A Health & Social Care Trust v C

[1] The identities of the parties to these proceedings have been anonymised in order to protect the interests of the child to whom the proceedings relate. Nothing may be publicised or disclosed which reveals the identity of the child, directly or indirectly.

[2] M is 15 months old. He was born to C who has now indicated that she is transgender and wishes to be regarded as a man called J. The identity of M�'s actual father is unknown.

[4] In light of the evidence of positive changes in J�'s life since then, the Trust agreed an alternative way forward. At a review on 25 November 2016 in this court, Ms Simpson QC on behalf of J indicated that her client agreed to engage in the Trust�'s Home on Time assessment but wanted reassurance that after M moved to concurrent carers time would be allowed for settling in before the actual start of the assessment.

(i) That he doesn�'t have, or doesn�'t yet have, the same good relationship with the concurrent carers as he had with the couple who fostered M for the last year. I do not regard this as an issue of any substance. I would not expect him to have the equivalent relationship, certainly not at this stage. By all accounts the previous foster carers were unusually open and accessible. That may or may not develop with the concurrent carers as time goes on (hopefully it will) but it is not critical and it cannot be the basis for an application to bring the current assessment to an end.

(iii) There are other general concerns about how contact starts and ends and where the handover should be. None of these is or should be especially difficult to make progress on and none of them touches on whether Home on Time should continue.