Social Work and Domestic Violence by Lesley Laing Cathy Humphreys Kate Cavanagh

Author:Lesley Laing, Cathy Humphreys, Kate Cavanagh [Lesley Laing, Cathy Humphreys, Kate Cavanagh]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Social Work, Political Science, Public Policy, Social Services & Welfare
ISBN: 9781446290996
Google: Nq6AAgAAQBAJ
Publisher: SAGE
Published: 2013-02-01T05:18:39+00:00

Post-separation Violence and Abuse

The earlier discussion of the research findings on domestic violence and children highlights the problems attending a narrow focus on a siloed issue within a focus on the nuclear family. Children are no safer if separation allows ongoing and unsupervised access to violent fathers (Radford and Hester, 2006). Too many women are now finding themselves shifting from being designated as ‘the failure to protect mother’ to that of the ‘alienating mother’ (Laing, 2010). The children and the risks are the same or higher, but the legislative arena is different. The study by Stanley et al. (2011b) found that 50 per cent of the referrals to the statutory service were for post-separation violence: circumstances in which child protection traditionally takes little interest in spite of the dangers. This is, in fact, a system’s problem.

Urging women to separate from violent men is totally ineffective, if not dangerous, unless careful planning to create a tight network of safety and support is provided alongside careful documentation which outlines the child protection concerns about the father and his violence. It is an arena in which careful investigation and assessment skills are required, as most violent fathers will argue that the mother is either as violent as he is or the instigator of the violence (Bancroft and Silverman, 2002; Jaffe et al., 2003b). While the evidence suggests that this may be true for a small minority of women, the gendered nature of domestic violence (outlined earlier) in which the dominant pattern is of male violence towards women suggests that these ‘family law arguments’ are structured to gain strategic legal advantage (Laing, 2010). They may even be part of litigation abuse (Frederick, 2008; Miller and Smolter, 2011). They are rarely in the interests of children.

The documentation required by child protection workers to outline the evidence and their concerns about the impact of domestic violence on children must be readily available and accessible in private law proceedings. It requires that child protection workers are able to assess domestic violence and understand its impact. It would also require child protection workers to be available to provide assertive testimony to support the ongoing protection of both women and children (Humphreys, 2010). In many areas this would represent a significant change in practice and policy.

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