National Domestic Abuse Delivery Plan for Children and Young People

Listen

PROVISION OVERVIEW

Children and young people affected by domestic abuse are nurtured, healthy, respected, active and included

Protection without healing does not fulfil the purpose of keeping children nurtured and safe. Living with domestic abuse, witnessing the abuse of a parent or being directly abused themselves, can be a profoundly traumatic experience for children and young people. The many disruptions to their environment as a consequence of domestic abuse, including the need to move accommodation or school and the loss of friends and possessions, are also likely to impact on their health, their wellbeing and their educational attainment.

Research reveals that, compared to their peers, children and young people who have experienced domestic abuse show much higher rates of depression, anxiety and behavioural and cognitive problems which may continue to affect them throughout their adult lives. The immediate impact of domestic abuse is found to vary according to a child's development stage and their vulnerability, as well as the severity and length of exposure to abuse. Children who are unable to vocalise their feelings, such as very young children, tend to be the group who show the most apparent behavioural disturbances, including loss of previously acquired development skills, sleep disturbance, separation anxiety and repeating themes of trauma incidents in their play.

Whilst the impact of domestic abuse on a child's or young person's physical, psychological and emotional health can be both profound and enduring, long-term damage is not inevitable. The right kind of support, provided at the right time, can reduce the impact of domestic abuse on children's present and future wellbeing. It can enable them not only to survive their experiences but, as exemplified by the children and young people who have lead the work of the NDADG, it can also empower them to become compelling activists and effective change-makers in their own rights.

Even in the absence of support from agencies, it must be recognised that many children still demonstrate remarkable resilience in the face of their circumstances and can develop complex survival strategies in order to cope with the levels of violence at home. Factors which contribute to a child's resilience include the strength and stability of support through their networks of family and friends, from sources in their wider community and, crucially, from their non-abusive parent. Practitioners need to respect and build on children's own survival strategies, recognise their resilience and enable them, where possible, to secure their own outcomes. This means listening to children and helping them identify themselves the best ways to support them.

Children and young people consulted on the Delivery Plan Priority Areas have clear views about the full range of support that should be available for all children affected by domestic abuse. Opportunities to talk to children in the same circumstances and to become involved in activities that can take their minds off things were seen to be important. However, access to a dedicated support worker, someone they can trust and confide in for as long as they need, was explicitly identified by almost every single child as having the most immediate, positive impact on helping them through their experiences. The Delivery Plan Priority Area 6 takes forward their recommendations to improve the availability, quality and range of local, specialised domestic abuse services for children and young people. It seeks to build on and sustain progress achieved through the implementation of the Children's Services Women's Aid Fund, recognising that, demand for services still exceeds current availability and more must be done to ensure specialist support provision meets the needs of particular groups of children and young people including very young children, children with complex needs, from minority ethnic backgrounds or from rural areas and young people with experience of domestic abuse in their own relationships.

One of the most detrimental effects of domestic abuse is the potential for the abuse to significantly undermine the relationship between children and their parents. Support services for children should be separate but integrally linked with support services for the adult victim, most frequently their mother, and interventions with the perpetrator. Interventions for men who use violence are explored in Priority Area 3. Priority Area 7 looks at ways that agencies providing therapeutic interventions for victims of domestic abuse can offer structured opportunities for children to communicate with their non-violent parent about what has happened and to rebuild their relationship, if this has been damaged. It supports the development of a Community Groupwork Programme pilot across three Scottish local authorities. The programme, based on a Canadian model, has proven international effectiveness. It is designed around separate but concurrent groupwork sessions for children and their mothers affected by domestic abuse, with opportunities for joint sessions as the programme progresses.

The provision of emotional support and therapeutic interventions to reduce the impact of domestic abuse on the wellbeing of children is undoubtedly important. Equally of importance, however, is the provision of practical assistance to ease the difficult transitions children, young people and their non-abusive parent may face as a consequence of domestic abuse. Of these transitions, moving out of their home because of risk of harm from the perpetrator and, in some cases, the necessity to keep 'on the move' frequently leads to a spiral of homelessness, poverty, disruption to schooling or employment and loss of contact with friends, family and communities. Action under Priority Area 8 will focus, in the short-term, on improving understanding through research of the barriers which prevent women and children from accessing appropriate levels of coordinated support to stay safely in their own homes or to make the move into alternative accommodation without facing additional economic or social disadvantages. From this evidence base, future action will focus on developing measures which enable local authorities and relevant agencies to deliver better joined-up responses to the housing and support needs of those affected by domestic abuse.

