Children's Homicide as an Indicator of Effective Child Protection: A Comparative Study of Western European Statistics

Correspondence to Colin Pritchard, Professor of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton SO9 5NH. Summary It is known that the extreme consequence of child abuse is adead child. Attempts to determine the success of services toprevent child abuse and subsequent deaths confront the problemsinherent in trying to prove a negative. The use of an epidemiologicalapproach resolves some of the methodological problems by measuring‘failure’ to protect in an examination of children'shomicides rates over time. Between 1973 and 1988 it was found that there was a substantialreduction in baby homicides in England and Wales, equivalentto a fall of 61 per cent and a 57 per cent reduction in Scotland.In a comparison with the other fifteen Western European countries,England and Wales topped the league of improvements in children'shomicide, and Scotland was fourth. Such improvements suggestadvances by the child protection services. Explanations forthe positive British results are considered.     

Have Child Protection Efforts Reduced Child Homicides? An Examination of Data from Britain and North America

Correspondence to Duncan Lindsey, School of Public Policy and Social Research, Department of Social Welfare, University of California, Los Angeles, 247 Dodd Hall, Los Angeles, CA 90024-1452, USA. Summary In a recent British Journal of Social Work article examiningtrends in child homicide statistics collected by the World HealthOrganization (WHO), Colin Pritchard attributes a reduction inchild homicides in England and Wales to improved effectivenessof child protection services. However, further analysis of theWHO data show that the decrease in England and Wales is dueto an unusual single-year drop in homicide rates, and that thereis no evidence of a long-term downward trend. Examination oftrends in Europe and North America show that there are no consistentpatterns in fluctuations in child homicide rates, and in particular,no evidence that fatality statistics have been influenced bythe rapid expansion in child protection efforts.     

Unemployment, Age, Gender and Regional Suicide in England and Wales 1974-90: A Harbinger of Increased Suicide for the 1990s?

Correspondence to Prof. Colin Pritchard, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton SO9 SNH. Summary The Department of Health's Health of the Nation aims at a substantialreduction in suicide; this is a ‘vote of confidence’in the effectiveness of the community psychiatric and healthservices. However, it will be shown that a number of socioeconomicchanges have occurred which may lead to increased suicide; forexample British male suicide rose in the 1980s, significantlyassociated with unemployment. Though female suicide fell substantiallyover the period, across the regions suicide rates for both menand women were worse amongst the ‘work age’ bands,16–44 years, than the older groups. In respect to therelatively poorer rates amongst younger women, this may be linkedto unemployment and their unfulfilled job expectations. If thesuicide targets are not met, it is feared that the ‘failure’will laid at the door of the community and health services.     

Children's Homicide and Road Deaths in England and Wales and the USA: An International Comparison 1974-1997

Correspondence to Professor Colin Pritchard, Department of Mental Health, University of Southampton, Southampton SO14 OYG, UK. Summary Child murder often leads to demands for new legislation. Todetermine relative risks and the need for such change, children's(0–14) homicide and road deaths were compared internationally.All data were extrapolated from WHO standardized mortality statisticsand ratios of change were calculated. Five-year summed actualnumbers and rates for 1974–78 and 1993–97 were usedfor comparison. The findings indicate that children's road deathsfell substantially everywhere across the two periods; Englandand Wales had the lowest rate, and the fifth biggest reduction.In addition, in every country, the figures for children's homicidewere substantially lower than road deaths. England and Waleshad been fourth highest but by the later period were the thirdlowest. While children's homicide rose substantially in Franceand the USA, the biggest reductions were found in Japan andin England and Wales. For every country considered, road deathsfell proportionately more than deaths by homicide, althoughthe latter remained considerably lower than road deaths. Thestatistics led to the clear interpretation that the averagechild is substantially more at risk of being killed on the roadthan being murdered.     

