Grandparents are often very important to children and yet are often squeezed out when parents split up. They may not realise that if they are not able to get the agreement of the parent who is looking after the child for contact they can probably ask the court for an order about contact, or even for an order that the child should live with them. They are often kept in the dark if social services are involved and again do not realise that they can ask the court for the opportunity to look after the child if neither of the parents seem to be up to the job. Social services are supposed to look at members of the extended family but there are all sorts of reasons why they might not including that the parents may not give the social workers all the information they need in order to communicate with other family members.

If you are a grandparent you may be entitled as a right to apply for orders about contact and residence or you may have to go through a first hurdle of persuading the court to give you permission to apply for an order. This will depend on whether the child has been living with you in the past. If the child was living with you under a Residence order then you have an automatic right to make an application to the court for a residence or contact order. If the child was living with you for at least 3 years even without a court order then you have an automatic right to apply. If the local authority has a care order and agrees you should be able to make an application then you have an automatic right and if all the people with ParentalResponsibility agree then you have an automatic right. In practice, however, if you are a grandparent who had a real involvement with the child and there is not an obvious reason why you should be shut out (such as your having abused the child yourself) you are likely to get permission to apply to the court even if you don't have an automatic right.

A grandparent may be able to get legal aid to bring an application if they have a reasonably good argument on paper for contact or residence and if they don't earn very much money. If the local authority are involved, the same applies. In practice it can be difficult for a grandparent with even a modest income to qualify for legal aid. This does not mean they cannot make an application, just that they may not be able to get legal aid. In CareProceedings the court may be much happier about letting the grandparent make an application, without agreeing that the grandparent or other family member should be a party to the proceedings (in other words have all the papers in the case and have a separate representative) if there is someone else in the case who can represent their interests. For example, mother is represented in the care case. She agrees that her mother should have the care of the children or have contact so that they are saying the same thing to the court. The court is likely to say that the mother can argue for the grandparent.

There are a number of organisations in the UK that offer advice and support to grandparents: for example

• The Family Rights Group : http://www.frg.org.uk/More/more.asp who produce an downloadable booklet for wider family members
• Children Need Families: http://www.childrenneedfamilies.co.uk/
• National Society for Children & Family Contact : http://www.nscfc.com/