The themes of workforce development and interagency working, both at a strategic and operational level, in order to deliver better joined-up responses for children and families cut across the entire Delivery Plan. Action under each Priority Area takes into account the need for specific workforce interventions to achieve each Area's discrete outcomes. Priority Area 9 recognises, however, that a consistent approach to workforce development across different sectors and agencies can best be supported through a common framework of action, identified through partnership at a national level, and a shared understanding of the needs, views and wishes of children affected by domestic abuse.

Priority Area 6

Ensure all children and young people affected by domestic abuse have access to specialist services that meet their needs.

Commitment

We will take action to ensure that progress establishing a range of specialist domestic abuse services for children and young people across Scotland is built upon over the next three years and we will work with key service providers and Children's Planners to ensure the long-term sustainability of high quality specialist support services for all children and young people affected by domestic abuse.

Rationale

It cannot be underestimated that children affected by domestic abuse need an adult they can trust other than their family to speak to. Indeed, they need to speak about their mum/family and may also need help in speaking with their mum. ( Houghton, 2008b) Clearly, children can be supported in many ways by the range of professionals involved in their lives, including teachers, youth workers or social workers. However, in children's own words, what they benefit most from is 'their own worker', who understands their situation without judging and who is there for them 'all the way through'. ( Fitzpatrick, 2003)

Children and young people in Scottish Women's Aid's Listen Louder Campaign ensured that children's need for support workers was recognised by the Scottish Parliament. The Campaign resulted in the launch of the Children's Services Women's Aid Fund 2006-08 ( CSWAF06), enabling each Women's Aid group in Scotland to set up a minimum standard of two refuge/follow-on children's support workers and one outreach children's support worker. 4 ( Houghton, 2008b)

The interim evaluation of the CSWAF06 evidenced the emergence of many effective models of provision across Women's Aid groups which enable interventions to be tailored to meet individual needs. Such interventions include innovative approaches to keyworking, work around building children's resilience, intense post-crisis counselling, combinations of individual 1-to-1 and groupwork support, and offering a range of therapeutic activities. The evaluation report concluded that diversified approaches to specialist provision which increase choices for children and young people on the type of support they receive should become more widely implemented. ( Stafford et al, 2007)

Key to children's resilience in the face of domestic abuse is not only for them to have a strong relationship with the non-abusing parent but also that they see this relationship as having authority. Specialist support provision for children should therefore be separate but linked to provision for their non-abusing parent, usually their mother, so there is the capacity to strengthen the mother-child relationship. Provision for children should also be linked to interventions for the abusive parent, where such interventions seek to hold the abusive parent accountable for their behaviour and to keep women and children safe from further harm. ( Humphreys et al, 2008)

Despite direct funding to Women's Aid groups and the recent establishment of specialist domestic abuse services through other fund sources, 5 there are still children without access to support. A significant number of Women's Aid groups report waiting lists and capacity issues which prevent them reaching out to all children, especially those in remote and rural areas of Scotland. ( Women's Aid - CSWAF Grant Monitoring Reports) Particular gaps have been identified in community-based outreach services ( Women's Aid - CSWAF Grant Monitoring Reports), in 'in depth' mental health support including counselling ( Houghton, 2008b) and in services for young people with experience of domestic abuse in their own relationships. ( National Children & Young People's Network, 2007) Gaps in service provision for children and young people from black and minority ethnic communities have also been highlighted by Shakti Women's Aid and Hemat Gryffe Women's Aid.

What children and young people have told us

Without exception, children consulted on the Delivery Plan Priorities describe the help they have received from specialist children's workers (mainly through Women's Aid but also through other statutory and voluntary sector organisations) as crucial to enabling them, and their mothers, survive their experience of domestic abuse. One child in Stafford et al (2007) saying it was matter of life or death, and many children wishing it was available earlier. ( Houghton, 2008a; Houghton, 2008b; Stafford et al, 2007)

"I always felt like I wanted somebody to speak to because I was feeling like I was just piling and piling it all on myself. … I couldn't really talk to my mum about things no matter how close we were, because it was her that I was trying to protect, it was all to do wi' her that I was wanting to talk to somebody about." (Girl in Houghton, 2008a)

"Support workers don't just help children they also help the adults, however they are mainly there for children which is the most important thing … [support workers] would take me and my mother out and we would discuss problems from both ends - my mothers point of view and mine as well." (Boy in Houghton, 2008a)

What children appreciate is getting to know someone (crucially one named person) in a relaxed atmosphere, where children set the pace and content, and where innovative ways of communicating are found - from computer work, talking about whatever's important to the child or about 'anything but', going out, eating out, drawing, writing. ( Houghton, 2008b) Children's support workers are valued both for the emotional and the practical assistance they provide -

  • Being there when a child needed them; even making time in a busy schedule if necessary.
  • Listening and understanding the children and their feelings.
  • Keeping children informed about what is happening and helping them to understand why.
  • Providing advice, including how the children can keep safe. ( Smith et al, 2008)

Four key interlinked issues for children accessing support are repeatedly highlighted - trust, confidentiality, sharing information and not being identified. (Houghton, 2008b) As such, for children the most important qualities in a support worker is that they are able to trust them and that support workers will keep things in confidence throughout. Though children and young people are mostly clear about the limits of confidentiality, they feel that they should be more involved in deciding what information should be shared and with whom.

