do half siblings have rights.?

i have full custady of my 11 year old daughter who has special needs. she has 2 half siblings a boy who is 15 & a 12 year old girl.who had lived with there father who was a drug addict the 2 of them were going to be put in to care unless some other family member would take them on.no one would.so there father asked me. i said yes as this would help my daughter,and would keep the family together.but these 2 children were very difficult to control as they had no bondrys while they lived with there father.i tryied for 5 years but the stress they were putting me and my wife was stressfull. i have since put them in care through family break down. now i have social services telling me that the 12 year old girl wish''s to see her half sister from witch i object,& social sevices have said she has a right to do so becouse she is a half sibling can you please advice me on this matter ty kind regards david

When children are looked after by the Local Authority, the LA has a duty to those children to do what is in their best interests. These children lived with you, and their sister, for 5 years, and presumably had a relationship with her which was important to them. It''s reasonable that they would want to maintain that contact.

What are your objections?

If you don''t want to have your daughter''s siblings in your home, the Local Authority should be able to offer alternatives; Social Services may be able to organise and supervise the contact so it can happen at their premises, or at the home of the foster carers with whom your child''s siblings live.

You mention that your daughter has special needs - how severe are these? Is she able to understand who her siblings are, and their relationship to them?

This is a relationship which could be important to her , as well.

If you don''t allow contact, it would potentially be open to your child''s sister to make an application for contact, with the help of an appropriate adult as her litigation friend, and a court would decide whether or not contact was in your daughter''s best interests. However, as a general rule, the starting point is likely to bethat it is in the interests of siblings (including half siblings) to have contact with each other, and this is likely to be particularly true where those children have lived togathr for a long time.

It must be very hard for your step-daughter to have lost her oen parents, andthen to lose her home with you, without also losing her relationship with her sister. Is it possible for you to sit down with Social Setvices and try to come to some arrangements which allows some contact, without putting too much pressure on you?

thank you for your quick reply, although my daughter has special needs, she is aware of whats happening around her, she has not asked to see her siblings. she is doing well. LA did not inform me that these siblings were going to be a problem and did not advice me on the matter.it was a third party who informed me when i asked for advice on how i can control them. the oldest of the 2 has gone off on to acolhol and cannibis and his younger sister wants to follow him where ever he go''s. now that these siblings are in LA care and the oldest will be leaving there some what soon to live with his father again. i can only see more trouble with there new carers.
we live very close to the siblings father and there cosins... and becouse we have placed them in care. we have recieved many threats through them, we are going to move many miles away... at the end of the day i don''nt think its in the best interests of my daughter...as she is doing well since they have gone.