A Comparison of Child-sex-abuse-related and Mental-disorder-related Suicide in a Six-year Cohort of Regional Suicides: The Importance of the Child Protection-Psychiatric Interface

Correspondence to: Professor Colin Pritchard, Department of Mental Health, School of Medicine, Southampton University, Royal South Hants Hospital, Southampton SO14 0YG, UK. E-mail: cp1{at}soton.ac.uk Summary The study compares Mental-Disorder-Related (MDR) suicide rateswith Child-Sex-Abuse-Related (CSAR) suicide of ‘Victims’and ‘Perpetrators’ of child sex abuse, based uponan examination of all Coroners’ inquest files over a six-yearperiod (n = 1,017). Census data, psychiatric case register andpolice records were used to calculate the potential MDR andCSAR populations. There were five main findings: (i) male andfemale CSAR victim suicide rates were 2.2. and 2.5 times theGeneral Population Suicide Rate (GPSR), respectively; (ii) everyfemale, and 80 per cent of male CSAR victim suicides, also hada mental disorder but none of the CSAR perpetrator suicides;(iii) male and female MDR suicide rates were 5 and 6 times theCSAR Victim rates; (iv) the sex abuser perpetrators’ suiciderate was more than 3 times the male MDR rate; (v) the intra-and extra-familial perpetrator suicide rates, were 25 and 78times the GPSR, respectively. Possible explanations for thesesurprising results are briefly discussed. They confirm the overrepresentationof people with mental disorder amongst suicides, and identifyan overrepresentation of CSAR suicides, particularly perpetrators.The results have implications for suicide prevention programmes,whilst highlighting the importance of the child protection-psychiatricinterface, and indicates the futility of simple explanationsin an area of practical and moral complexity.     

Regulation in Child Protection--Policy Failure?

Correspondence to Mai Walton, Department of Applied Social Studies and Social Work, University of Keele, Keele, Staffs. ST5 5BG Summary This paper examines child protection policy formulation andimplementation. It suggests that policy has been incrementallyformed in an expedient fashion to suit the political and organizationalstatus quo. It draws upon models of issue ascendancy, policyanalysis and inspection, and argues that child protection policyis regulatory in nature yet lacks the prerequisites normallyfound in regulation. It examines perceived policy failure anddemonstrates that this results from partial policy formulationand lack of clarity in objectives.     

Determinants of Substitute Child Care Practice

Correspondence to Dr Matthew Colton, Department of Social and Administrative Studies, Barnett House, Wellington Square, Oxford CX1 2ER Summary The first part of this paper attempts to examine the factorswhich help to define foster and residential care practices.The discussion is informed by a comparative study of fosterhomes and Children's Homes, which was reported in the previousissue of this journal (BJSW 18:1). Overall, care practices inthe foster homes compared very favourably with those observedin the Children's Homes. It is argued that this finding owesmuch to the bureaucratization of Children's Homes. The secondsection considers the implications of my work for policy andpractice in the field of substitute child care. Use is madeof the insights provided by the preceding section to suggestways by which the major shortcomings identified by empiricalresearch might be ameliorated. This statement includes an argumentin favour of a significant expansion of family placement forolder children in public care, and a proposal for a child-orientedalternative to the sorts of Children's Homes visited.     

Liberty and Respect in Child Protection

Correspondence to Sally Holland, Cardiff University, School of Social Sciences, Glamorgan Building, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff CF10 3WT, Wales, UK. E-mail: HollandS1{at} cf.ac.uk Summary The paper begins by introducing Isaiah Berlin's concepts ofpositive and negative liberty and the application of these conceptsto child protection. There is discussion of some recent debateson the social and political context of state social work andchild protection in particular. The authors then consider, inturn, the experience of children, parents and social workersin the child protection system. There is also a considerationof partnership and rights. The conclusion is that opportunitiesfor statutory child protection to be liberating are limited,but that there is more potential than the most pessimistic accountsmight allow. Rather than libertarian child protection, socialworkers can aim for child protection practice that is respectful.The paper concludes with some principles for respectful practice,based on the ideas of Richard Sennett. Most importantly, Sennett'sideas recognize the importance of relationships in social welfareand acknowledge the context of inequality within which socialwork takes place.     

