Making a target work: Messages from a pilot of the 6‐month time limit on care proceedings in England

Since 2014, it has been a legal requirement in England and Wales for child care proceedings to be concluded, apart from “exceptional cases,” within 26 weeks. When this was first proposed, there were concerns that it might lead to poorer decision‐making or to delay being squeezed to either side of the court proceedings, before or afterwards. This paper reports on the messages from a pilot programme to hit the 26‐week target that took place in London in 2012–2013. The study compared the progress of the cases from the pilot year with those the year before, 180 cases in total, involving 256 children. The local authorities involved were able to achieve considerable improvements in timeliness, not just in the proceedings, but for the pre‐ and post‐court processes too; and the quality and fairness of decisions did not seem to be impaired, in terms of the plans for the children and subsequent outcomes over a period of 2 years. “Targets” do not generally find a warm welcome in the social work literature, but this paper shows that when collaboratively implemented, with a measure of flexibility and adequate resources, they can be an effective way of helping to achieve positive change.     

Linking children's social care data to information about their care proceedings to understand the use of care proceedings and their effects on parents,children and local authorities.

Care proceedings are the most powerful child protection intervention; local authorities make applications for over 20,000 children each year in England and Wales. The Department for Education holds two administrative databases of children who receive services, for children looked after and children in need. These databases do not record the use of care proceedings. Data linkage is a powerful tool for revealing patterns not visible from a single data set; the Outcomes for children before and after care proceedings reform study linked these administrative records with a research database of care proceedings to examine children's care and service journeys associated with care proceedings. The researchers also devised a simplified method for use by local authorities with their own records and tested this with North Yorkshire County Council. Analysis of the linked data reveals how care proceedings are used and the impact of care proceedings on care demand. It provides the basis for analysis of cohorts of children subject to proceedings and feedback to social workers, children's guardians, and the judges and lawyers on their decisions and children's outcomes.     

Supporting care‐experienced adults' educational journeys: “Linked lives” over the life course

Research highlights the role of key actors and relationships in supporting the educational attainment and progress of children in care and care leavers. We know less about how relationships influence the educational journeys of people with care experience over time and how to support the educational progress and engagement of adults with care experience. The principle of “linked lives” is central to the life course perspective referring to the interdependence of human lives throughout the life course. This paper explores how the principle of linked lives can illuminate our understanding of how relationships positively influence the educational journeys of adults with care experience over time. Educational life history interviews were conducted with 18 care‐experienced adults (aged 24–36) in Ireland. Findings suggest that the principle of linked lives is a valuable conceptual tool for providing new insights on this issue. Four key themes were identified: (a) opportunities for educational support are present across the life course; (b) “family” is a central source of educational support; (c) there is intergenerational capacity for educational support; and (d) relationships beyond the “family” are supportive of education. Implications for practice, policy, and research are explored.     

Care proceedings and parents with learning difficulties: comparative prevalence and outcomes in an English and Australian court sample

This paper presents and contrasts the findings from two independent but comparable court studies in England and Australia of care proceedings involving parents with learning difficulties. Significant differences between the two jurisdictions were found in both prevalence and outcomes, with a much higher proportion of cases showing in the England sample, with many more children being returned home to live with their parents in Australia, and with far more children being placed out‐of‐home and outside the family network in England. We explore the reasons for these differences and discuss the implications of the findings.     

Judgements of Solomon: anxieties and defences of social workers involved in care proceedings

Evidence from focus group discussions with social workers in child care and child protection was collected for a research project exploring decision‐making in care proceedings and seeking a better understanding of the causes of delay in the process. Here this material is used to examine social workers' feelings about their work and to explore the anxieties they expressed. Isabel Menzies's work on containing anxiety in institutions is used to provide a conceptual framework for thinking about the ways in which individuals' unconscious defences against anxiety may affect the structure, policies and practices of the organization in which they work. It is suggested that this dimension needs to be taken into account in understanding difficulties which arise in putting policy into practice.     