"[Support workers] would keep it all confidential and if they think it's really serious they would speak to you about it and see if you wanted to speak to someone about it or if you wanted them to do it on your behalf" (Boy from Houghton, 2008a)

Equally, it is vital for children that the support they receive does not identify them as 'experiencing domestic abuse' to others, including their peers, or brand them as having some sort of problem. Being referred to counselling services can be perceived as a case in point -

"Counselling is kinda branding that there's something wrong with you, but there's nothing wrong with you, you're just been through an ordeal." (Girl in Houghton, 2008a)

How we will take this work forward

Actions: Year 1

  • Taking into consideration learning from the past two years and the findings from the interim evaluation, we will review the current resources and support offered to Women's Aid projects through the CSWAF06 and make dedicated funding and support, including appropriate workforce development opportunities, available for Children's Workers across Scotland over the period 2008-11.
  • We will use findings from the final CSWAF06 evaluation report (due in summer 2008) to gain children's views and the views of practitioners on the impact of the CSWAF 2006-08 at local level and we will use both the evaluation and feedback from projects, to inform the ongoing development of services for children affected by domestic abuse.
  • In partnership with key delivery agencies and colleagues in local authorities, we will develop a national picture of the range of local services, both specialist and generic, which provide support to children, young people and their mothers affected by domestic abuse.
  • In partnership with local and national service providers, we will take action to facilitate the replication of effective practice, to identify and address gaps in service provision and to ensure services for children are integrated with services for their mothers and interventions with the perpetrator.

Actions: Future Work

  • We will actively encourage and support awareness-raising activities at local level, especially the involvement of children and young people in these activities, which aim to increase understanding of the value of specialist support services to improving outcomes for children affected by domestic abuse.
  • In partnership with local and national service providers, we will explore how we achieve the future sustainability of specialist services for children and young people affected by domestic abuse.

Key Outputs

  • Increase in funding available at national and local level to build the capacity of key service providers in the statutory and voluntary sectors enabling them to provide high quality specialist domestic abuse services for children and young people. This will lead to an increase in the number of children and young people supported through specialist domestic abuse services across Scotland, with particular focus on an increase in the number of children and young people supported in the community.
  • Increased knowledge of the support needs of children and young people affected by domestic abuse, (especially of those children and young people facing additional discrimination or whose needs are complex) with parallel, ongoing mapping of the range of local services, both specialist and generic, which provide support to children, young people and their mothers affected by domestic abuse.
  • Development of workforce training and awareness-raising initiatives for practitioners working with children and young people affected by domestic abuse, aimed at improving knowledge, skills and attitudes around domestic abuse and its impact on children and young people and leading to increased proportion of practitioners across the range of services able to plan and provide appropriate, high quality specialist support for this group.

Outcomes

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will support Children's Services Planners and key service providers in local government and the voluntary sector, including the network of Women's Aid groups, Children 1st, Barnardos and others, to build the capacity of local services for children and young people affected by domestic abuse and ensure that all children and young people across Scotland have access to specialist services that meet their needs no matter where they live.

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will therefore support local government and the range of service providers to contribute towards -

  • Improving the life chances for children, young people and families at risk as a consequence of domestic abuse.
  • Ensuring young people affected by domestic abuse are successful learners, confident individuals, effective contributors and responsible citizens.

Lead Government Division: Equality Unit

Priority Area 7

Develop and pilot a community-based groupwork intervention for children and their mothers affected by domestic abuse.

Commitment

We will support the development and implementation of a National Community Groupwork Programme pilot across Edinburgh, Fife and Forth Valley Councils and work with the National Partnership Group to disseminate findings from the ongoing evaluation of this pilot. Subject to positive findings of the evaluation, we will consider ways of supporting the replication of the community groupwork model across Scotland.

Rationale

Group intervention strategies with children and young people have the benefit of addressing the issues of secrecy, supporting children to feel less isolated and strengthening their peer relationships ( Mullender et al, 2002). Evaluations of groupwork models of support highlight a range of benefits for children including: positive changes in children's aggressive behaviour; greater knowledge of safety; changed attitudes to violence; strengthened relationships between mothers and children; reduction in feelings of shame or guilt and helping them deal with their emotions towards the abusive father (S udermann et al, 2000; Debbonaire, 2007).

