Children’s Order Quarterly Bulletin

October – December 2008 (Provisional Figures)

Table 1a: Applications entered and disposed
Table 1b: Applications entered and disposed by processing office
Table 1c: Applications entered and disposed
Table 2: Reasons for transfer [1]
Table 3: Total own motion orders
Table 4: Total interim orders
Table 5: Sitting times and applications disposed of by venue
Table 5: Sitting times and business disposed of in Northern Ireland
Table 6: Orders Made
Table 7a: Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal of cases by processing office
Table 7b: Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal of cases in Northern Ireland
Table 8: Age and gender of children
Appendix 1 - Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal by venue for Care Cases
Appendix 1 - Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal for Care Cases
Appendix 2 - Average time in weeks spent at the court tier in which the case was finally disposed
Appendix 2 - Average time in weeks spent at the court tier in which the case was finally disposed

Summary

There were 1037 applications entered during the period, of which:
102 = Public
935 = Private
There were 945 applications dealt with during the period, of which:
165 = Public
780 = Private
There were 127 cases transferred during the period.
Of the own motion orders made, 24% were in relation to Care issues.
The majority of interim orders made were in relation to Contact and Care issues.
Court time spent on Children Order business between October - December 2008:
Total time = 1028 hours 18 minutes
Ave. sitting time = 2 hours 26 minutes
There were 2,180 orders made between October - December 2008
The average waiting time in weeks between lodgement to disposal for public law cases was 30 weeks.
The average waiting time in weeks between lodgement to disposal for private law cases was 26 weeks.
There were 1,166 children involved in Children Order Proceedings during the period, of which 37% were under the age of five.

Figure 1: Number of applications received by court tier Figure 2: Reasons for Transfer

Table 1a: Applications entered and disposed

		Number of applications entered	Number of disposals
Private Law	Family Proceedings Court	849	677
	Family Care Centre	58	80
	High Court	28	23
	Total	935	780
Public Law	Family Proceedings Court	99	117
	Family Care Centre	2	38
	High Court	1	10
	Total	102	165

Private law = residence, contact, specific issues, prohibited steps, parental responsibility, financial contribution, guardianship, family assistance, non-molestation and occupation orders

Table 1b: Applications entered and disposed by processing office

		Public Law		Private Law
		Number of applications entered	Number of disposals	Number of applications entered	Number of disposals
Family Proceedings Court	Antrim	0	0	0	0
	Ballymena	13	15	73	86
	Belfast	22	31	212	174
	Coleraine	0	0	7	1
	Craigavon	8	8	64	60
	Downpatrick	0	0	1	0
	Dungannon	26	25	63	41
	Larne	0	0	1	0
	Limavady	0	0	0	0
	Lisburn	4	8	79	55
	Londonderry	6	9	127	90
	Newry	13	10	78	70
	Newtownards	7	11	141	99
	Omagh	0	0	3	1
	Venue total	99	117	849	677
Family Care Centre	Craigavon	1	10	41	30
	Londonderry	0	1	5	8
	Belfast	1	20	8	38
	Dungannon	0	7	4	4
	Venue total	2	38	58	80
High Court	Matrimonial	0	0	5	2
	Office of Care & Protection	1	10	23	21
	Venue total	1	10	28	23

Private law = residence, contact, specific issues, prohibited steps, parental responsibility, financial contribution, guardianship, family assistance, non-molestation and occupation orders.

Table 1c: Applications entered and disposed

	Public Law		Private Law
	Number of applications entered	Number of disposals	Number of applications entered	Number of disposals
Northern Ireland	102	165	935	780

Table 2: Reasons for transfer

Transferred from								Total
Transferred from		Urgency	Convenience	Gravity	Complexity	Case linked - Consolidation	Other	Total
Family Proceedings Court	Antrim	0	0	0	1	0	0	1
	Armagh	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	Ballymena	0	5	0	2	3	3	13
	Belfast	0	0	0	14	5	13	32
	Coleraine	0	0	0	0	2	1	3
	Craigavon	0	0	0	0	1	6	7
	Dungannon	0	0	0	1	0	3	4
	Larne	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
	Lisburn	0	0	0	5	0	2	7
	Londonderry	0	0	0	1	1	4	6
	Newry	0	1	0	3	1	1	6
	Newtownards	0	0	0	3	0	1	4
	Omagh	0	0	0	1	0	0	1
	Venue total	0	6	0	31	13	34	84
Family Care Centre	Belfast	0	0	0	9	2	13	24
	Craigavon	0	0	0	0	0	13	13
	Dungannon	0	0	0	2	2	0	4
	Londonderry	0	0	0	0	1	1	2
	Venue total	0	0	0	11	5	27	43
High Court	Office of Care and Protection	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
High Court	Venue total	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Northern Ireland Total		0	6	0	42	18	61	127

Where a court tier / venue is omitted, this indicates a nil return for the period to date.
Total number of reasons for transfer. There may be more than one reason for each case.

