Risk Managment

Since our last contact with the children's sibling we have been waiting for information from social services.

To cut a long story short, the sibling has been in direct contact with their birth mum. Something we were not aware of. We should have been aware so we could have made the right choices about the location and format that our contact arrangement took. It turns out that she has made an application to court for him to be returned to her care as social services can not locate an adoptive placement for him. I didn't understand or appreciate that children with a plan for adoption have direct contact with birth family stopped in a appropriate manner but a child in long term foster care does include a plan for direct family contact. The change in status of the sibling has meant that this contact (which had been stopped) was re-started and then increased as part of the court proceedings as they require a full report of

Anyway we took the children to a soft play centre that we use regularly. It is the one nearest to home. They are invited to parties that their friends have there. We allowed the children to play together, under supervision but out of hearing range, We don't know what they talked about, if anything,

Had we have know we would have gone somewhere further from home, more neutral and the children would not have been allowed out of ear shot.

The risk we have to manage when direct contact is taking place is whether our children could share information that could locate us which their sibling passes onwards to their birth mum without realising the consequences. He is not old enough to understand the consequences. Our oldest is, rightly, very proud of the fact that he knows his full name, address and what school he goes to. All information which is denied to his birth family.

I know that we are probably worrying about nothing, We have almost definitely over reacting but I have made an issue of this with social services on the grounds that we are entitled to have the information that allows us to make the best choices for our children - for their safety, for the sanctity of our home and their school environment and the emotional well being of our family.