When courts are reviewing who will care for children, they consider financial means. A family member who you would like to be the guardian may not have the income or assets needed to raise your children. You have several options to achieve this. Life insurance is one of the easiest ways to provide for your children. You can buy a policy that covers your future earnings or what you would have spent to raise them including college costs.
You can name your children as beneficiaries, or have the money go into a trust on their behalf. You can also use your will to leave money to your children. A will has to go through probate, and if you have debts, your creditors may be entitled to repayment before your heirs receive anything.
A will also provides the lowest degree of control over how the money you leave is spent. A trust with your children as the beneficiary holds assets to your benefit during your life and then automatically transfers them to your children upon your death.
Some of the major benefits of using a trust are that you can set it up to hold money until your children reach a certain age or to be used for a specific purpose. You should also prepare for a long-term illness or other incapacitation.
Life insurance, wills, and trusts only work after death. If you are still alive, your family will need the legal authority to access your funds to use for your children. A durable power of attorney kicks in on a triggering event you specify such as your hospitalization. You can give your power of attorney access to your checking account, or you can maintain a separate savings account with funds for your children in case of an emergency.
In both types of guardianship, the basic premise is that the individual cannot conduct reasonable self-care. This may be true of both minors and adults, but most children have parents in place to act in their best interest.
When our valued elders, for example, begin to lose the physical and cognitive skills to make salient health, wellness, and financial decisions, oversight may be necessary. Other adults may temporarily fall ill, and the protections are put in place only until they recover. When children go astray, become incapacitated, or a parent is unable to provide proper care for them, guardianship tends to be a stop-gap measure.
Either the situation corrects itself, or the minor eventually becomes an adult and takes on their own decision-making. In either case, the court will need to be formally petitioned to end a guardianship. In all likelihood, either a third party petitioned the court and won a case against you to deem you incompetent, or you came to the process voluntarily. This difference has a substantial impact on termination.
Going to the court and asking to be voluntarily deemed a ward came with certain advantages. You probably had input about who would become your guardian during your recovery. And, your wishes about what areas this person would hold legal sway may have been negotiated. Terminating a voluntary guardianship often entails merely proving you have regained competence. On the other hand, involuntary tracts could mean that you will face increased resistance from the party or parties that petitioned the court in the first place.
That may mean overcoming objections as well as having documentation and testimony from experts that you are prepared to resume control over your affairs. These are common steps that are required to terminate a guardianship. If the guardianship pertained to end-of-life considerations, the court generally requires a financial accounting before releasing the guardian. The challenges confronting parents or other loved ones trying to terminate a guardianship and regain custody can be significantly different.
In order to restore your parental rights and regain custody of a child, you may be tasked with petitioning the court to terminate a guardianship. Much like when adults are deemed wards of the court, the reason your child has a guardian in place will likely impact how difficult you can anticipate the process ahead. For instance, if another family member petitioned the court to have your child made a ward, the underlying claims will likely need to be adequately addressed. If it involved substance abuse, neglect, or a health condition, a proactive filing and subsequent argument at a formal hearing would have to overcome the initial court findings.
In other words, you face an uphill battle of basically proving your ability to properly care for yourself and the child. The goal of this rigorous process will involve persuading the court of the following. The process of regaining parental rights and terminating a guardianship requires crafting a highly persuasive petition and supplying authoritative supporting documents, as well as possible witness testimony. There are also a variety of legal pathways that can be accessed, depending on how and why you got to this point.
In some cases, the court-appointed person finds that they can no longer serve in that capacity. The court enjoys great latitude in such cases and may decide to resolve the matter in a number of ways. The court may agree that the minor no longer needs or benefits from oversight. In many instances, the court appoints a new guardian to take over the responsibilities.
The legal hurdles, hearings, and documentation required to negotiate the process tend to be highly complicated. And, missteps can cause unexpected setbacks and a less than desirable result.
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Third-Party cookies are set by our partners and help us to improve your experience of the website. Click here for a full list of third-party plugins used on this site. News and Events. My child has been made a Ward of Court - what does this mean? What is Wardship? Who can apply for Wardship? When might a child be made a Ward of Court? Wardship should not be used to place a child in Local Authority care or supervision.
How can I apply for a child to be made a Ward of Court? An application must be made to the High Court using a form C66 with a supporting document detailing the grounds for the application How does Wardship end?
Get in touch with Johnson Astills Solicitors in Leicester and Loughborough Should you require representation at Court or need advice regarding a Ward of Court then please contact Emery Johnson Astills at either our Leicester Office on or our Loughborough Office on and ask for a member of the Care Team so that we can advise you accordingly.
Your choice regarding cookies on this site Clicking the Accept All button means you are accepting analytics and third-party cookies check the full list. Accept All Settings. The term is commonly used in the United States, though in the United Kingdom and Ireland the phrased is shortened to ward of court.
In Canada, these people are referred to as Crown wards. Children are often designated wards of the court when their parents either die or become unable to care for them. While the hoped-for resolution in such cases is that grandparents or other family members will step up and assume legal guardianship of the child, there are cases in which there are no family members available or willing to assume that responsibility.
When a child has nobody to care for him, he will be made a ward of the court and usually enter the foster care system, although he may eventually be adopted or, in some cases, returned to the care of his parents.
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