Table 3: Total own motion orders

	Own motion orders
Parental Responsibility	0
Contact: Permission	167
Contact: Refusal	0
Residence	58
Prohibited Steps	9
Specific Issues	18
Family Assistance	1
Care	186
Supervision	17
Education Supervision	3
Declaration of Parentage	1
Child Assessment	2
Emergency Protection	1
Extension of EPO	0
Recovery	0
Secure Accommodation	8
Article 53 Contract	0
Appointment of Guardian under Part XV	34
Contribution and other Financial	0
Non-Molestation Order	0
Occupation Articles	0
Article 56 Investigations	0
Exclusion Requirement	0
Other orders, applications etc	257
Total	762

Table 4: Total interim orders

	Interim orders
Parental Responsibility	1
Contact: Permission	1600
Contact: Refusal	0
Residence	320
Prohibited Steps	108
Specific Issues	6
Family Assistance	0
Care	873
Supervision	76
Education Supervision	0
Child Assessment	0
Emergency Protection	0
Extension of EPO	0
Recovery	0
Secure Accommodation	2
Article 53 Contract	0
Appointment of Guardian under Part XV	0
Contribution and other Financial	0
Non-Molestation Order	6
Occupation Articles	0
Article 56 Investigations	0
Exclusion Requirement	0
Other orders, applications etc	0
Total	2992

Table 5: Sitting times and applications disposed of by venue

		Total sitting time	Average sitting time	Total sittings
Family Proceedings Court	Antrim	13:20	3:20	4
	Ballymena	57:46	3:51	15
	Belfast	196:46	3:39	54
	Coleraine	18:10	3:02	6
	Craigavon	35:45	2:33	14
	Downpatrick	0:20	0:20	1
	Dungannon	29:55	4:16	7
	Larne	12:05	3:01	4
	Lisburn	38:05	3:28	11
	Londonderry	87:28	3:30	25
	Newry	49:00	2:35	19
	Newtownards	85:30	2:15	38
	Omagh	56:35	5:09	11
	Venue total	680:45	3:15	209
Family Care Centre	Belfast	154:46	1:36	97
	Craigavon	71:59	3:08	23
	Dungannon	9:24	1:53	5
	Lisburn	1:40	1:40	1
	Londonderry	13:55	1:33	9
	Omagh	4:47	2:24	2
	Venue total	256:31	1:52	137
High Court	Matrimonial	3:00	1:30	2
	Office of Care & Protection	88:02	1:10	76
	Venue total	91:02	1:10	78

Table 5: Sitting times and business disposed of in Northern Ireland

	Total sitting time	Average sitting time	Total sittings
Northern Ireland	1028:18	2:26	424

Total sittings include both minority and majority sittings

Table 6: Orders Made

		Orders Made		Total
		By Consent	Other	Total
Orders Made	ADJOURN GENERALLY	0	8	8
	APPLICATION DISMISSED	0	0	0
	APPLICATION REFUSED	0	0	0
	ARTICLE 20 NON-MOLESTATION ORDER	0	2	2
	ARTICLE 53 CONTACT WITH A CHILD IN CARE	3	1	4
	C18 - FINAL ORDER	325	219	544
	CARE ORDER	27	39	66
	CASE WITHDRAWN	1	54	55
	CONTACT ORDER	400	157	557
	DECLARATION OF PARENTAGE	8	3	11
	DISCHARGE RESIDENCE ORDER	0	0	0
	DISCHARGE NON MOLESTATION OCCUPATION ORDER	0	4	4
	DISCHARGE / VARIATION OF A SUPERVISION ORDER	0	1	1
	DISCHARGING A CARE ORDER	0	2	2
	DISMISS ORDER (CHILDREN ORDER)	0	3	3
	EDUCATION SUPERVISION ORDER	0	5	5
	EMERGENCY PROTECTION ORDER	7	9	16
	EMERGENCY PROTECTION ORDER - OUT OF HOURS	0	6	6
	EXTENSION OF AN EMERGENCY PROTECTION ORDER	4	4	8
	FAMILY ASSISTANCE ORDER	0	2	2
	LEAVE TO CHANGE SURNAME BY WHICH CHILD IS KNOWN	4	2	6
	LEAVE TO WITHDRAW	0	9	9
	ORDER FOR LEAVE OF COURT	0	30	30
	ORDER FOR RECOVERY OF A CHILD	1	5	6
	ORDER OR DIRECTIONS FINAL	0	0	0
	ORDER TERMINATING APPOINTMENT OF GAL	84	45	129
	OTHER ORDER	82	69	151
	PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY ORDER	30	15	45
	PROHIBITED STEPS ORDER	12	28	40
	REFUSAL OF ARTICLE 3 CERTIFICATION	0	2	2
	RESIDENCE ORDER	224	120	344
	SECURE ACCOMMODATION ORDER	13	22	35
	SPECIFIC ISSUES ORDER	8	26	34
	STRIKE OUT	0	34	34
	SUPERVISION ORDER	15	6	21
Total		1248	932	2180

