FGM Protection Orders: Protecting A Girl At Risk

Part of: Family Law Specialists

An FGM protection order is a family court order that protects a girl or woman from female genital mutilation. A judge can make one urgently. In the right case, the judge can act before the people involved know that anyone has applied.

FGM breaks the criminal law in England and Wales. The law forbids it whatever a family’s reasons, and whoever asks for it. That applies here, and it applies abroad. An FGM protection order sits alongside the criminal law, but it does a different job: it protects her now, instead of punishing anyone afterwards. We assist and advise girls and women at risk, relatives who fear for a child, and professionals who have spotted something and need to know the next step.

Your safety comes first. If someone may check this phone or computer, read this in a private window, then close it. The Back button still returns here, so close the tab if you can. When you contact us, give us a safe number and a safe time to call. You can also tell us not to leave a message at all.

If a girl faces danger right now, call 999. If you cannot speak safely, cough or tap, then press 55 when the operator prompts you. The system then connects you to the police (IOPC Silent Solution guidance). Calling the police, telling children’s services and asking the court for an order are not alternatives. You can do all three, and in an emergency the 999 call comes first.

What is an FGM protection order?

It is a civil order from the family court, which people often shorten to FGMPO. A judge makes it to protect a girl before a genital mutilation offence happens, or to protect a girl after one has happened to her.

Schedule 2 of the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003 holds the power. In deciding whether to make an order, and on what terms, the court must have regard to all the circumstances. That includes the need to secure the health, safety and well-being of the girl the order protects (Sch 2, para 1(2)). The test therefore puts her welfare at the centre, rather than asking who deserves blame.

Because an FGM protection order is a civil order, it does not depend on a charge or a conviction. So you can ask for one whether or not the police already know, and whether or not you ever want a prosecution. Many people want exactly that: protection without seeing their own relatives in the dock.

Who can apply for an FGM protection order?

Three groups can apply. The girl the order protects can apply herself. A “relevant third party” can apply. Anyone else can apply with the leave of the court (Sch 2, para 2(2) and 2(3)).

A relevant third party means a person that regulations specify. Those regulations name local authorities, so a council can apply without asking the court’s permission first (Relevant Third Party Regulations 2015). That matters in practice: where children’s services already know the family, the local authority may be the natural applicant.

If you are an aunt, a grandmother, a sister, a family friend or a teacher, you fall into the third group. You would need the court’s permission, and that permission forms part of the same process rather than a separate battle. The court can also make an order on its own initiative during existing family proceedings, where a respondent already appears as a party (Sch 2, para 2(1)(b)).

Deciding who should seek an FGM protection order is one of the most useful conversations to have early. The right applicant depends on who holds the evidence, who can safely put their name to it, and whether the local authority already knows the family.

What can an FGM protection order actually do?

The order may contain whatever prohibitions, restrictions or requirements, and whatever other terms, the court thinks appropriate for its purpose (Sch 2, para 1(3)). Parliament left the terms open deliberately, so a judge can shape the order around the actual risk.

That breadth matters. A risk that runs through a booked flight needs different terms from a risk that runs through a visiting relative. The court can also fix how long the order lasts, or let it run until the court varies or discharges it (Sch 2, para 1(4)).

Afterwards, nothing locks the order in place. Any party can ask the court to vary or discharge it. So can the girl herself, if she never became a party, and so can any other affected person (Sch 2, para 6). A judge can therefore refine an order made in a hurry, once everyone has had their say.

Can the court act before the family finds out?

Yes. The court may make the order even though nobody has given the respondent the notice that the rules normally require (Sch 2, para 5(1)). Lawyers call this applying “without notice”. It is why an FGM protection order can take effect before anyone hears about it.

The court does not do this lightly. Before it proceeds without notice, it must weigh the risk that the girl, or another person, will become a victim of a genital mutilation offence unless the court acts immediately (Sch 2, para 5(2)). The court then serves the respondent, who gets a hearing of their own. There they can argue that the order should change or end.

Timing therefore matters more than almost anything else here. Once a family suspects that someone has spoken to a lawyer, a council or the police, the window can close fast, and relatives can bring a trip forward. So if you know of a date, tell us the date first.

