In an emergency situation, the police can remove a child from his home (or elsewhere) to a place of safety, or prevent the child being removed from a safe place such as a hospital (‘police protection’) for ≤72 hours, on the grounds of reasonable cause to suspect the child may be suffering, or likely to suffer, significant harm. The police must inform social services as soon as practicably
possible, who must provide accommodation. The police must inform parents of the action taken, but not necessarily where the child is, and may restrict contact between the child and parents.
Parental responsibility is not shared.
An emergency protection order (EPO)18 may be requested from the court under section 44 of CA89 if a child is in immediate danger19 from the risks of returning home, but the parents will not agree to the child being accommodated by the local authority under section 17 of CA89 as a ‘child in need’.
Anyone may apply to a magistrate for an EPO, but application is usually made by social services. An EPO may be granted on the application of:
• any person, where there is reasonable chance a child will suffer significant harm if not removed to a safe place or kept in a safe place
• local authorities, where enquiries are being made as to whether a child is suffering or at risk or harm, and where these enquiries are being frustrated or access to the child is unreasonably refused
• the NSPCC, where there is reasonable cause to suspect a child will suffer significant harm or where enquiries into a child’s welfare are being frustrated or access to the child is unreasonably refused.
An EPO may last for up to eight days and may be extended for another seven days. After this, the local authority may start care proceedings. Parental responsibility is shared by the local authority during the time an EPO is in force. Parents are entitled to have
contact, although this may be supervised by the local authority.
Rather than the child having to leave home during an EPO, an ‘exclusion requirement’ can be made as part of the EPO, requiring an adult who is considered to be a danger to the child to leave the home. This can be enforced only with cooperation of the resident parent.