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SCOTTISH CHILD CONTACT CENTRES: CHARACTERISTICS OF CENTRE USERS AND CENTRE STAFF
CHAPTER ONE : INTRODUCTION
1.1 This research was undertaken as part of the programme of research into the operation of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. The Act is a major piece of legislation, covering matters of private and public law. Centred on the needs of children and their families, an underpinning principle of the Act is that parents normally should be responsible for the upbringing of their children and should share that responsibility, even if separated or divorced. The Act makes it a parental responsibility (and corresponding right) to maintain personal relations and direct contact on a regular basis with a child that is not living with them. 1 At an international level, this principle is enshrined in the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child, and the European Convention on Human Rights.
1.2 The Scottish Office gave a commitment to monitor and evaluate the implementation of the 1995 Act through a number of means, including research. The overall aim of the research programme is to evaluate the impact of the Act on the lives of children and their families, as well as its impact upon court practices and procedures. This research was conducted as part of that obligation.
SCOTTISH CHILD CONTACT CENTRES
1.3 Contact centres are
" neutral, safe and welcoming venues, which exist to promote and support regular contact between parents and children who no longer live together. Ultimately the goal of a contact centre is to protect children from parental conflict so that the time parents and children do spend together is not spoiled by the display of hostile feelings between parents".2
14. Contact centres predate the implementation of the Children (Scotland) Act (1995) 3. The first centres were opened in 1988. Family Mediation Lothian and One Parent Families Scotland were the first organisations to provide the service. Since then there has been a large growth in numbers, and at the time the research was embarked upon there were 26 centres operating in Scotland. 4 The centres were set up by a variety of organisations, predominantly Family Mediation and the Women's Royal Voluntary Service (WRVS). They are staffed by a mixture of paid organisers and voluntary workers.
1.5 All centres are affiliated to the Scottish Network of Child Contact Centres. The Network is an informal body and does not manage or direct the affiliated centres. The Network's role is to encourage the development of good practice across centres and to standardise service provision. The Network is co-ordinated by the Scottish Contact Centre Development Officer, who is based at Family Mediation Scotland. The Development Officer produces information packs for organisations seeking to set up a centre, with guidance on issues such as staff, premises and funding, and provides training for contact centre staff.
1.6 There is no single model of a Scottish child contact centre. They operate within constraints imposed by the limitations of their premises, the availability of staff and funding. The majority of centres are open for a very limited number of hours per week, and as a matter of course are usually only open at weekends. The Network has a Scottish Code of Practice, which all affiliated centres abide by and which states that contact centres:
- are child-centred
- support the principle of the Act of continued parenting following separation/divorce
- do not provide written reports to the court or any other agency
- do not provide statutory supervised contact.
Type of Contact Offered
1.7 Contact centres are used when a difficulty exists in establishing or re-establishing contact. The difficulty is not confined solely to situations where there is conflict between the parents. Other reasons include fears of abduction, no relationship with the child, or a gap in contact.
1.8 The definitions of the different kinds of contact that have been used throughout this report are as follows:
Supported contact / supervision of venue contact - Low vigilance contact, typically with more than one family per room and more than one family per worker. The venue itself is supervised but there is no supervision of the parents. Centres take a neutral stance and do not comment on the quality of parenting. However, centre staff will intervene where there is perceived danger of abuse of the child. Use of the centre can be instigated by courts, solicitors or by families themselves. All centres provide supported contact.
Supervised contact - High vigilance contact, typically with one family per room and with at least one mutually agreed third party monitoring contact. This does not involve reporting or assessment. Again, this can be instigated by courts, solicitors or by families themselves. Supervised contact may be possible on the basis of local negotiations with the centre 5.
Statutory supervised contact - High vigilance contact, typically with one family per room and at least one worker monitoring contact. This typically involves reporting or assessment. Such contact must be instigated by courts or social work departments. This type of contact is provided by local authority social work departments, and must be conducted by a trained social worker or equivalent. Scottish centres do not generally provide statutory supervised contact. This is not to say, however, that contact centres may not be used as venues for statutory supervised contact. The Network is aware of the possible confusion surrounding the type of service provided.
1.9 As contact centres do not generally provide statutory supervised contact, this report focuses on the former two types of contact. Some further points of clarification on what these levels of contact may involve are offered below.
1.10 Under the generic term supported contact, centres can provide a range of contact, extending from contact solely within the confines of the centre to exchange supervision. Contact centres see themselves as stepping stones to parents making their own future contact arrangements outwith the centre. The range of contact available is seen as progressive points along this path, covering, in ascending order:
- Contact solely within the confines of the centre from which the child cannot be removed. In these cases, staff manage the 'handover' arrangements concerning the children. Within this there may be varying levels of vigilance. For example, contact with a high level of vigilance may involve constant surveillance and one worker allocated to a family for the whole visit. Whereas, low vigilance contact would involve a low ratio of centre workers to users, with occasional checks made by the centre workers.
- Contact within the centre, but the child can be taken out for short walks or activities.
- Exchange supervision - the child is picked up and dropped off at the centre, or alternatively, the child is picked up at the centre but returned to the resident parent's home.
1.11 In line with the terms of the NACCC guidelines, Furniss describes supervised contact as follows: "Typically only one family has contact in the room at one time, and there is at least one worker (often professionally trained in social work or a similar discipline) closely monitoring the behaviour and conversations during the contact session. Interventions occur when necessary. Although reporting and assessments are more common in the supervised setting, they are not always undertaken." (Furniss 2000: 256). In this study, supervised contact is not taken to include any kind of reporting or assessment. No reporting and / or assessment had been undertaken according to the members of staff responding to the survey.
RESEARCH AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
1.12 The primary aim of the research was to collect key demographic characteristics of families using contact centres, and on the roles and experiences of staff working at contact centres. It was anticipated that the basic quantitative information collected would identify issues for further investigation. Further, these data may provide the centres with a working example of information they may want to collect routinely. The research was not designed as an audit or evaluation of service provision across the centres.
THE STRUCTURE OF THE REPORT
1.13 The report discusses the findings of the survey of contact centres undertaken in order to establish basic demographic information about their users.
Chapter 2 sets out the research methodology.
Chapter 3 describes the general characteristics of centre users.
Chapter 4 explores the issues concerning contact centre staff.
Chapter 5 discusses the findings in the context of pertinent social issues.
Chapter 6 reports on the key findings, and draws conclusions from across the two surveys.
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