The Difficulties to UK Social Workers who Work with Children - Case Study Example

191087     The question asks you to consider the literature related to child sexual abuse and then go on to explore the difficulties to UK social workers who work with children and their carers Child abuse is not a new phenomenon, although recent reports would seem to suggest that abuse has become more prevalent over the years. It is probably truer to state that child abuse has not increased significantly but that awareness and openness of the abuse is what makes it seem more common. In recent years children have been encouraged to speak out about the abuse they are suffering and money has been spent on campaigns designed to encourage such disclosure and also to reassure the child that they are not to blame for the abuse they are being subjected to. In the past there was a sense of shame and guilt on the child, where they were made to feel that the abuse was their own fault and that talking to anyone about the abuse they were suffering would bring shame on their families. Despite this new openness towards discussing abuse in the family the social workers are constantly facing difficulties in being able to assist those in need. Firstly the powers they are given to intervene are very limited and orders to have the child removed from the family home are only issued under the most extreme of circumstances. A further area that causes difficulties comes with having to deal with ethnic minority families. Within these families the children are often encouraged to not discuss the things that are happening in their homes. There are also cultural issues that can affect the way the child deals with the abuse they are suffering. Within some ethnic families sexual abuse of the child is in some ways regarding as normal. Some ethnic communities might regard the father of the child involving in sexual activity with the child as normal within their community. In order to protect children from abuse several pieces of legislation have been implemented. Child abuse first came under the spotlight in 1889 when the children’s charter was passed1. The aim of this was to prevent the cruelty of children by allowing the state to intervene in relationships between parents and children. Under the charter the police had the power to arrest anyone believed to be ill treating a child or to enter the home of a child they believed to be in danger. The Children’s Act 1908 introduced in Ireland made further changes towards protecting children and created juvenile courts and the registration of foster parents. Irish law went one stage further at this point in time by introducing the Punishment of Incest Act2. Prior to the inclusion of this Act the church were responsible for punishing those who committed incest. Despite legislation being devised to protect children the powers of the social workers remain limited meaning that many children are left to suffer on their own and are unable to put an end to the abuse they are subjected to. Following the death of Dennis O’Neill in 1945 the Children Act 1948 was introduced as recommended by the parliamentary care of children committee which formed after the death of Dennis3. This Act brought about the inception of a children’s committee and children’s officer in every local authority4. The aim of the committee and the children’s officer was to oversee the protection and care of children in their district. It was hoped that giving these extra powers to the social services that more could be done to prevent abuse in the future. Scottish law was amended in 1968 and social work departments replaced the committees that previously existed for the care of children. This was incorporated into the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968. Under this new legislation local authorities were empowered to investigate child abuse in their locality5. Similar changes followed in the UK under the Local Authority Social Services Act 1970. 1973 saw the death of Maria Colwell at the hands of her stepfather. The outrage caused by her death led to the formation of Area Child Protection Committees throughout England and Wales6. The inquiry into her death had highlighted a lack of coordination in the social services departments responsible for overseeing the health and welfare of children in their locality. The Children Act 1975 came into force as a direct result of this inquiry. Following the death of Jasmine Beckford in 19847 the focus was changed from child abuse work to child protection work8. Guidance was published by the Department of Health entitled Protecting Children: A Guide for Social Workers Undertaking a Comprehensive Assessment in 1988. This became known as the Orange Book and was designed to give guidance on risk assessment and dangerousness for the child in the environment they were living in9. The deaths of Kimberley Carlisle in 198710 and Tyra Henry in 1988 led to further inquiries into child protection measures11. In 1989 the United Nations Conference on the Rights of the Child conferred rights on all children below the age of 18 to have their best interests taken into consideration as a primary function of the authorities concerned. The aim of the convention was to enforce protection of all children in an attempt to stamp out the abuse reported not only in the family home but also in Local Authority care homes. As a result of this convention the Children Act 1989 came into being which received Royal assent by 1991 and gave every child the right to protection from abuse and exploitation and the right to an inquiry to safeguard their wellbeing12. From the reading of the Act the suggestion is that the best place for the child is within the family environment. Under this Act the Area Child Protection