Managing the Family: Productivity, Scheduling and the Male Veto

This paper argues that research, analysis and policy innovations focused on how households combine paid work with care responsibilities are driven to too great a degree by preconceptions of “the problem” that do not take sufficient account of how families themselves understand their work and care roles and the choices they are making. The evidence of 246 SOCCARE interviews across five European countries (Finland, France, Italy, Portugal and the UK) is that the variables that are conventionally accepted as having fundamental significance (family‐friendly policies and generous care services, flexible working hours, women's work–life preferences, family type, national labour markets, cultural differences) are less important than is often suggested. More important are time pressures and the idiosyncratic factors that constrain the work and care timetables that families are able to construct. We characterize these as “scheduling problems”. They occupied a large part of the accounts of their lives provided by our respondents and are a primary dimension within which their combinations of paid work and care responsibilities need to be understood. The difficulties our respondents faced in coordinating the work and care activities of their families bear a striking similarity to the problems described in the operations research literature on small businesses. Within the context of these scheduling problems a second important factor emerged: the preferences and behaviour of men who played a critical, though often passive, part in the construction of work and care timetables of the families. We characterize this effect as the “the male veto”.     

“Roll back the years”: A study of grandparent special guardians' experiences and implications for social work policy and practice in England

Growing numbers of grandparent special guardians (GSGs) are assuming responsibility for increasing numbers of children in the care system in England. Special guardianship arrangements are increasingly used as a permanency option as they allow children to remain in their kinship networks rather than in local authority care or be adopted; yet there is a scarcity of research on GSG carers' experiences. This paper reports a small qualitative research study where 10 sets of grandparents were interviewed to explore their journey to becoming GSGs and to theorize their subsequent experiences. Two themes emerge. First, experiences of the assessment process are elaborated, decisions often being made at a time of family crisis, impacting on GSGs: financial, employment, and relational. Second, GSGs' experiences of managing often challenging relationships and contact arrangements between the grandchildren and the parents reveal three main relationship management approaches emerging: containing‐flexible, containing‐controlled, and uncontained/defeated approaches. Anthropological concepts of affinity help theorize the GSGs' ambivalent responses to becoming carers in later life, enabling reconfigured kinship relationships in new family forms. Family policy and social work practice is critiqued as GSGs appear often left alone to “roll back the years,” to heal previous harms done to the grandchildren who end up in their care.     

Care, control and change in child care proceedings: dilemmas for social workers, managers and lawyers

This paper draws on findings from an interview‐based study of the ways that local authority social workers, social services managers and lawyers work together in child care cases in England. The study shows how stressful social workers can find care proceedings, and how much they look to the lawyers for support. It also shows how the lawyers’ involvement can bring new stresses and dilemmas. The managers are especially likely to resent ‘over‐involvement’ (as they see it) from lawyers, but lawyers are quick to defend their role and responsibilities. The paper shows how the complex, multifaceted dimensions of care, control and change interweave with professional differences in care proceedings: care for children, parents and social workers; struggles for control against the court, the other parties and sometimes the other professionals on one's own side; and responsiveness to change set against wariness about ‘lawyers’ deals’ and undue risk to children. The paper concludes that the valuing of difference, rather than its avoidance or suppression, is at the heart of effective inter‐professional work. It calls for greater recognition of this in current initiatives to promote interdisciplinary working in children's services in England.     

A new approach to care proceedings

A new approach to care proceedings, introduced in April 2008 with revised Children Act 1989 Guidance Volume 1 and the Public Law Outline (PLO), a procedural guide for the courts, adds a semi‐formal pre‐proceedings stage. This paper critiques the aims and objectives of the pre‐proceedings process in the light of what is known about the families who become subject to care proceedings. Drawing on the Care Profiling Study, the analysis of a random sample of 386 court files for care proceedings brought in 2004 and the Ministry of Justice's preliminary study of the operation of care proceedings under the PLO, it questions whether formalizing communication between the local authority and the parents immediately before proceedings can produce the intended benefits of diverting cases from the courts and improving the preparation of court applications. It considers how the new processes fit with existing safeguarding and planning procedures, the impact on workers and families, and whether the procedures will help produce good, long‐term arrangements for children at risk of significant harm more quickly.     

What social workers talk about when they talk about child care proceedings in the District Court in Ireland

Court proceedings are a fundamental and increasingly time‐consuming aspect of social work practice. However, to date, there is a relatively modest body of literature considering the experiences of social workers in instituting child care proceedings and giving evidence in court. This paper draws on data gathered as part of an in‐depth qualitative study of professional experiences of District Court child care proceedings in Ireland and presents findings regarding the experiences of social workers in bringing court applications for child protection orders. It seeks to answer 2 key questions: First, how do child protection and welfare social workers experience the adversarial nature of child care proceedings in the District Court? Second, what are the views of child protection and welfare social workers on the strengths and weaknesses of child care proceedings as a decision‐making model for children and young people? The main findings are that social workers expressed significant reservations about the predominantly adversarial model that currently operates in Irish child care proceedings and about the level of respect that social workers are afforded within the operation of the system.     

