·         Children’s wishes and feelings – where FCAs failed to include children’s views or feelings because of their age and without considering the child’s understanding or including reference to their feelings.

     It is worth noting that the Children's Act 1989 only provides for children's views being considered 'in the light of his age and understanding'). That said, the Ofsted inspectors provide an example of their disagreeing with CAFCASS regarding children's views, which is recorded under section 34 of their report and reads:

·        Evidence – where FCAs did not investigate thoroughly or did not provide evidence to substantiate allegations or assertions made in reports. Similarly, where reports used important terms without clarity such as asserting that ‘the children have clearly suffered emotional distress’ or that a parent ‘misuses drugs’ or ‘does not handle children well or consistently’.

·        Relevance – the relevance of reporting some statements was not clear. For example, ’their relationship commenced without their parents’ consent, although once their families learned of the relationship it was agreed they would marry.’ The report does not clarify why the issue of parental consent is mentioned at all. Another example concerned an 11-year-old girl: ’D has explained that she thinks she will shortly start her menstrual cycle. She will not talk to her father about this but has explained that she feels she has plenty of female adults around her whom she can talk to. D is prepared for her first period. She would appear to have no outstanding needs in this respect.’ Inspectors can see no reason to include such information in an application about contact.

·         Recommendations – where FCAs made recommendations that were reliant on optimism or had not been discussed with or agreed by the parties to the proceedings. Examples included suggesting specific contact arrangements or attending mediation or therapeutic interventions such as anger management courses.

     Self explanatory

·         ‘No order principle’ – inspectors are concerned that almost all private law reports gave insufficient attention to the ‘no order principle’ and most did not give reasons why it was better to make an order in the case.22 Such practices mean that most reports contain recommendations to the court that fail to take account of a key principle of the Children Act 1989 that there should be minimum state intervention in family life.

     'The No Order Principle' - The principle that a court will only make an order when necessary and if it is in the children's best interests. It is worth noting that some Judges still believe that Shared Residence Orders are only made when the parents are in agreement. If this were so, shared residence orders would never be made, since the no order principle would come into play. CAFCASS Officers can be similarly confused.

·          Welfare issues – where FCAs completed an investigation and wrote a report to court in cases where no welfare issues were identified. Statute indicates that Cafcass functions operate ‘in respect of family proceedings in which the welfare of children is or may be in question’.23

      Cafcass Should only ever be involved in your case if there are concernes raised about the children's wellfare.

·         Expertise – where FCAs offered views outside their professional expertise such as in relation to mental health.

     If questions are raised about mental health, these need to be assessed by a properly qualified psychologist or psychiatrist.

·         Cafcass report template – where this was not used by FCAs.

·         Description – where the report described rather than evaluated information it did not differentiate fact from opinion and failed to give a reasoned assessment of the consequences of the options set out for the court.