Discourses of Child Protection and Child Welfare

Correspondence to Gordon Jack, University of Exeter, Department of Social Work and Probation Studies, Amory Building, Rennes Drive, Exeter EX4 4RJ Summary The history and dominance of the discourse of child protectionand its influence over social work practice with children andfamilies is discussed in the light of recent research into theoperation of child protection systems in the UK and elsewhere.The often negative effects of current approaches on professionals,parents, and, particularly, children are highlighted. The issuesof confidentiality and empowerment appear to be of central importancefor current debates about the welfare of children and youngpeople. Three strategies for change are outlined and discussed. It isargued that a fundamental challenge to the child protectiondiscourse is required. Parallels are drawn with the changeswhich occurred in attitudes and responses towards football supporters,following the Hillsborough disaster in 1989. The dangers and shortcomings of the present reliance on a diseasemodel of ‘abuse’, with its focus on individual pathology,are analysed. Support is provided for the development of a newdiscourse, which acknowledges the social contexts within whichallegations of ‘abuse’ arise, and without whichsocial work will continue to be restricted to a procedurallydominated conservative orientation to child welfare.     

Contract Management and Community Care: A Negotiated Process

Correspondence to Jackie Powell, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK. Summary Drawing on a wider study of community care arrangements forvisually impaired people in England and Wales, this paper exploresthe implementation of contractual arrangements as part of thedeveloping formalization of partnerships between local authoritysocial services departments and voluntary organizations. Itargues the importance of conceiving contract management as acomplex set of social processes involving a diversity of interestsand inequalities of power, where skills in negotiation are centralto promoting greater participation in community care policyand practice. It concludes with a brief discussion of the relevanceof social work to the implementation of this key area of contemporarycommunity care arrangements.     

Parents' Views on Social Work Interventions in Child Welfare Cases

Correspondence to Trevor Spratt, Lecturer in Social Work, School of Social Work, The Queen's University Belfast, 7 Lennoxvale, Belfast BT9 5BY, Northern Ireland. E-mail: T.Spratt{at}qub.ac.uk Summary This article reports findings from the third part of a three-partresearch project examining the potential for social workersto shift from a child protection to a child welfare orientationin their practice. Whilst social workers in the UK have beenencouraged to make such changes, they have been hampered byconcerns to manage risk. Findings reported from the earlierparts of the project, indicated that there was potential fora substantial proportion of child protection work to be redesignatedas child welfare work, but that where this was achieved in practice,there was evidence of the continued influence of child protectionprocesses as social workers sought to manage the risks inherentin child welfare cases. The study reported here sets out toascertain the views of parents who were subject to child welfareinterventions. The findings indicate that while parents feelapprehension with regard to contact with social workers, inthe majority of cases successful relationships are formed. Itis argued that social workers display considerable skill inmonitoring potential risks whilst engaging with families andthat the subtleties involved in such activity are not capturedby official measures of governance which concentrate on moreabstract indicators of performance.     

Managing Assessment. Quality Planning in Assessment Procedures of the Dutch Child Protection Board

Correspondence to Carolus van Nijnatten, University of Utrecht, Department of General Social Sciences, P.O. Box 80140, 3508 TC Utrecht, The Netherlands. E-mail: C.vanNijnatten{at}fss.uu.nl Summary The Child Welfare and Protection Board (CP), which plays a centralrole in Dutch child welfare is an agency of the Dutch Ministryof Justice. The CP may present petitions to the juvenile courtfor their judgement regarding the custody or guardianship ofchildren. The Board presents petitions concerning legal propositionsfor custody, suspension of the execution of custody, provisionalguardianship, and dispossession and restriction of custody.These petitions are based on an investigation of the socialconditions of the child and the family. In the past, the qualityof these investigations has often been questioned, the maincriticism being the lack of any systematic procedure and thestrong intrusion of personal opinion. Nevertheless, social workersof the CP Board often regarded potential changes to these investigationswith some apprehension because they feared the assessment proceduresmight lose their human character. More recently, the CP Boardhas experimented with a system of testing hypotheses in itsassessment procedures. In this article, we present the resultsof an evaluation of this new procedure. The results are presentedin the context of the recent debate, published in the BritishJournal of Social Work, between the advocates and opponentsof making social work more scientifically rigorous.     

