What it is
A Together or Apart assessment is a structured assessment of sibling relationships, designed to help the court decide whether brothers and sisters should be placed together or in separate placements. It follows the "Together or Apart" framework, which has been used in social work for years and is well established in the Family Court. The purpose is straightforward, even if the work itself is not: to give the court a clear, evidence-based picture of what each sibling relationship looks like, what the children need from each other, and whether keeping them together serves their welfare or undermines it.
The starting assumption in law and in practice is that siblings should be placed together wherever possible. That is the right starting point. Brothers and sisters who have been through the care system together share something that no one else in their lives can fully understand. Keeping them together preserves identity, continuity, and a sense of belonging that is difficult to replicate by any other means. But the starting assumption is not the ending assumption. Sometimes there are good reasons to separate siblings, and this assessment examines whether those reasons exist in a particular family.
When it's ordered
The court orders a Together or Apart assessment when it is actively considering different placements for siblings within the same family. There are several situations where this comes up, and they are not always the ones people expect.
Sometimes the issue is practical. There simply are not enough foster placements available to accommodate a large sibling group together. Finding a foster carer who can take three or four children at once is genuinely difficult, and the court needs to know what the consequences would be if the group has to be split. Sometimes the issue is about individual needs. One child might have complex behavioural or emotional needs that would be better met in a specialist placement, and the question is whether keeping them with their siblings would hold them back or place too great a strain on the placement. Sometimes the children have very different relationships with prospective carers, particularly in kinship cases where a family member can care for one child but not another.
And sometimes the issue is the sibling relationship itself. Not all sibling relationships are positive. I have assessed families where one child's behaviour towards another is controlling, aggressive, or sexualised. I have seen situations where the dynamic between siblings re-enacts patterns of abuse they experienced from adults. In those cases, the question is not whether separation is unfortunate but whether it is necessary to keep both children safe.
What I look at
The heart of this assessment is the quality and nature of each sibling relationship. I say "each" deliberately, because not all sibling relationships within one family are the same. A group of three children will have three distinct pairings, and each one can look completely different. The oldest and the youngest might have a warm, protective bond. The two middle children might be in constant conflict. The oldest might be parenting the others in a way that looks caring on the surface but is actually robbing them of their own childhood. You cannot assess a sibling group as a single unit. You have to look at every relationship within it.
I observe the children together and separately. I watch how they play, how they resolve disagreements, how they respond when one of them is upset or distressed. Does the older child step in to comfort a younger sibling, or do they become distressed themselves? Do the children seek each other out, or do they avoid each other? When they are apart, are they calmer and more settled, or are they anxious and preoccupied with where their sibling is? These observations tell me things that no interview can.
I also look at attachment patterns between the siblings. In some families, children have formed stronger attachments to each other than to any adult in their lives. That can be a sign of resilience, but it can also be a sign that no adult was reliably available and the children had to turn to each other by default. Both of those things can be true at the same time, and the assessment needs to hold that complexity honestly.
I speak to foster carers, teachers, and other professionals who see the children day to day. Carers often have the clearest picture of sibling dynamics because they see the unguarded moments: bedtime, mealtimes, the car journey home from school. Teachers see how each child functions when they are away from their siblings, which is just as important as how they function when they are together.
The child's perspective
For children old enough to express a view, their wishes and feelings are an important part of the assessment. The Children Act requires it, and I take it seriously. But I am careful about how I explore this, because children in care proceedings are under enormous pressure, and what they say is not always a straightforward reflection of what they feel.
A child who says "I want to live with my sister" might be expressing a genuine and deeply felt attachment. They might also be repeating what a parent or carer has told them to say. They might be driven by anxiety about change rather than a genuine preference for a particular arrangement. They might be saying what they think the adult in front of them wants to hear. My job is to understand what is underneath the words, not just to record them. That means spending time with the child, building enough of a relationship that they feel safe to be honest, and paying attention to what they show me as well as what they tell me.
For younger children who cannot articulate their feelings, I rely on observation. How does a three-year-old behave when their older sibling leaves the room? Do they carry on playing, or do they become unsettled? When the sibling comes back, do they light up, or are they indifferent? These small moments are data, and they matter.
The analysis
The analysis is where everything comes together. It weighs up the benefits and risks of joint placement against the benefits and risks of separation, and it does so for each child individually, not just for the group as a whole.
Keeping siblings together maintains identity, continuity, and mutual support. Children who have lost their birth family have already lost enough. Losing their siblings as well is another layer of grief. There is good research showing that children placed with their siblings tend to have more stable placements and better long-term outcomes. That evidence matters, and I give it proper weight.
But evidence also matters when it points the other way. If one child's behaviour is harming another, keeping them together is not in either child's interest. If maintaining the sibling group means accepting a less suitable placement for all of them, that is a cost that has to be weighed honestly. If one child is thriving in a foster placement where they are the only child and would regress if their sibling were placed alongside them, that tells you something important about what they need.
These are never easy recommendations. I have never written a Together or Apart assessment and felt casual about the conclusion. Recommending that siblings be separated is one of the hardest things I do, and I take it seriously. When I make that recommendation, I explain my reasoning carefully so that the court, the parents, and the children's representatives can all understand how I got there and challenge it if they disagree.
Contact if separated
If the recommendation is separation, the assessment does not stop there. It also addresses what contact between the siblings should look like going forward. How often should they see each other? In what format? Should it be supervised or unsupervised? Should it be direct contact or, for very young children or where there are safety concerns, indirect contact through letters, photos, and life story work?
Sibling contact is one of the most overlooked areas in care planning, and I think that is a real failing. Local authorities are often good at setting up parental contact arrangements but far less consistent when it comes to making sure siblings who live apart actually see each other regularly. Contact plans get written into care plans and then quietly fall away. Carers change. Transport becomes difficult. No one takes responsibility for making it happen. By the time anyone notices, the children have not seen each other for months.
I address this directly in my recommendations. Contact arrangements need to be realistic, specific, and built into the care plan from the start. If I am recommending that siblings be separated, I owe it to them to be equally clear about how their relationship will be maintained.
For solicitors
Together or Apart assessments are specialist work, and a well-drafted letter of instruction makes a significant difference to the quality of the report. Specify which children and which sibling relationships you want assessed. In a group of four siblings, the court may be most concerned about one particular pairing. Tell me that, and I can focus the analysis where it is needed most.
If there is a specific placement scenario the court is considering, name it. "Should Child A and Child B be placed together with the maternal grandmother, or should Child A be placed with the grandmother and Child B remain in foster care?" gives me something concrete to assess. "Should the siblings be together or apart?" is a much broader question that will take longer to answer and may not address the court's real concern.
I will need access to all of the children involved, their current carers, and the relevant professionals. If any of the children are in separate placements, please factor in the logistics of that when agreeing timescales. Observing siblings together when they live at opposite ends of the country requires planning, and the timetable needs to reflect that reality.