Nearly 240 applications made for deprivation of liberty for children in first two months of new national court

There were 237 applications to deprive children of their liberty in the first two months of the new national deprivation of liberty (DoLs) court, the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory (NFJO) has said.

The court was launched in July 2022 by the President of the Family Division, Sir Andrew McFarlane. It is based at the Royal Courts of Justice under the leadership of Mr Justice Moor.

The court deals with all new applications seeking authorisation to deprive children of their liberty under the inherent jurisdiction and will run for a 12-month pilot phase initially.

The NFJO, which was invited to collect and publish data on these applications, said there were 101 applications in July and 136 in August. A quarter (25.1%) of applications were made by local authorities in the North West of England, followed by 15.4% of applications from London and 11.5% from the South West.

Two thirds of the applications related to children aged 14 to 16 (aged 16 – 24.7%; 15 – 23.3%; 14 – 21.6%). Applications in relation to 17-year-old children accounted for 8.8% of the total. Four per cent of the total related to 10-11 year olds, 4.4% for 12 year olds and 13.2% for 13 year olds.

The applications were almost evenly split between girls (50.6%) and boys (49.4%).

The NFJO warned in its first briefing on high-level trends that “Particular caution should be exercised when interpreting this data due to the small sample size and the fact we only have two months of data. As data collection continues, we will be able to build a better picture about how the use of deprivation of liberty applications varies across the country.”

Previous research from the NFJO found that the number of applications to deprive children of their liberty under the inherent jurisdiction had increased by 462% in the three years to 2020/21. “Despite this increase, children subject to deprivation of liberty orders do not currently appear in published administrative data or records,” it said.