Written evidence submitted by Mrs Ann
Head, children's guardian (CAF 32)
I am a practising children's guardian in Oxfordshire.
I was first appointed to the post of guardian ad litem in 1985
and have practised in a self employed capacity since that time,
both in Oxfordshire and in Buckinghamshire.
In the last 10 years I have had extensive experience
in the appraisal of guardians ad litem/children's guardians in
ten authorities in the south of the country. I have training in
appraisal.
I have had experience of complaint investigation
and I have acted as a mentor to a number of new guardians ad litem/children's
guardians. I have been a trainer on a variety of topics.
I have participated in original research in
relation to social work issues and I have written articles and
chapters on a variety of topics, including the role of the guardian
ad litem.
I have been awarded the Advanced Award in Social
Work (Oxford Brookes University, 1998).
I am currently assisting Joan Hunt, Senior Research
Fellow, Oxford Centre for Family Law and Policy, University of
Oxford, in critically examining the reports of guardians ad litem
in six former panels, with a view to commentary on the extent
of the role prior to the inception of CAFCASS and variations in
interpretation and performance.
1. INTRODUCTION
I realise that the Committee will be receiving
information from many sources on a range of issues. I am therefore
limiting my comments to the following three areas.
2. COMMUNICATION
WITH CHILDREN
This is the nub of the role of the children's
guardian. Practitioners have built up skills over the years in
communicating with children of all ages, in order that the court
can be made aware of their wishes and feelings. This is not a
simple task: many children find it hard to articulate feelings
when their family situations are complex and often violence-ridden.
Some children are put under intense pressure to express particular
views. Some children have been so traumatised by events in their
lives that they cannot speak about them in any straightforward
way.
Children's guardian's have developed listening
and observational skills and also play therapy techniques, which
enable them to develop an understanding of the child's world.
There has been little sign so far that CAFCASS
appreciates the level of skill required to do this work well.
Experienced practitioners do not feel that their skills are valued
by the new organisation and this is especially true of self employed
practitioners.
There is now a greater emphasis on the need
for practitioners in private law proceedings to ascertain the
wishes and feelings of children and there is much scope for mutual
learning on the part of practitioners in both types of proceedings.
CAFCASS should be taking the lead in valuing
work being done to enable children to participate in decision
making which affects them.
3. CAFCASS AND
QUALITY CONTROL
With the breadth and variety of my experience,
I had hoped that I would be able to be of assistance to the new
organisation in the areas of training, appraisal and mentoring.
Despite being asked several times to detail
my past experience and despite writing to management, asking to
be used more widely, I have had no requests to contribute in any
of the ways suggested. This is despite the fact that my fellow
children's guardians and I in Oxfordshire have had no opportunity
for appraisal or performance review since CAFCASS came into being;
neither have family court advisers, who wish to work in public
as well as private law, been offered training or mentoring opportunities.
A key reason for the creation of CAFCASS was
the bringing together of public and private law practitioners,
but to date there has been very little sign that it is considered
desirable or practicable to promote the necessary training nor
does it seem to be the intention to use experienced practitioners
to assist in this process.
It is dangerous for an organisation of practitioners
working with extremely difficult and emotionally stressful situations
to have no system of quality control nor support in place for
frontline workers. It has been proposed that managers should review
the work of their practitioners and, for those who are employees
of CAFCASS, supervision sessions with managers are being offered.
However, the majority of current managers have had no experience
of the work of children's guardians and many are not qualified
social workers. They will be in a poor position to offer the support
and critical appraisal required.
4. ECONOMY AND
BUDGETARY CONTROL
I accept the need for budgetary constraint and
for CAFCASS to operate in the most efficient way possible. This
was always an element I had in mind when conducting appraisals.
The organisation must bear in mind, however,
that children's guardians do not act in isolation and many factors
will influence the amount of time they need to spend on a case.
In particular, the state of social services departments or social
and health care directorates impinges greatly on the work, which
needs to be done by the children's guardian. In the present situation,
where most departments are understaffed and many newly qualified
social workers are having to take on these very difficult cases,
where local authority resources of all kinds are stretched to
the limit and where the allocated social worker may change more
than once during the course of the proceedings, the children's
guardian will have more work to do on the child's behalf than
in a situation where the local authority services are well organised
and operate efficiently. She/he may be the most consistent person
for the child over the period of the proceedings.
The state of play in courts also influences
the time taken for the case to be concluded. There is a generally
recognised shortage of circuit judges and therefore there can
be lengthy delay involved in time-tabling a final hearing. The
Human Rights Act ensures that close attention has to be given
to the rights of children and of parents in these proceedings
and there is understandable reluctance on the part of the judiciary
to curtail in any way requests for additional assessments or for
time to be given to see whether particular family situations will
be amenable to change. This has the effect of lengthening court
proceedings, with a knock on effect on the time children's guardians
are involved in a case.
These and other factors influencing the work
of the children's guardian are set out in detail in the research
of Joan Hunt and Nancy Drucker, summarised in a recent report
for the Department of Health.
Mrs Ann Head
Children's Guardian
March 2003
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