‘Is it a positive or a negative?’ Children’s participation in discharge of care order proceedings

This paper explores the involvement of children in discharge of care applications and the tensions children’s guardians and other stakeholders may face when aiming to both uphold children’s rights to participate and their right to protection from harm. Using Lundy’s (2007) model of participation and drawing on qualitative interviews and a focus group with 41 family justice professionals and data from 209 electronic records relating to 327 children, this paper explores the extent to which children are given space, voice, audience and influence within discharge proceedings. In principle professionals were supportive of children’s participation. The reality was more complex, with only a minority of children consulted about discharge proceedings and professionals inferring their views in many situations, for fear of causing further distress or traumatisation. The findings from the study suggests that a fifth concept, impact, should be included within Lundy’s model, whereby the potential impact of participation on children’s wellbeing is considered alongside space, voice, audience and influence.