Kinship care

Reforming the law to improve the current complex landscape, making options for kinship care for children simpler and easier to navigate.

Consultation paper

The Law Commission has now published its consultation paper on kinship care. The public consultation period is now open and will run until 16 October 2026.

Find out how to respond

We invite consultees to submit responses via the online response form. If possible, please use this method.

Alternatively, you can respond by email or by post (see our contact details at the end of this page).

Key proposals

The consultation paper contains provisional proposals to reform kinship care law in England and Wales, on which we are seeking consultees’ views.

Our provisional proposals include

a proposal for a new form of kinship care order (“KCO”), a flexible order which could be tailored to reflect the particular circumstances of the child in the kinship care arrangement, as well as those of their parents and kinship carer.

a KCO would be available to kinship carers only, and would replace, for them, the use of special guardianship orders (“SGOs”) and child arrangements orders (“CAOs”). Existing SGOs and CAOs in favour of kinship carers would be unaffected.

a kinship parental responsibility agreement (“kinship PRA”), which would enable parents to enter into an agreement with a kinship carer who is also a close relative of the child, granting the kinship carer parental responsibility for the child.

a kinship PRA could be for any duration from one year up to the remainder of the time until the child reaches 18. A kinship PRA could be entered into before a planned period of kinship care, allowing families to make arrangements for children in advance. We consider that kinship PRAs could be of particular use in a situation where informal kinship care is taking place.

a proposal to adopt the definition of kinship care contained in section 22I of the Children Act 1989, with some additional eligibility requirements, for the purposes of the new KCO and kinship PRA.

The consultation paper also contains proposals to improve consistency of assessment for kinship foster carers in England and Wales, and we seek consultees’ views on how the assessment process for kinship foster carers in England could be reformed, to reflect the particular circumstances of kinship care.

Finally, we make proposals for reform of certain aspects of SGOs and CAOs, as an alternative to our proposals for introduction of a KCO.

Response form for the Easy Read summary of the consultation paper

We have published an Easy Read summary of the consultation paper. The summary does not contain consultation questions. We have therefore also produced a short response form with 11 questions, asking consultees to tell us about their experiences of kinship care and for their views on our proposals. This response form is not intended to replace the questions in the consultation paper, but we appreciate that people using the Easy Read summary may find it easier to respond to the response form than to the full consultation paper.

If consultees are responding to the consultation paper, there is no need to also complete the response form.

Background (Back to top)

Kinship care has been defined as:

“Any situation in which a child is being raised in the care of a friend or family member who is not their parent for a significant amount of the time. The arrangement may be temporary or longer term.”

(Department for Education, Stable Homes, Built on Love: Implementation Strategy and Consultation (February 2023) p 85)

It is estimated that around 141,000 children live in kinship care arrangements in England and Wales. Most commonly, kinship care will be an alternative to the child entering the care system, or a way of caring for a child who is the subject of a care order.

There are a number of ways to formalise kinship care, including:

special guardianship orders
child arrangements orders
fostering

This variety is confusing and hard to navigate for kinship carers who do not always feel confident that the order underpinning their arrangement is right for their circumstances.

Project (Back to top)

The project considers the scope for reform to simplify and streamline the orders underpinning kinship care placements and how better to support the consideration of kinship care as an option for children who cannot remain with their parents. 

It was referred to us as part of the Government’s kinship strategy, published as Championing Kinship Care – The National Kinship Care Strategy, in December 2023. The aim of the project is to reform the law to facilitate kinship care for children. The areas the project considers are set out in the project Terms of Reference.

Consultation events (Back to top)

In-person events

As part of our consultation process, we are holding several in-person events, open to all and free to attend. At these consultation events we will discuss our provisional proposals for reform, listen to attendees’ views, and answer questions.

The in-person events are detailed below. Space at these events is limited, so if you wish to attend, please complete the relevant form, which provides details of the event. Please see our Law Commission Eventbrite page for more information about all our events.

Northumbria, Newcastle on 8 September 2026 from 3.30 to 5.00 pm. Please follow the link here for details of this event, and the Eventbrite registration form.

Leeds Beckett University on 9 September 2026 from 3.30 to 5.00 pm. Please follow the link here for details of this event, and the Eventbrite registration form,

University of Birmingham on 16 September 2026 from 3.00 to 4:30 pm. Please follow the link here for details of this event, and the Eventbrite registration form.

Cardiff University on 24 September 2026 from 3.30 to 5.00 pm. lease follow the link here for details of this event, and the Eventbrite registration form.

University of Westminster, London on 28 September 2026 from 4.00 to 5:30 pm. Please follow the link here for details of this event, and the Eventbrite registration form.

We encourage participants to tell us ahead of the event if there are any particular topics they would like to discuss by emailing the kinship care team at kinshipcare@lawcommission.gov.uk.

Online events

We are also holding several online events, aimed at groups of consultees who may have similar experiences or concerns. These events will be held via Microsoft Teams, and joining instructions will be provided nearer the time. These events are open to consultees from both England and Wales.

Event for local authorities and social workers on 3 September 2026 from 4.00 to 6.00 pm. Please follow the links for details of this event (a copy of this document is also available in Welsh), and the Eventbrite registration form, in English and Welsh.

Event for legal professionals on 29 September 2026 from 5.00 to 7.00 pm. Please follow the links for details of this event (a copy of this document is also available in Welsh), and the Eventbrite registration form, in English and Welsh.

Event for kinship carers on 6 October from 11.00 am to 12.30 pm. Please follow the links for details of this event (a copy of this document is also available in Welsh), and the Eventbrite registration form, in English and Welsh.

If you wish to contribute to an online event in Welsh, please let the kinship care team know by email on kinshipcare@lawcommission.gov.uk, at least 14 days before the event, so that we can arrange for translation facilities. Please can attendees also let us know in advance if there are any particular topics they would like to discuss.

In addition to these online events, we intend to hold further online events, aimed at parents whose children are or have been in kinship care and those who support them, as well as two events for young people with experience of kinship care in England and Wales respectively. These events will be by invitation only; if you would be interested in attending such an event, please do contact us.

Next steps (Back to top)

Our public consultation on kinship care runs from 8 July 2026 to 15 October 2026. During this period, we will host a number of consultation events (as detailed above), and invite written responses to our consultation paper.

We would like to hear from as many stakeholders as possible, including young people who have experienced kinship care, kinship carers, parents, local authorities, social workers, lawyers, charities and anyone with experience of or an interest in kinship care.

After the public consultation closes, we will consider consultees’ responses to our provisional proposals. We will later publish a final report setting out the conclusions that we reach and our recommendations to the UK Government and Welsh Government for reform of the law. We anticipate that our final report, containing our recommendations for law reform, will be published in autumn 2027.