From parental co-operation to parental participation: exploring the development of "relevant person" status in the children's hearings system and implications for reform

In 2023 the most recent review of the children’s hearings system, carried out by the Hearings System Working Group, reaffirmed the centrality of parental involvement in decision making that has always characterised children’s hearings. Alongside this, the Group highlighted the “increasingly complex legislative and rights-based environment” of a modern children’s hearing. This article explores the connection between these two conclusions and their implications for future practice within, and reform of, the children’s hearings system. It is concluded that while parental involvement in decision-making has always been a feature of the children’s hearings system there has been a shift from that involvement being about co-operating with the decision maker to address the child’s needs towards a recognition of the participation rights of the parent. This shift has contributed to increased legal technicality in the children’s hearings system; something which places more onus on the skills of children’s panel members and children’s reporters to practice in a manner that does not compromise the inquisitorial and less formal atmosphere characteristic of the children’s hearings system. While significant, this increased onus does not necessitate law reform. Rather it can be responded to by greater consideration of how the non-legally qualified actors in the system can be supported under the current legislation to enhance their knowledge and skills to implement the technical legislation more fully in practice.