Clearly though, group intervention strategies need to be carefully planned and structured around the needs, interests and abilities of young participants. Different sessions for different age-groups, for example, are a pre-requisite for children and young people getting the most from their experience. ( Smith et al, 2008) Equally, it must be recognised that many children may benefit best from ongoing one-to-one support or may not even wish to participate in a group. ( Houghton, 2008b)

A community-based groupwork model developed in Ontario, Canada has been widely disseminated and built upon in both England and Australia. The Canadian model allows for a concurrent approach to groupwork, whereby both children and their mothers are supported in parallel but separate sessions with opportunities for joint sessions as the programme progresses. The pre and post test results showed significant positive changes as well as high levels of satisfaction reported by both children and their mothers. ( Debbonaire, 2007)

Currently there is no consistent groupwork provision available to children and young people experiencing domestic abuse in Scotland. The Children's Service Women's Aid Fund Monitoring and Evaluation Reports show that while some groupwork is carried out, this is patchy across the country and the approach is not as rigorous as the Canadian model. Furthermore, this work has not been formally evaluated to date.

Since November 2006, Scottish Women's Aid has been developing work with experts from Canada and colleagues from the Stronger Families Project in the London Borough of Sutton, with the view to piloting the Canadian model and approach in Scotland. As a result, a National Partnership Group has been set up to develop a National Community Group Work Programme, the Cedar Project (Children Experiencing Domestic Abuse Recovery) - which will be piloted across Edinburgh, Fife and Forth Valley. Each area has a Local Partnership Group with representation from key service providers involved in the pilot.

What children and young people have told us

Overall, most children and young people are positive about participating in groupwork sessions. They feel groupwork offers a real opportunity to understand what has happened to them, have fun and make some friends -

"I think it'd be better than one-to-ones, cos then it's like, then I really know that it's not just me, d'you know what I mean? Cos, like, when other people say 'I'm like this because this happened' and I'll go 'well that happened to me as well' or 'I know where you're coming from'." (Girl 14 in Stafford et al, 2007)

"An 'after support groupwork session' - it would take a number of individuals who have been experiencing support after domestic abuse and we'd meet together and just have a good time kinda like a club - but we'd be able to talk serious if we needed to and you ended up trusting this group of people too and that really helped, being able to go out and do extra curricula activities but having this group of trusting friends really helps you get on the right track after such a low point in your life." (Boy in Houghton, 2008a)

Children have a number of recommendations to ensure groupwork sessions are always enjoyable and meet their needs. They should be organised by age-group and both boys and girls should be in the same group. They should be very activities-based and, crucially, nobody should be expected to contribute if they don't want to. Groups for mothers are also viewed as positive. They are seen as a space for mums to be able to talk and improve understanding of their children, behaviour, emotions and improve communication between mothers and children. ( Smith et al, 2008)

However, some children and young people have concerns, especially about issues surrounding confidentiality -

"depends on the person [if they want to take part] I think, cos obviously not everybody, not many people want to go to a group and make it [domestic abuse] be identified" (Girl in Houghton, 2008a)

How will we take this work forward

Actions: Year 1

  • We will provide funding to support the development and implementation of a three-year National Community Groupwork Programme pilot across Edinburgh, Fife and Forth Valley.
  • We will work with the National Partnership Group to develop appropriate monitoring and evaluation arrangements and to ensure learning from the pilot is disseminated to relevant agencies across Scotland.

Actions: Future Work

  • Subject to positive findings of the pilot evaluation, we will work in conjunction with the National Partnership Group, colleagues in local authorities and key delivery partners to identify mechanisms, including the development of an 'implementation toolkit', that facilitate and support the replication of the community groupwork model across Scotland.

Key Outputs

  • Funding provided for the development of a robust and fully evaluated community-based model of therapeutic groupwork that is relevant to the Scottish context of interagency work to address domestic abuse and the experiences of women and children affected by domestic abuse in Scotland.
  • Increase in the number of practitioners across different agencies trained and supported to deliver the community-based model of groupwork, leading to an increase in the number of women and children accessing community-based groupwork initiatives across Scotland and reporting positive experiences from their involvement.

Outcomes

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will support the range of agencies across Edinburgh, Fife and Forth Valley represented on the National and Local Partnership Groups to develop and pilot a community groupwork model of intervention, enabling increased choice and personalisation of local support services for children, young people and women affected by domestic abuse. It will also support the capture and dissemination of learning from the Community Groupwork pilot in a way that enables colleagues in local government and agencies across Scotland to develop and adopt effective approaches to implementing the model according to local needs.

