Child Care Act, 1991

Removal from placement.

43.—(1) A health board may, in accordance with regulations made by the Minister, remove a child in its care from the custody of any person with whom he has been placed by the board under section 36 .

(2) Where a person refuses or neglects to comply with a request of a health board to deliver up a child in accordance with regulations made under subsection (1), the board may apply to the District Court for an order directing that person to deliver up the child to the custody of the board and the justice may, if he considers that it is in the best interests of the child so to do, make such an order.

(3) Without prejudice to the law as to contempt of court, where the District Court has made an order under subsection (2) (requiring that a child be delivered up to the custody of a health board), any person having the actual custody of the child who, having been given or shown a copy of the order and having been required, by or on behalf of the health board, to give up the child to that board, fails or refuses to comply with the requirement shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £500 or, at the discretion of the court, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 6 months or both such fine and such imprisonment.

(4) For the purposes of this section, a person shall be deemed to have been given or shown a copy of an order made under subsection (2) if that person was present at the sitting of the court at which such an order was made.

(5) Where a child is removed from the custody of a person in pursuance of this section, any contract between the board and that person in respect of the child shall terminate immediately upon the removal.

(6) The provisions of this section are without prejudice to the power of a health board to apply for an order under Part III or IV .