Participants or Recipients--Disabled People's Involvement in a European Programme

Correspondence to Jackie Powell, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton S017 1BJ Summary Drawing on an evaluative study of UK participation in a Europeandisability programme (HELlOS I), this paper explores the extentto which and the ways in which disabled people were-or werenot-involved in the programme as active participants ratherthan passive recipients, at local, national and European levels.The findings presented here draw attention to the differentperspectives of the programme's various stakeholders and arediscussed in relation to two broader themes. The first of thesethemes is the involvement of disabled people themselves in anyprogramme aiming to promote the full participation of disabledpeople in society. The second is the role and value of formalizednetworks as a means of promoting information exchange and learning,as a prerequisite for promoting change in individuals (thatis in day-to-day practice) and change in organizations (thatis service developments). These two themes are pertinent tocurrent developments in social work, with its explicit attentionto anti-discriminatoiy practice and its strong tradition ofvaluing the learning gained from experience.     

Keeping Social Work Honest: Evaluating as Profession and Practice

Correspondence to Ian Shaw, School of Social and Administrative Studies, University of Wales Cardiff, 50 Park Place, Cardiff CF1 3AT Summary The central argument of this paper is that social work needsa radical alternative to existing options for evaluating practice.Social workers at present are offered three choices. They areinvited to choose between applying research, conducting researchor adopting specific forms of empirical research-based practice(for example Everitt et al., 1992; Thyer. 1993; Fuller and Petch,1995). We touch briefly on reasons why we believe none of these optionsprovides an adequate grounding for social work, referring especiallyto the growing call for social work to find new purpose throughan empirical, research-based practice. If alternative approachesare to be persuasive, they must be fashioned from the materialsof a new approach to research on social work practice—‘one that is exploratory rather than confirmatory, buildinga model of evaluation from the practitioners' own accounts ratherthan superimposing an ideal model’ (Elks and Kirkhart,1993, p. 555). The major part of this paper is taken up withevidence from research of this kind. The model of evaluatingin practice with which we conclude the paper is simultaneouslytrue to social workers' accounts of their practice, while offeringa critical starting point for evaluating and refashioning thatpractice.     

Evaluating Social Work and Medical Practice with Black and Ethnic Minority Groups Using the Clinical Audit Model

Correspondence to Kish Bhatti-Sinclair, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. Summary This paper is based on the External Audit-Ethnically SensitivePractice (EA-ESP) project which was undertaken within six primaryand secondary health care settings. This project is used asan example of how the clinical audit model can be used to monitorand review health and social work practice in the UK. The paperexamines quality, compares approaches to evaluation, and suggeststhat audit can be a useful tool for agencies in obtaining userand staff views on many areas of practice but in particularon equal opportunities, anti-racism and anti-oppression. Attentionis drawn to audit within broader evaluative and review approachesalready employed by social work academics and practitioners.The issue of quality and how it can be measured is consideredthrough an analytical comparison with approaches which employaction research and other evaluative means in the process ofreview. Audit is explored in the context of a growing need for the developmentof monitoring and review systems which provide evidence to supportand develop professionalism within social work. External auditis explored and compared to internal audit. Finally, the needfor the development of quality services in anti-racist and anti-oppressivework is highlighted and it is suggested that audit can be acost-effective and efficient way of achieving this.     

Child Sexual Abuse Allegations in the Context of Divorce: Issues for Mothers

Correspondence to Catherine Humphreys, Department of Applied Social Studies, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL Summary The investigation and assessment of allegations of child sexualabuse constitute a difficult and contentious area for practitionersinvolved in this process. When these allegations emerge in thecontext of divorce, the problems of assessment appear to becompounded. This paper argues that when mothers raise concernsabout child sexual abuse during divorce proceedings these areoften construed as vindictive or misguided. Such constructionsof mothers have significant implications for the protection,or lack of protection of children in these circumstances. Theway in which this ‘knowledge’ about mothers hasdeveloped is explored and held up against the results of empiricalstudies which show that there is little basis for this constructionof mothers. Possible explanations for this incongruity are suggestedwith a view to progressing child protection in this area. As the court cases go on I can see the hopelessness of the wholething. It's getting stronger in me to want to take the law intomy own hands. I wouldn't say it's revenge, it's not ... I meana mother protects its young. You wouldn't see a lioness lettingsomething attack its young. (A mother expressing her desperation that the Family Court ofAustralia has ordered her to send her child on visits to herex-husband who she believes sexually abused their child.)     