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will therefore support local government and the range of service providers to contribute towards -

  • Improving the life chances for children, young people and families at risk as a consequence of domestic abuse.
  • Ensuring young people affected by domestic abuse are successful learners, confident individuals, effective contributors and responsible citizens.

Lead Government Division: Equality Unit

Priority Area 8

Reduce the risk to women and children of becoming homeless as a consequence of domestic abuse and ensure, whenever necessary, they are supported to make the move to safe and suitable accommodation without facing additional emotional, economic or social disadvantages.

Commitment

In partnership with the Domestic Abuse Accommodation & Support Provision Action Plan Implementation Group, we will work to identify and break down the barriers that place women and children affected by domestic abuse at risk of homelessness, to ensure women and children have access to a range of safe and suitable accommodation options, including the right to remain in their own home, and are supported, both in practical and emotional terms, throughout every stage of the housing transitions they make.

Rationale

Historically, it has been women on whom expectation is placed to move out of the family home in domestic abuse situations. The circumstances surrounding their first move and, in many cases, the need to keep 'on the move' can result in women and their children 'leaving everything but the abuse behind'; their possessions, pets, employment or school and their most valued networks of support - their family, friends and community. It places them at significant risk of experiencing an enduring cycle of financial hardship, homelessness and social isolation. ( Houghton, 2008b)

Developments around the use of exclusion orders (under the Matrimonial Homes (Family Protection) (Scotland) Act 1981 and the Children (Scotland) Act 1995) that allow women and children to stay in their own homes and require the perpetrator to leave is one example of how this trend is being challenged. Clearly, the use of exclusion orders in domestic abuse situations will only be effective as part of coordinated interventions which provide women and children support in their own homes, including higher levels of house security, 6 as well as monitor the perpetrator to guarantee compliance. In some cases, local authorities will need to consider appropriate accommodation options for the perpetrator, ensuring that he is not re-housed in the vicinity of the family home. ( Humphreys et al, 2008)

In reality though, relocating somewhere the perpetrator cannot find them is the only safe option for many women and children or, most importantly, the only option that makes them feel safe. Access to appropriate refuges, housing and support services is therefore key to ensure the safety and wellbeing of women and children affected by domestic abuse. ( Stafford et al, 2007)

A survey of refuge spaces in Scotland, carried out between September and December 2007, found that a total of 520 households could be accommodated by Women's Aid groups. In many areas women and children can be in refuge for up to 2 years. This extended length of stay in what is intended as short term temporary accommodation is largely due to the shortage of housing for women to move on to. This in turn results in many women and children being unable to gain access to refuge when they need to. The same survey highlighted that that only 23% of women requesting refuge in 2006/07 were able to be accommodated by Women's Aid groups. ( Scottish Women's Aid, 2008)

In 2006, the National Group to Address Violence Against Women set up the Domestic Abuse Accommodation & Support Provision Action Plan Implementation Group ( DAASOAPIG). The Working Group has developed a comprehensive Action Plan which sets out recommendations, at a strategic level, to improve accommodation and associated support provision for women and their children affected by domestic abuse. The Action Plan focuses recommendations on five key areas: Training & Regulation, Funding Framework, Strategy Framework, Joint Working and Homelessness Prevention & Community Services.

Two priorities in the Action Plan are (1) establishing a timescale for the removal of the exception to the Unsuitable Accommodation Order and (2) developing a programme for re-provision or replacement of unsuitable accommodation currently used as refuge. The Homeless Persons (Unsuitable Accommodation) (Scotland) Order 2004 was introduced to stop the use of accommodation defined as unsuitable for families with children or pregnant women, such as accommodation that obliges shared living arrangements. At the time the Order was introduced, however, much accommodation which provides enormous benefits to families, including 43% of accommodation provided to Women's Aid groups by local authorities, would have failed to meet required standards and it was decided that to prevent its use would unnecessarily disadvantage those families.

What children and young people have told us

The first move, particularly if unplanned, can be a traumatic and confusing experience for children. Many report not being fully informed of what was going on at the time and having to leave all their most treasured possessions behind, including pets -

"No, I didn't know we were moving, because my mum told my dad we were going to the chippy for his dinner..." (Girl, 14 from Stafford et al, 2007)

Children express great relief to have escaped the abuser and 'proud of my mum for getting away from him' ( Girl, 13 from Stafford et al, 2007). In fact, most children cannot conceive of a situation where staying in their own home, even with the perpetrator gone, would make them feel safe. ( Smith et al, 2008).

