Special guardianship
Special guardianship is a new legal option intended to provide permanence for children for whom adoption is not appropriate.
A special guardianship order (SGO) gives the special guardian parental responsibility for the child. Unlike adoption, under a SGO the parents remain the child's parents and retain parental responsibility, though their ability to exercise their parental responsibility is extremely limited.
The intention is that the special guardian will have clear responsibility for all the day-to-day decisions about caring for the child or young person and for taking any other decisions about their upbringing, for example their education. A special guardian may exercise parental responsibility to the exclusion of others with parental responsibility, such as the birth parents, and without needing to consult them in all but a few circumstances.
A special guardianship order will:
- Give the carer clear responsibility for all aspects of caring for the child
or young person, and for taking decisions to do with their upbringing
- Provide a firm foundation on which to build a lifelong permanent
relationship between the carer and the child or young person
- Preserve the basic legal link between the child or young person and their
birth family
- Be accompanied by proper access to a full range of support services including, where appropriate, financial support
An SGO is flexible and can work in a variety of situations:
- For older children who do not wish to be legally separated from their birth
family, but could benefit from greater legal security and permanence
- For children in long-term foster care or those who are cared for on a
permanent basis by members of their wider family
- For children and carers who have cultural and religious difficulties with adoption as set out in law
Click to view the Special Guardianship Regulations 2005.
Statutory guidance has been produced to accompany the regulations.
Special Guardianship Guidance (2005)
Local authorities may also find it helpful to refer to the good practice guidance on assessing adoption support needs, as the process for assessing needs for special guardianship support services will be very similar.
Practice Guidance on Assessing the Support Needs of Adoptive Families (2005)
This page was last updated on 28 June 2007
