Therapeutic Confidentiality and the Provision of Psychological ...

16 (DoH/WO, 1999, para 31.6). 5 It is widely recognised and applied in
the context of providing medical and psychological services for children
in the healthcare sector 2, 11 .
Children's rights or parental rights?
Some agencies, such as Brook, base their practice firmly on their
understanding of the Gillick principle. Other agencies, particularly those
working in schools, adopt a much more cautious approach, citing the
need to work in partnership with parents, as well as with children. One
principle wheeled out to endorse this practice in a school setting is the
concept of being in loco parentis. This is an archaic piece of Victorian
case law, dating from the last century, which requires school teachers to
care for their pupils as would a 'careful father', a principle adapted by
degrees to 'careful parent' in subsequent case law. The concept carries a
strong subliminal suggestion that, in acting for parents, schools should
be mindful of parents' wishes and concerns. Offering a child-centred
counselling service for young people without specifying a need for prior
parental consent could be seen to run counter to this approach. In one
version of the argument, parents have rights as well -including a right to
family privacy and a right to be involved in decisions about their children.
Providing confidential counselling to children without parental agreement
would surely then count as a major infringement of the rights of the
parents, to say the very least, according to this view.
This argument is persuasive, but mistaken. Case law has shown that
parents do not, in fact, have a strong case in claiming an infringement of
their parental rights by organisations such as Social Services. Under the
Children Act 1989, the concept of 'parental rights' has been decisively
displaced by that of 'parental responsibility'. This is a set of powers and
duties which can be determined by the courts, and, for example, can be
acquired in this way by a key figure in a child's life, such as a
grandparent. The emphasis carried by this concept is much more on the
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