"My father received a court order that he wasn't allowed near us. He came back the next day anyway." (Boy in Houghton, 2008a)

However, they also feel their losses acutely. Some children describe leaving home as being doubly 'punished' due to being 'dumped' in one room in a refuge ( Houghton, forthcoming) whilst father is in a nice middle class house. The importance of ensuring women and children have access to high quality and suitable accommodation, both temporary and permanent, has been repeatedly highlighted by young people -

"All refuges should be up to the same high standard such as the new refuge in Stirling. There are still lots of underprivileged refuges all over Scotland." (Boy from Houghton, 2008a )

"It is imperative that the child or young person and parent can be re-housed fairly quickly so they can get on with their life and not be stuck in a refuge." (Girl from Houghton, 2008a)

There are many things which help 'make moving home smoother' for children (Girl from Houghton, 2008a) such as mums actively including them in planning the move and help to replace or regain the possessions they have left behind. Support from Women's Aid Children's Workers, or from another trusted adult, can enable them to overcome the disruption to their lives. Teachers understanding their situation and the impact it might have on their schooling is also important. Crucially too, for many children, being able to keep in touch with friends or being helped to make friends in their new area is cited as one of their biggest priorities.

How will we take this work forward

Actions: Year 1

  • We will work with the Domestic Abuse Accommodation & Support Provision Action Plan Implementation Group ( DAASOAPIG) to review the Action Plan in light of the changing relationship between Government and local government, and to ensure the Delivery Plan feeds into and helps progress key Action Plan recommendations, including taking forward work to address the need for improved refuge accommodation for women and children affected by domestic abuse.
  • The existing Code of Guidance on Homelessness will be expanded with new information on the prevention of homelessness, particularly for those people known to be at risk of homelessness such as women and children fleeing domestic abuse. In partnership with the DAASOAPIG, we will contribute to discussions in this new guidance about how local authorities and their partners can do more to ensure that victims of domestic abuse are able to access help on housing before they reach crisis point.
  • To further existing work on the prevention of homelessness, we will commission research to examine the barriers to accessing housing and housing-related services that victims face. From this evidence base, we will work with the DAASOAPIG and relevant government bodies and service providers, to identify measures which can be implemented, at local or national level, to break down these barriers.
  • We will commission research looking at possible options for removal of the perpetrator from the family home (including examining the use of exclusion orders in domestic abuse situations) and consequential re-housing, and we will include extensive discussions with local authorities and other stakeholders on the viability of these options.
  • The results of the evaluation of the Scottish Government-funded Innovation Fund 'Safe as Houses' project in Edinburgh will be considered and disseminated as appropriate to other local authorities.

Actions: Future Work

  • We will work with children, young people and agencies, focusing on those working in the Criminal Justice, Education, Homelessness and Violence Against Women sectors, to ensure practitioners and organisations have the knowledge and resources to provide both practical and emotional support to children, young people and their mothers to help them during housing transition phases.

Key Outputs

  • Review of the Domestic Abuse Accommodation & Support Provision Action Plan.
  • Expansion of the Code of Guidance on Homelessness completed and disseminated to local authorities.
  • Increase in knowledge and awareness amongst local authorities and key agencies of the housing and support needs of women and children affected by domestic abuse and corresponding increase in the effectiveness of coordinated, multi-agency responses to meet these needs, leading to a decrease in the number of moves women and children need to make to stay safe and to a decrease in waiting times to access appropriate accommodation.
  • Linked to the output above, an increase in knowledge and awareness amongst local authorities and key agencies of the issues surrounding women and children remaining in the family home without the perpetrator, and a corresponding improvement in the delivery of joined-up interventions to ensure the safety of women and children in this situation.

Outcomes

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will enable Government, local government and other key delivery partners including the Women's Aid network, the Scottish Housing Regulator and Housing Associations, to develop shared understanding of the housing and support needs of families affected by domestic abuse and to work collaboratively to develop strategic, local approaches to ensuring these families are housed in the right type of accommodation with the right package of support.

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will therefore support Government, local government and the range of delivery partners to contribute towards -

  • Improving the life chances for children, young people and families at risk as a consequence of domestic abuse.
  • Ensuring both child and adult victims of domestic abuse are able to live their lives safe from crime, disorder and danger as a result of ongoing abuse from the perpetrator.
  • Tackling the significant inequalities that impact upon families who are homeless or at risk of homelessness as a consequence of domestic abuse.

Lead Government Divisions: Homelessness Legislation Division, Equality Unit

Priority Area 9

Ensure a consistent, holistic approach to children and young people affected by domestic abuse through the development of skilled workforces and robust inter-agency working.