“Nothing goes as planned”: Practitioners reflect on matching children and foster families

Matching children with foster carers is an important step in every nonkinship family foster care placement. Although guidelines for matching are provided in several studies, the case‐specific context of the decision can influence the practitioners' ability to adhere to these guidelines. Therefore, this study answers the following question: “How does the case‐specific context influence the practitioners' decision‐making process regarding matching in family foster care?” Using a qualitative design, 20 semistructured interviews were conducted with practitioners matching children with foster families. Three themes emerged representing different layers of practitioners' everyday decision‐making: matching as planned, matching being tailored, and matching being compromised. The results show that exceptions are part of practitioners' daily work, either due to the belief that it might benefit those involved or because of obstacles presented during the decision‐making process. When the decision is compromised, matching practitioners lower their standards, while at the same time safeguarding the quality of the match. This proves that matching in practice is more than choosing a family, and guidelines are needed to determine what “good‐enough” matching should entail.     

After Safety,What is the Goal of Child Welfare Services: Permanency,Family Continuity or Social Benefit?

Child welfare services have multiple goals, including child protection, family continuity, and achievement of legal permanency so children can end their involvement with child welfare services and have a lifetime family. These goals are not all achievable to the same extent in all cases. American child welfare policy has, in the last few years, become more definitive about the priority of child protection above family preservation. Now, situations which involve safety risks that are too great do not require any efforts at reunifying children to their biological homes. Less clear in American child welfare policy and practice is the value to be placed on other factors – particularly when a child cannot return home and will need an alternative adoptive family. Practitioners often emphasize family continuity – that is, the opportunity to maintain contact with the biological parent and extended family members – as a key decision making consideration. Yet, family continuity does not necessarily predict a successful transition to adulthood that is healthy for children or provides social benefits to the community. This paper explores the rationale for expanding child welfare decision making criteria by adding longer-term outcomes and the likelihood that children will eventually generate social benefits.     

Use of population measures and norms to identify resilient outcomes in young people in care: an exploratory study

The purposes of this study were to derive a new method for identifying resilience (i.e. positive adaptation in spite of serious adversity) among young people in care and to determine the percentage of the latter who experienced resilience on selected outcomes, as conceptualized from within the developmental approach of Looking After Children. The participants comprised two samples of young people who were living in out‐of‐home care (mainly foster care) in the province of Ontario, Canada, 340 aged 10–15 years and 132 aged 5–9 years. Virtually all had experienced severe adversity in their families of origin, such that in most cases the legal custody, care, and control of the young people had been permanently transferred from their parents to a local Children's Aid Society. Corresponding to each in‐care sample was a general‐population sample of the same age range that served as a normative comparison group and was drawn from the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY). The NLSCY is an ongoing, long‐term social‐policy study of the development of a nationally representative sample of Canadian children into adolescence and early adulthood. The general‐population samples were composed, respectively, of 5539 young people aged 10–15 years and 11 858 children aged 5–9 years. Resilience among the young people in care was operationally defined, on each outcome variable, as average or above‐average functioning relative to that of the general‐population sample of the same age range. The percentage experiencing resilience was relatively high on the outcomes of health, self‐esteem, and pro‐social behaviour, moderate on the outcomes of relationship with friends and anxiety and emotional distress, and low on the outcome of academic performance. The implications of the findings are discussed.     

How do placements in kinship care compare with those in non‐kin foster care: placement patterns,progress and outcomes?

As the use of kinship care is set to rise in England, it is important that policy and practice developments are based on firm evidence about kin placement outcomes and how these compare with those in stranger foster care. The research reported in this paper was based on case file reviews of 270 children, half in kin placements and half in stranger foster care, and on interviews with a sub-sample of 32 kin carers, social workers, children and parents. Kin carers were found to be significantly more disadvantaged than stranger foster carers: more kin carers were lone carers, with health problems, living in overcrowded conditions and had financial difficulties. The children, in contrast, were remarkably similar in the two kinds of placement. The main differences between the children in the two settings are examined in the paper. The children's progress and outcomes in terms of placement quality and disruption were very similar in the two settings, but kin placements lasted longer, mainly because fewer were planned as interim placements. However, because kin carers persisted with very challenging children and yet received fewer services than stranger foster carers, they were more often under strain. The implications for policy and practice are examined.     

