Brendan Fleming - Care Proceedings Solicitors
What Are Care Proceedings?
Care proceedings is a legal process started by Children’s Services (also referred to as the local authority) as a result of a local authority being of the view that there are significant concerns about a child’s welfare, including but not limited to, allegations of physical harm, emotional harm, sexual abuse, neglect and a child/children being considered beyond parental control.
Here at Brendan Fleming Solicitors, we are passionate about all aspects of care proceedings. Not only do we offer legal advice and representation to parents, children, intervenors, grandparents and other family members, but we seek to support and guide you throughout what is likely to be a complex and emotional journey. Let us help you defend the allegations of children’s services and fight to avoid your child/children being potentially removed from your care, either temporarily or permanently.
Do I Need A Solicitor?
We would suggest that the involvement of legal representation in care proceedings is vital. The role of any legal representative within care proceedings is to ensure your voice is heard, to apply the relevant law and legal principles when challenging the local authority’s case and to gather the relevant evidence in support of your case.
Why Choose Us?
Our dedicated team have considerable experience in handling the most complex cases to include where there are serious allegations of abuse towards a child or where there are complex legal matters such as jurisdictional arguments and applications for a deprivation of liberty and/or secure accommodation.
Regardless of the local authority’s reported concerns, our team is here to help with all aspects of the case. We will support and guide you throughout what is likely to be a complex and emotional journey.
Our family law team includes members of the Law Society’s Children Panel and the Family Law Advanced Panel.
Legal Aid
Representation via legal aid is free where Care Proceedings have been initiated by the local authority, if you are a parent or someone with parental responsibility.
If you are not a person with parental responsibility, then legal aid may be available subject to meeting certain criteria set by the Legal Aid Agency, giving due consideration to means (finances) and/ or merits of an application. Our team will explore legal aid eligibility with you from the outset. If you do not qualify for legal aid, we work on fees tailored to your specific needs, agreeing a fee structure with you directly with no hidden charges as your case proceeds. Costs are always discussed with you beforehand, and our team will provide complete transparency.
Please do not delay in contacting the team as we need to move quickly to ensure that we can start representing you without delay.
The quicker we are instructed, the quicker we can start helping you.
If your Care Proceedings case has already started, it may not be too late to work with us as there is still a chance that we can take over. Contact us to discuss the options that may be available.
A family judge's opinion of what parents have to suffer from care proceedings...
“I am a passionate believer in the value of adoption in appropriate circumstances… But I fear that, in making all those orders, I never gave much attention to the emotional repercussions of them. In particular I fear that I failed fully to appreciate that an adoption order is not just a necessary arrangement for the upbringing of some children… the order is an act of surgery which cuts deep into the hearts and minds of at least four people and will effect them, to a greater or lesser extent, every day of their lives…”
– Lord Wilson Denning Society Lecture, 13th November 2014
Accreditations
Contracted with the Legal Aid Agency.
Get In Touch
- info@brendanfleming.co.uk
- 0800 999 1408
- 165 Newhall Street St. Paul’s Square Birmingham B3 1SW
Any data that you submit using this web form will be held by our firm as Data Controller and will be held securely for 12 months before being securely and confidentially destroyed. Your data will not be disclosed to any third parties without your consent or as otherwise allowed by the relevant Data Protection legislation and will only be used for responding to your query (or purposes associated with that purpose).
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