Commitment

We will use the training infrastructure to deliver an increasingly common set of skills across the broad range of workers. We will encourage employers to use and share the learning from good practice in terms of different delivery models and joint working. We will ensure that the increased expectations of the public and the needs of children affected by domestic abuse are congruent with the skills, flexibility and capacity of the workforce.

Rationale

Responsibility for improving outcomes for children and young people affected by domestic abuse does not lie with any one agency alone.

Action to implement the Delivery Plan recognises that tackling domestic abuse will require interventions to be systematically planned and coordinated at local level. It will also require practitioners across many different sectors to have the knowledge base, skills and capacity to provide support through their own agencies and, where necessary, engage fully in a multi-agency response to address the complex issues facing children, young people and their families as a consequence of domestic abuse. This approach demands a change of culture in many organisations who have traditionally had a 'siloed' or specialist focus on perpetrators, adult survivors (usually women), or children. ( Humphreys et al, 2008)

The process of shifting organisational cultures has already begun and is being tackled through a number of emerging policy drivers. For Scotland's Children (Scottish Executive, 2001) highlighted the need for agencies to integrate their services more around the needs of children. Since then, local agencies have made good progress towards this goal and programmes such as Getting it right for every child will ensure that progress continues.

Cultural issues, by their very nature, take years to change but there are actions that can be taken now, at a national level, to complement this long term agenda. The implementation of the Domestic Abuse - A National Training Strategy (2003) led to the establishment of Domestic Abuse Training Consortia in each of the fifteen Health Boards across Scotland. The Training Strategy, which will be reviewed and taken forward under the emerging Violence Against Women Strategic Framework, provides a key mechanism to build the capacity of workforces across the range of sectors to meet the needs of children and young people affected by domestic abuse. Action at national level will be further informed by local developments in the Getting it right Domestic Abuse Pathfinder areas.

What children and young people have told us

Children's 'headline message' is that they want to be safe and to be listened to ( Mullender et al 2002, echoing children's postcards headline messages to the new Scottish Parliament 1999, Scottish Women's Aid). The most common reason that children cite for not talking to anyone is fear of their father finding out and the backlash - hurting them or their mother especially -

" RES:He threatened to kill me if I told anybody… I kept it quiet to every single person…

INT :What was it like not being able to tell?

RES :I just felt angry and half sad." (Boy 10 in Stafford et al, 2007)

Children, in the main, do not trust in agencies to respond appropriately to their needs. They lack confidence in practitioners ability to keep them and their mother safe and fear the consequences of being referred to the Children's Reporter (Mullender et al, 2002; McGee 2000; Houghton, 2008a; Houghton, 2008b; Stalford et al, 2003; Stafford et al, 2007) Reassuring children and their mothers that the optimum outcome is for them to be safe and together, and that professionals will be allies of the non-abusing members of the family, is a shared challenge for all agencies. A priority is also reassuring children that their views and rights, especially their right to confidentiality and privacy, will be respected. ( Houghton, 2008a)

Children and young people themselves are clear that their mistrust stems in part from a belief that the basic understanding and "knowledge" of domestic abuse is missing in many adults. Only Women's Aid support was rated highly, other professionals and support staff were not deemed to have "the knowledge or experience" to help, with some professionals particularly inflexible and lacking understanding of domestic abuse and children's situations. Social work support, for example, was not rated highly leading to the conclusion that the government needed "to make sure social workers actually help". ( Houghton, 2008b)

Young people speaking to Scottish Ministers highlighted that systematic training for teachers, as well as other professionals, was really important, and that if all agencies (such as the Children's Panel) didn't get training then they would 'miss' domestic abuse as adults would not pick up what children were going through _-

" M:I've always said that if you're gonna go into work like that, its not just about going to uni or college or anything, its actually having some knowledge about the whole thing, such as the social worker me dad's got - she doesn't really understand it all, so if you're going to go into it make sure you understand...

J :so that they're sensitive to it, not expecting too much of children to speak about it." (M, boy, J, girl in Houghton, 2008a)

Equally important for professionals is to understand the cultural and religious context of children's experiences. Asian children in Mullender et al (2002) highlight the concepts of izzat (honour, reputation) and badnamni (get a bad name) and their fear of bringing shame (or being seen to bring shame) on the family.