Swimming with Dolphins: The Assessment Framework, New Labour and New Tools for Social Work with Children and Families

Correspondence to Dr Paul Michael Garrett, School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK. E-mail: paul.garrett{at}nottingham.ac.uk Summary Local authorities, in England, implemented the Framework forthe Assessment of Children in Need and their Families in April2001. The Framework is the first ‘official’ standardassessment model intended for use in the initial assessmentof all ‘children in need’ under Part 111, section17 of the 1989 Children Act. This new ‘conceptual map’needs to be understood in terms of previous policy documentsand earlier technologies of intervention related to child protectionand, more broadly, child welfare. However, it also needs tobe more expansively perceived, fixed and located as it relatesto other elements in New Labour's political ‘project’.The Framework's preoccupation with an ecological approach toassessments and with questionnaires and scales are likely tohave major implications for social work practice and for micro-engagementswith children and families.     

Family Group Conferences: User Empowerment or Family Self-Reliance?--a development from Lupton

Correspondence to Shirley Jackson, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. Summary This article isa response to Lupton (1998). It is not in thetradition of a critical response, but rather a complementaryand extended exploration of the issues raised in the earlierpaper. It draws on the authors' respective experiences as innovatorand researcher in the field of child welfare and youth justiceand presents, within the overall debate, new material both fromchild welfare initiatives and from the recently completed studyinto the use of family group conferences in youth justice. Itconcludes that some of the key tenets of family group conferencesare in danger of being neglected by professional and politicalagendas if urgent attention is not given to the primary purposeof family empowerment and to adequate resourcing of FGC plans.     

The Influence of Performance Measurement on Child Welfare Policy and Practice

Correspondence to Clare Tilbury, School of Social Work and Applied Human Sciences, University of Queensland Q 4072, Australia. E-mail: c.tilbury{at}social.uq.edu.au Summary The increasing use of performance measurement in child welfarepromises to have significant consequences. Performance indicatorsare not neutral or merely technical—they represent viewpointsand values that may influence policy and practice. This three-partarticle examines how this may occur. The first part outlinesa theoretical approach to understanding the policy significanceof performance indicators. As they become part of the frameworkwithin which policy debates occur, indicators may frame policyissues, create boundaries around options for solutions, definestandards for evaluating results, and set the terms of publicdiscourse. The second part discusses the background to the developmentof performance measurement in child welfare in Britain, theUSA and Australia, locating it as integral to contemporary approachesto public sector management. The third part examines the performanceindicators used in these jurisdictions-aspects of performancemeasured, underlying assumptions about ‘good’ performance,and how they construct child welfare. Existing indicators narrowlyconstruct child welfare in terms of investigations and out-of-homecare, whereas the child welfare literature suggests a broaderapproach with more attention to family support. The articleargues that there is space to negotiate on the new managerialistterrain, developing an approach to performance measurement thatcontributes to better services and outcomes for children andfamilies.     

Moving beyond Litigation and Positivism: Another Approach to Accusations of Sexual Abuse

Correspondence to Professor Lena Dominelli, Department of Social Work Studies, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton SO17 IBJ. Summary The Current polarized debated about false memory and reclaimedmemory with regard to child sexual abuse have trivialized thesignificance of experimental knowledge and contributed to thesilencing of the voice of the victim-survivor. They have alsoenabled the alleged abuser to avoid confronting those elementsof his behaviour which are problematic for others and discouragedpreventative approaches by locking the protagonists into adversarialpositions. We argue that this need not be the case if therapeuticrelationships can operate outside of court driven proceedingsand be aimed at responding to the needs of the victim-survivorto have their experience of abuse validated and of the allegedabuser to work on non-abusive ways of relating to others.