Listening to Children

Brian Cantwell, Senior Family Court Welfare Officer in Humberside, and Liz Trinder, Research and Development Officer with Save the Children North and East Division in Hull, report the initial findings of their recent research survey of court welfare work. The Children Act's requirement upon courts to have regard to the ascertainable wishes and feelings of the child in contested applications has clearly places renewed practitioner emphasis on ascertaining children's wishes, but there remains considerable variation in interpretation of 'good practice'.