"If you speak to adults make sure they understand about your family and religion and they don't take things the wrong way. Like, sometimes, goray [white people] will not know about izzat and shame and they can make you do things that bring shame on the family. You are left without any help or support from the community, if they feel you have gone against the religion. I don't say it is always right, but sometimes we have to sort things out in our own way - white people can never really do things in the same way if they don't understand." (16 year old South Asian girl in Mullender et al, 2002)

How will we take this work forward

Actions: Year 1

  • Through consultation with key employers in the voluntary and statutory sectors, we will create a common set of Core Messages about children and young people affected by domestic abuse which will form the backbone of new standards, guidance and training developed by the broad range of agencies. These Core Messages will also form a framework for planning and commissioning services and coordinating multi-agency initiatives for this group of children and young people.
  • We will work with the National Group to Address Violence Against Women to ensure the common Core Messages are embedded into guidance for Violence Against Women Multi-Agency Partnerships.
  • We will work with the National Training Consortia Steering Group to ensure the common Core Messages are translated into a consistent approach to developing and ensuring the quality of training around domestic abuse and children enabled by the Violence Against Women Training Consortia.
  • Through the Getting it right Domestic Abuse Pathfinder, local Consortia and training providers across different sectors we will learn about opportunities to support and promote multidisciplinary training initiatives, where domestic abuse is addressed as part of building workers' capacity to meet the needs of the whole child. One early example is Children at the Centre training where social workers received training around the interface between drugs and alcohol abuse, domestic abuse, mental health and the impact on child protection. We will commission STRADA to re-develop the training materials to be suitable for a wider range of practitioners than social workers. We will encourage employers to use the materials once developed.
  • Through the Getting it right Pathfinder we will also continue to test and refine the role of the 'lead professional' in ensuring that in cases where a number of agencies are delivering services to a child, there is a professional with a clear responsibility to co-ordinate support.
  • Through existing practitioners forums and networks of communication, we will establish sustainable methods for capturing and sharing good practice across in terms of successful skills and resource mixes in multi-agency teams and joint working arrangements.
  • At national level, we will work closely with colleagues taking forward relevant policy areas such as the Early Years Strategy, to strategically align the domestic abuse agenda with other long-term national workforce development strategies which aim to deliver greater integrated working, earlier intervention and more personalised services for children and their families.
  • Through supporting a programme of analytical activities at national and local level, we will develop an evidence base to address key knowledge gaps in relation to domestic abuse, in particular the prevalence of domestic abuse and its impact on children and young people from a child's perspective. We will focus on understanding the experiences of children who may face additional discrimination or disadvantage, including black and minority ethnic children, children from rural areas and children with disabilities or multiple and complex needs. We will also focus on enabling communities themselves to identify local needs.

Actions: Future Work

  • Workforce development strategies are long-term, cumulative processes. Apart from the development of common Core Messages, all of the activities in Year 1 will be continued over the course of the three-year Delivery Plan implementation phase.
  • Building on progress achieved in Year 1 in terms of increasing professionals' ability to help children and their families, we will identify and develop work which focuses around promoting an associated increase in public confidence, especially children's confidence, in the approach agencies will take to address their needs and the needs of their families. This work, which will complement activities outlined in Priority Area 12 (public education campaign), will aim to build employers' capacity to directly engage with children and the public, to share views and expectations. It will also aim to increase all practitioners' understanding of and confidence in their helping role.

Key Outputs

  • Development and dissemination of a common set of Core Messages on children and young people affected by domestic abuse
  • Publication and dissemination of the Guidance for Violence Against Women Multi-Agency Partnerships.
  • Review and implementation of the National Training Strategy to Address Violence Against Women.
  • At policy and practice level, there is strategic alignment between the domestic abuse agenda and other long-term workforce development strategies.
  • Continuation and increase of funding to support progressive capacity building of local Violence Against Women Training Consortia, leading to an increase in the number of practitioners across the range of agencies taking part in domestic abuse training initiatives and associated improvement in practitioners' understanding of domestic abuse, and capacity to help children and their families through single agency responses and interagency working.
  • Appropriate, consistent training on a multidisciplinary basis (and underpinned by appropriate policies and procedures) is available on an ongoing basis to staff working at all levels and tiers of intervention to enable them to appropriately identify and support children affected by domestic abuse.
  • Increase in public confidence in the quality of services for children, young people and their families affected by domestic abuse.

Outcomes

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will support progressive capacity building across the voluntary sector and all mainstream services, including the police, health, judiciary, education and social work, to enable agencies develop practice that meets the individual needs of children and young people affected by domestic abuse, leading to an increase in entry points for these children and young people to access appropriate packages of support.

Action taken forward under the Delivery Plan will therefore support the voluntary sector and all mainstream services, including the police, health, judiciary, housing and social work, to contribute towards -

  • Improving the life chances for children, young people and families at risk as a consequence of domestic abuse.
  • Providing a high quality, continually improving, efficient and responsive service according to local people's needs.

Lead Government Divisions: Safer Children, Stronger Families Division, Equality Unit

Page updated: Tuesday, June 17, 2008