Nearly 1,000 children subject of deprivation of liberty applications since new court established nine months ago
Some 977 children have been the subject of applications for authorisation of a deprivation of liberty (DoL) since the launch in July 2022 of the national DoL court by the President of the Family Division.
Running for an initial one-year pilot phase, the DoL court is now three quarters of the way through its first 12 months.
According to latest data trends published by Nuffield Family Justice Observatory (NFJO), between July 2022 and March 2023, the national DoL court issued a total of 1,035 applications.
The organisation notes that in some cases, a ‘repeat’ application is issued within the same case, meaning that a total of 977 children have been the subject of DoL applications since the launch, (including a very small number of applications for sibling groups).
On average, there have been 115 applications per month, with the highest number of applications issued in August (131 applications). In the most recent month, March 2023, there were 126 applications, revealed the NFJO.
The data revealed that the applications were made by 149 different local authorities and 17 other applicants (usually hospital or mental health trusts).
Looking at how the number of applications varies by region, the NFJO found that between July 2022 and March 2023, just over a fifth (21.4%) of all applications were made by local authorities in the North West of England, followed by 17.0% of applications from local authorities in London.
Local authorities in the North East made the fewest number of applications (3.7% of the total). The NFJO note that this pattern of regional variation has “broadly remained the same” since July.
Looking at why the regional variations may be occurring, the NFJO said: “There are multiple possible explanations for this variation, including variation in the number of children in care, variation in the needs of children and families, and variation in access to and the availability of residential or other specialist provision.”
Lottie Winson