Social workers' reflexive understandings of their “everyday” communications with children

Over the past two decades, the use of ethnographic research methods, in combination with a range of discursive, conversational, and multimodal analytical approaches, have provided vivid accounts of the complex nature of social workers' everyday communication. This paper discusses the potential and the problems of combining a video‐stimulated recall methodology with an explicit theoretical framework, in order to generate critical reflexive “insider” accounts of social workers' direct encounters with children. The framework employed was based on an adaptation of Goffman's concepts of “framing” and “footing,” which were integrated into an analytical process designed to theorize social workers' critiques regarding the nature of their communication with children. Three detailed case exemplars are used to demonstrate the potential of this methodology to explore the “delicate” agency required by social workers in the practice of authentic communication in complex professional inquiries with children. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of the theoretical and practical issues associated with utilizing reflexive methodologies in professional contexts.     

“Build a friendship with them”: The discourse of “at‐risk” as a barrier to relationship building between young people who trade sex and social workers

Young people in statutory care and protection interact with social workers, who hold potential to provide a supportive adult role in their lives. Many however, run away at an early age and end up on the street trading sex for money or other favours. There is potential to improve outcomes for young people in care if the relationship between young people and their social workers is better addressed. This paper uses data from a qualitative study of 14 young people who traded sex and who had experienced interactions with social workers. A thematic analysis identified three themes: the rigidity of social work practice; contesting the family situation; and resisting the at‐risk label. We argue that to have any impact on outcomes for young people in care, social workers need to prioritise relationship‐building above the need to conform to organizational protocols and guidelines. Such guidelines assist the social worker in assessing whether family situations pose high risk for a young person, but the “at‐risk” label is contested by young people, which results in a lack of trust and a barrier to relationship building.     

Improving decision‐making in care order proceedings: A multijurisdictional study of court decision‐makers' viewpoints

Child welfare removals of children are among the most invasive decisions a state can make toward its citizens, and typically it is the courts that make these decisions. These interventions are regularly exposed to criticism. In this paper, we examine if and how care order proceedings could be improved in England, Finland, Norway, and California, USA. We have asked the judiciary decision‐makers about their view on what should be improved. Our findings show that the organization of the proceedings, including time and staff, are identified as issues in all four systems. Furthermore, the preparations by the child welfare agency are also mentioned as an issue, for English, Finnish, and Californian decision‐makers. Very few decision‐makers indicate features related to the individual, situational, and contextual dimensions, which is interesting since this would be expected from organization theory. The strong call for change in the way proceedings are organized indicates a need for modernization as well as better use of available competency from child development experts. The respondents focus on the elements that a decision‐maker has direct experience with and knowledge about, and this is indeed worth noting for policymakers in the four systems.     

Caregiving in Transition in Southern Europe: Neither Complete Altruists nor Free-riders

In the framework of the SOCCARE Project, focusing on families dealing with a double front of care for children and frail elderly people, similarities can be found in Italy, France and Portugal beyond their different welfare regimes. The comparison of family histories and caregiving strategies, by the methodology of case‐matching, gives an interesting overview of the relationship between the debate on social care and that on the intergenerational contract. The paper aims to understand which are the available combinations of family, informal and institutional resources making a heavy burden of care “acceptable and still normal”: this focuses both typical situations of each country and common features through the countries. The results show how changes in the representations of obligation and duty in the intergenerational pact produce different outcomes and demands in welfare systems. The analysis of shifting boundaries between the public and private spheres in care provides useful policy recommendations, aimed at improving choices and “sustainable” responsibilities of individuals, families and social networks. Sustainable policies seem to be more dependent on family and structural types and resources of networks than on different welfare and services support.     

Policy transfer,social pedagogy and children's residential care in England

Much concern has been expressed about the quality of care and poor outcomes for looked‐after children (‘children in care’) in England, especially regarding residential homes. This paper builds on a recent evaluation of the piloting of the continental European model of social pedagogy (SP) in English residential care. It does three things: it considers the theoretical social policy literature on policy transfer and its implications; discusses European residential care for children and the discipline of SP; and reflects on these debates and the situation of children's residential care in England. The paper concludes that there are some major hurdles to a widespread implementation of SP in England. This particularly concerns the differing social, professional and political context of children's residential services across neighbouring countries.