Table 7a: Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal of cases by processing office

		Public law		Private law
		Average time weeks	Number of cases	Average time weeks	Number of cases
Family Proceedings Court	Antrim	0	0	0	0
	Ballymena	22.2	15	19.3	86
	Belfast	34.3	31	23.3	174
	Coleraine	0	0	0.7	1
	Craigavon	33.5	8	23.1	60
	Dungannon	9.8	25	21.3	41
	Larne	0	0	0	0
	Lisburn	33.6	8	19.1	55
	Londonderry	38.1	9	21.5	90
	Newry	17.3	10	20.0	70
	Newtownards	42.8	11	23.4	99
	Omagh	0	0	0.0	1
	Total	27.0	117	21.7	677
Family Care Centre	Belfast	35.5	20	82.2	38
	Craigavon	23.1	10	14.8	30
	Dungannon	24.4	7	28.0	4
	Londonderry	106.4	1	71.7	8
	Total	32.0	38	53.2	80
High Court	Matrimonial	0	0	136.1	2
	Office of Care & Protection	58.7	10	44.5	21
	Total	58.7	10	52.4	23

Nb Cases disposed will include time spent at the lower court tier.

Table 7b: Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal of cases in Northern Ireland

	Public law		Private law
	Average time weeks	Number of cases	Average time weeks	Number of cases
Northern Ireland	30.1	165	25.8	780

Nb Cases disposed will include time spent at the lower court tier.

Table 8: Age and gender of children

	0-4	5-8	9-12	13-16	Total
Male	257	161	129	70	617
Female	177	173	137	54	541
Unknown	0	2	4	2	8
Total	434	336	270	126	1166

Appendix 1 - Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal by venue for Care Cases

		Average time in weeks	Number of cases
Family Proceedings Court	Ballymena	46.0	5
	Belfast	49.2	17
	Craigavon	45.6	5
	Dungannon	35.8	2
	Lisburn	48.8	4
	Londonderry	80.0	3
	Newry	34.5	5
	Newtownards	49.2	4
	Total	48.2	45
Family Care Centre	Belfast	38.5	16
	Craigavon	32.0	7
	Dungannon	32.8	4
	Londonderry	106.5	1
	Total	38.5	28
High Court	Office of Care & Protection	67.2	6
High Court	Total	67.2	6

Nb Cases disposed will include time spent at the lower court tier. This table includes all care applications irrespective of the order made.

Appendix 1 - Average time in weeks from lodgement to disposal for Care Cases

	Average time weeks	Number of cases
Northern Ireland	46.2	79

Nb Cases disposed will include time spent at the lower court tier. This table includes all care applications irrespective of the order made.

Appendix 2 - Average time in weeks spent at the court tier in which the case was finally disposed

		Public Law	Private Law
Family Proceedings Court	Antrim	0	0
	Ballymena	20.7	19.3
	Belfast	34.3	21.9
	Coleraine	0	0.7
	Craigavon	33.4	23.1
	Dungannon	11.6	20.4
	Lisburn	33.6	18.5
	Londonderry	38.1	21.1
	Newtownards	42.8	23.3
	Newry	17.3	19.7
	Omagh	0	0.0
	Total	26.8	21.1
Family Care Centre	Belfast	18.2	49.6
	Craigavon	5.1	10.8
	Dungannon	19.9	6.3
	Londonderry	33.6	41.9
	Total	15.5	32.1
High Court	Matrimonial	0	118.4
	Office of Care & Protection	45.7	37.5
	Total	45.7	44.5

Appendix 2 - Average time in weeks spent at the court tier in which the case was finally disposed

	Public Law	Private Law
Northern Ireland	25.3	22.9