Committees were required to investigate whether child protection procedures had been properly followed if the death of the child was caused by abuse or there was a suspicion that the child had been abused. Despite the reforms in legislation the abuse of children has still continued both in the UK and in Scotland. After each new reported incident changes have been recommended as the death as highlighted the failure of the authorities to provide adequate protection to the children. The death of Kennedy McFarlane in Scotland highlighted the fact that over half the children in Scotland who were at risk were not receiving adequate protection. This led to the introduction in Scotland of the children’s charter which gave instructions to carers and professionals on how to best protect children in their care. In 2000 the Department of Health introduced the Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families. The aim of this was to change the way social workers assessed children and their families by encouraging social workers to take a more holistic approach to family assessment and consider the wider environment and its influence on family functioning13. The lessons of the past had still not been learned. This was evidenced by the death of Victoria Climbie in 200114. The inquiry into her death which was concluded in 2003 found that there had been at least 12 opportunities when the authorities could have saved her15. The failure of those engaged to protect her led to a major shake up in child protection organisations and led to the appointment of a children’s Minister. This was followed by a green paper entitled Every Child Matters16 which made many recommendations including an electronic tracking system for every child in the UK. Many have argued that social workers do very little to protect those they are employed to care for. In some ways social workers are in a no win situation as they are condemned when they fail to do anything to protect the child but are also condemned if the use of their powers seems to be too extreme. This was highlighted by the cases of alleged satanic abuse in the Orkneys. In these cases children were snatched from their family homes17 when information supplied to social services led them to believe that the children were being subjected to satanic abuse. The inquiry revealed that although there was some evidence that the children were not being brought up in ideal circumstances there was no defendable suspicion of widespread satanic abuse18. Similar problems occurred in Cleveland in 1987 were 121 children were removed from their homes on court orders after doctors had diagnosed that they had been sexually abused19. A report compiled following this incident criticised social workers for acting too precipitously20 and recommended that greater consideration should have been given to the rights of the children and the parents21. The biggest problem surrounding allegations of child abuse is that the presumption of innocence appears to have been almost completely eliminated. A case that highlighted the difficulty an accused might have in proving their innocence was D. v. National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children [1978] A.C. 171. In this case the court allowed the NSPCC immunity from having to disclose the source of the allegation made against the accused. The accused attempted to show that such immunity could protect those who maliciously make false accusations. Whilst accepting the argument Lord Simon of Glaisdale was swift to point out that Experience seems to have shown that though the resulting immunity from disclosure can be abused the balance of public advantage lies in generally respecting it. Abuse within ethnic minority families is likely to be even greater than within traditional British families. This is partly due to lack of awareness of the roles of professionals as well as a lack of faith in these services. Cultural issues are also likely to impact on issues as mentioned above. The authorities seem to be unsure on how to deal with these communities and often fail to do anything as they have opted to rely on those in need coming direct to them (Sue and Sue 1990). In many ways the social services seem to regard. This is not the case as has been noted by Dwivedi, (1980, 1997). There is a limited availability of professional carers to assist such families (Dayal, 1990). This has been argued that cultural conflict is the cause of this lack of commincation (Devereux, 1953). An article in the Social Work Journal 3 June 1998 reported on the impact of intrafamilial child sexual abuse. In the article it was noted that certain factors can have an impact on the negative outcomes of sexual abuse (Courtois, 1980; Finkelhor, 1984). Research suggested that the emotional support of the non-offending parent can help negate the effects of the abuse. It used to be believed that the non-offending parent were hardly ever supportive of the abused child, as well as the common misconception that the non-offending parent was in part to blame for the abuse suffered by the child. It was often suggested that one prime cause of child sexual abuse was due to the mother abandoning her marital role and hinted that the non-offending parent was often in collusion with the offender (Machotka, Pittman & Flomenhaft,1967). More recent studies have shown that most non-offending parents have demonstrated supportive behaviour of the sexually abused child (Everson, Hunter, Runyon, Edelsohn & Coulter, 1989; DeYoung, 1994). When dealing with sexually abused children social workers are often required to counsel the non-offending parent as well. In many cases of child sexual abuse the child does not feel that they have the support of the non-offending parent. This can often be because