Hundreds of children are currently at risk of being taken into care without a guardian to represent them, a leading children’s lawyer said this week.

The warning came as the president of the family division, Sir Mark Potter (pictured), announced an interim ‘stop-gap’ scheme to deal with the crisis.

There are 260 children’s public law cases in London alone which are presently waiting for a guardian to be appointed, Christina Blacklaws, Law Society Council member for child law, said this week. The cases involve up to 1,000 children, many of whom may already have been taken into care.

While the children will each have a solicitor, they are still waiting for a guardian to be appointed by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) due to the ‘historic’ increase in the number of applications being dealt with by the agency. There has been a surge in applications since the case of Baby P earlier this year. Guardians have an important role advising on the welfare of children.

Sir Mark said ‘urgent action’ was needed to address the ‘hotspots’ in the country where delays in appointing a guardian are most acute. In London, guardians are often not appointed until the case has proceeded for four or five months.

He outlined arrangements for a ‘reduced service’ from Cafcass to prioritise resources, to be agreed locally. A duty guardian would be allocated at the same time as a solicitor, with a named guardian appointed at a later stage. The number of hearings attended by the guardian would be reduced.

A Cafcass spokesman said it had been working with other parties in the judicial process to best prioritise resources.

Speaking at a separate event last week, Sir Mark also called for more young solicitors to specialise in children’s law.