Interim Care Order in UK Law

Under the interim care order the decision-making power as to the care, residence and general welfare of the child is vested in the local authority, not in the court. Under the interim care order the decision-making power as to the care, residence and general welfare of the child is vested in the local authority, not in the court.

The purpose of subsection (6) is to enable the court to obtain the information necessary for its own decision, notwithstanding the control over the child which in all other respects rests with the local authority. The purpose of subsection (6) is to enable the court to obtain the information necessary for its own decision, notwithstanding the control over the child which in all other respects rests with the local authority.

Next, it is true that the subsections (6) and (7) only refer to the assessment "of the child" and not, as is proposed in the present case, a joint assessment of the child and the parents, including the parents' attitude and behaviour towards the child.

The regime of interim care orders laid down by section 38 of the Act (with its limitation to maximum periods of eight weeks in the first instance and four weeks thereafter) is designed to leave the court with the ability to maintain strict control of any steps taken or proposed by a local authority in the exercise of powers that are by their nature temporary and subject to continuous review.

Decisions in this court have emphasised that at an interim stage the removal of children from their parents is not to be sanctioned unless the child's safety requires interim protection. The cases to this effect already reported are H (A Child) (Interim Care Order) [2003] 1 FCR 350 and M (Interim Care Order: Removal) [2006] 1 FLR 1043. Mr Hepher also draws attention to a similar approach in the European case of Haase v Germany [2004] 2 FLR 39.

Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council applied for an interim care order. On 23 October M was discharged from hospital into the care of an aunt, with supervised access for the parents. At a hearing on 23 December the court decided M's injuries were non-accidental and care was given to the aunt. More tests were carried out, and the revised medical opinion was that the history and injuries were consistent with brittle bone disease.

As I hope I have already made clear, it would, in my judgment, be both highly artificial and unprincipled if the protection afforded to social services and the doctors in the investigation of child abuse ceased (perhaps temporarily, or in relation only to one part of the investigation) when an interim care order was made, or otherwise where it might temporarily be argued that there was no actual conflict of interest between the parent and the local authority.