered as part of the wider Independent Review of Children’s Social Care which is now under way,” the report states.

Concerns raised over the use of supervision orders by the Public Law Working Group include questions over how useful such orders are.

The report adds that: “Early case-law established that '...supervision should not in any sense be seen as a sort of watered-down version of care. It is wholly different'”. 

It also raises concerns over the fact that local authorities can only intervene in situations where a supervision order is in place if the action is agreed in court.

Previous research by Lancaster University has also raised questions about the effectiveness of standalone supervision orders, and identified varying practice across regions.

However, nine out of 10 professionals who took part in the study also supported the continued use of such orders overall. 

A key reason for this was the need for a proportionate order between a care order and no order when children were returning home at the end of proceedings in which the threshold for a care or supervision order had been established, the research found.

Lisa Harker, director of Nuffield FJO, said: “The Nuffield Family Justice Observatory is committed to holding up a mirror to practice in the family justice system. 

“For some time questions have been raised about the effectiveness and value of supervision orders. Respondents to this survey highlighted many of the problems. However, there was also strong support for retaining supervision orders if these problems can be addressed.”