the non-offending parent is not aware of the abuse or that the abuser has convinced the child that the non-offending parent does not care as they have not done anything to stop the abuse. In a lot of sexual abuse cases the child is told by the offender that they will not be believed if they tell anyone about the abuse they are suffering. Children have a tendency to accept this as fact and so very few confide in the non-offending parent. These abused children sometimes find it difficult to believe that the non-offending parent is not aware of the abuse they are suffering and see the failure of the non-offending parent to stop the abuse as endorsing the behaviour of the abuser. Children damaged in this way are harder for social workers to deal with as the social worker has to try to persuade the child that the non-offending parent is not responsible for the abuse. A further problem that is faced by the social worker is that the non-offending parent blames themselves for not realising the child was being abused and the non-offending parent becomes unable to connect with the child as they feel responsible for not protecting the child. The conclusion that can be drawn from the above is that the social workers lack the power to do their jobs efficiently and effectively and also have cultural difficulties with some of those they try to assist. Bibliography Butler-Sloss, E. (1988). Report of the inquiry into child abuse in Cleveland 1987. Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Social Services by Command of Her Majesty, July, 1988. London: HMSO. By Lord Laming Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Health and the Secretary of State for the Home Department by Command of Her Majesty January 2003 Carlisle, K. (1987). The Kimberley Carlisle case. London Borough of Greenwich and Greenwich Health Authority. London Corby, B, Child Abuse: Towards a Knowledge Base, 1993, Oxford University Press, Buckingham, Corby, B, Social services departments and child protection — An evaluation, Liverpool Law Review Volume 11, Number 1 / March, 1989 Courtois, C.A. (1980). Studying and counselling women with past incest. Victimology, 322-334. Dayal, N. (1990) Psychotherapy services for minority ethnic communities in the NHS - a psychotherapists view Midland Journal of Psychotherapy 11, 28-37. Department of Health Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families. 2000 Department of Health, Protecting Children: A Guide for Social Workers Undertaking a Comprehensive Assessment 1988 Devereux,G. (1953) Cultural factors in psychoanalytic therapy Journal of American Psychoanalytic Association 1, 629-55. deYoung, M. (1994). Immediate maternal reactions to the disclosure or discovery of incest. Journal of Family Violence, 9, 21-33. Dingwall, T, The Jasmine Beckford Affair(1986) 49 MLR 489 Dixon, L, Hamilton- Giachritsis, C and Browne, K, Attributions and behaviours of parents abused as children: a meditational analysis of the intergenerational continuity of child maltreatment (Part II), Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry Volume 46 Issue 1 - January 2005 Dwivedi, K.N. (1980). Indian Notions in Counselling Situations. B.A.C. Counselling News, No. 32 : 10-14 Dwivedi, K.N. (1997, forthcoming) Management of Anger and some Eastern Stories in K.N.Dwivedi (Ed.) The Therapeutic Use of Stories. London: Routledge. Everson, M.D., Hunter, W.M., Runyon, D.K., Edelsohn, G.A. & Coulter, M.L. (1989). Finkelhor, D. (1984). Child Sexual Abuse: New Theory and Research. New York: Free Press. 204 Hamilton, C., & Browne, K.D. (2002). Predicting physical maltreatment Hudson B. Health visiting and child abuse: lessons from the Jasmine Beckford inquiry. Midwife Health Visitor & Community Nurse. 1986 May;22 Inquiry report. London Borough and Brent Health Authority, London. Johnson, S & Petrie, S, Child protection and Risk-Management: The Death of Victoria Climbie Journal of Social Policy, Volume 33, Issue 02, Apr 2004 London Borough of Brent (L.Blom-Cooper), A Child in Trust. The Report of the Panel of Inquiry into the Circumstances Surrounding the Death of Jasmine Beckford (1987) Machotka, P., Pittman, F., & Flomenhaft, S. (1967). Incest as a family affair. Family Maternal support following disclosure of incest. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 59, 197-207. Process, 6(1), 98-116 Morrison, T, Making a real difference or just another child death inquiry? Learning the lessons from Childhood Lost, Journal of Sexual Aggression Volume 9, Number 2 / November 2003 Reid, D H S, The Orkney Child Abuse Scandal, Suffer the Little Children May 1992 Medical Institute for Research into Child Cruelty Napier Press Sheldon B. Macdonald G. Research and Practice in Social Care University of Exeter Sue, D.W. & Sue, D. (1990) Counselling the Culturally Different, New York: John Wiley The Victoria Climbie Inquiry. United Nations Conference on the Rights of the Child 1989 Williams J. Intervention in Child Protection: can it be justified? Child Protection Co-ordinator for Canterbury and Thanet http://www.victorianvoices.com http://links.jstor.org http://www.nspcc.org.uk http://society.guardian.co.uk http://www.victoria-climbie-inquiry.org.uk http://www.everychildmatters.gov.uk http://www.childrenuk.co.uk http://www.ipt-forensics.com Table of Statutes Children Act 1948 Children Act 1975 Children Act 1989 Children Act 2004 Children and Young Person’s Act 1933 Children’s Act 1908 Local Authority Social Services Act 1970 Prevention of Cruelty to Children (Amendment) Act 1894 Prevention of Cruelty to Children Act 1894 c. 41 Prevention of Cruelty to, and Protection of, Children Act 1889 Chapter 44 Protection of Children Act 1999 Punishment of Incest Act Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 .   Read More