What does the criminal law say about FGM?

FGM is a criminal offence. So are several acts around it. The Act creates offences of carrying out FGM, of assisting a girl to carry it out on herself, and of assisting a non-UK person to do it overseas (ss.1 to 3). Those offences carry up to 14 years’ imprisonment on indictment (s.5).

The Act also creates an offence of failing to protect a girl from the risk of genital mutilation (s.3A). Someone responsible for her can commit it, even where another person does the harm. It carries up to seven years on indictment. That offence repays attention if you are a parent who does not want this, and who fears the pressure to allow it.

Travelling abroad changes nothing. Those offences reach acts outside the United Kingdom when a UK national or a UK resident does them (s.4). So a procedure during a holiday remains a crime that our courts can try.

Could you apply, and how urgent is it?

Three short questions help you see where you stand before you speak to anyone. They also show which gaps matter most. People often reach for an FGM protection order without knowing who should apply, and this check surfaces that early.

Who has a legal duty to report FGM?

Some professionals must tell the police, and they have no choice about it. A person working in a regulated profession in England and Wales must notify the police in two situations: where a girl under 18 tells them she has had FGM, or where they see physical signs of it (s.5B).

The Act defines “regulated profession” narrowly. It covers a healthcare professional, a teacher, and a social care worker in Wales. The duty started on 31 October 2015 (mandatory reporting of FGM: procedural information).

Notice what the duty leaves out. It bites only where FGM has already happened to a girl under 18. So it does not cover a future risk, and it does not cover adults. Even so, a risk that falls outside s.5B still deserves action, and an FGM protection order answers exactly that situation.

If you teach or treat a child, and you have one particular child in mind, then the duty and the order answer different questions. One asks what you must do today. The other asks what will actually stop it.

How FGM protection orders fit with other family court orders

An FGMPO is one of several protective orders, and sometimes the right answer uses more than one. Its closest relative is the forced marriage protection order, which Part 4A of the Family Law Act 1996 creates. It works in a similar way, and it carries the same power to act without notice.

Where a family presents both risks, you can seek both orders together. Our guide to forced marriage protection orders explains that route in full, so this page does not repeat it.

Where the risk comes from a partner or a relative in the household, the domestic abuse remedies may fit better, or fit alongside. Our guide to domestic abuse protection orders covers that newer regime, and domestic abuse protection notices explains what the police can do immediately. If you want to know whether a new partner has a record of abuse, Clare’s Law explains how to ask the police.

Choosing between them is not really a legal puzzle. It comes down to which order reaches the person creating the risk, and which one a court can put in place fastest.

What happens when you ask us for urgent help

1. We agree how to contact you safely. A safe number, a safe time, and whether we may leave a message at all.
2. We pin down the date. Any fixed point, such as a booked trip, drives how fast everything else must move.
3. We identify the right applicant. That may be you, the girl herself, or the local authority where children’s services already know the family.
4. We shape the terms. The order must block the real route to harm, not merely restate the law.
5. We advise on notice. Together we weigh whether applying without notice lowers the risk or raises it.

From our casework

A relative outside the immediate household grew worried about a child after overhearing arrangements for a long visit abroad during a school holiday. Nothing had happened to the child. The police had no involvement, and she did not want anyone to prosecute the child’s parents. She wanted the trip stopped, and she feared that asking anyone would simply bring the trip forward.

The questions that mattered were practical ones. Who should apply, given that she was not the child’s parent. Whether to apply without notice. Which terms would actually prevent travel, rather than restate the law. What her own account could properly say, because she had overheard a conversation rather than heard it directly from anyone.

The lesson generalises. Her strongest early step was not a legal argument at all. She wrote down what she heard, when she heard it, and who else heard it, before the detail blurred. A clear, dated account of specific words lets a court act quickly. A statement that describes a worry in general terms, however genuine, gives a judge much less to work with.

Hannah Overton, Complex Children Specialist & Client Support

FGM protection orders: frequently asked questions

General information about the law in England and Wales, not advice on your circumstances.