13. Memorandum submitted by the Family
Welfare Association
FAMILY WELFARE
ASSOCIATION'S
HISTORY
FWA remains unique, being both a grant maker,
distributing nearly £1 million in small grants to individuals
and families for the purchase of essential items, and a provider
of innovative services that span the whole family life cycle.
FWA works with vulnerable young families with a newborn baby,
supporting parents to love the baby, to tolerate and put first
its infant demands and the huge upset to the lives they lived
before the baby's arrival. FWA works with families with children
of all ages, with grandparents who look after grandchildren because
a parent cannot, with elderly parents anxious about a future for
a grown child with learning difficulties.
FWA has a range of adult mental health services
that offer care, homes for those who need them, day resources
for people who can live alone or with their families, employment
support schemes, volunteering opportunities and friendships.
It is this breadth of services with the knowledge
and experience it brings that allows the organisation to offer
new, more experimental work, grounded in research and seeking
to find answers to questions just as FWA's founders did in 1869.
ANTI-SOCIAL
BEHAVIOUR WORK
FWA has always worked with the hardest to reach,
families with the hardest behaviours to change, those who are
outside the mainstream of society, for whatever reason. FWA is
working in areas of huge poverty, amongst communities who see
themselves as insular and where winning trust is hard. Within
these complicated groups we are working particularly hard with
a few families and individuals whose behaviour, attitudes and
life style offend and upset their own communities and the outside
world in equal measure. These families and individuals have behaviours
that are properly called anti-social, characterised by a scant
or absent regard for the wellbeing of those who live near them
or society at large.
This behaviour ranges from the thoughtless (fires,
loud noise at times when others might want peace, poor control
over children's behaviour and pet) to the positively persecutory
(attacking others' person and property, deliberately targeting
those whom the family think are getting them into trouble) and
the criminal (thefts, assaults and using their home/neighbourhood
for a wide range of criminal activity).
These are the families whom we work with, amongst
others.
WORKING WITH
DIFFERENT FAMILIES
WHOSE BEHAVIOUR
IS ANTI-SOCIAL
FWA workers will always try to seek out the
issues that may cause or support the continuance of anti-social
behaviour.
The list is familiar, families show histories,
sometimes over several generations of poor or absent parenting,
periods of time in local authority care, tremendous upheavals
and dislocations, and fathers engaging in criminal behaviours
copied by their sons. As a matter of course families relate poor
educational histories. Most of the families we work with are functionally
illiterate and place little or no premium on their children's
education, despise teachers and all other functionaries of the
state.
These are features of families where the problem
of the anti-social behaviour has been evident in the parents',
even grand parents, generation, families where anti-social behaviour
is the pattern and the norm.
We also work with families where, for other
reasons, their behaviour is deemed to be anti-social, the behaviour
is "new" and occurs where parents, often single parents
are trying to raise children in adverse circumstances, perhaps
living with severe clinical depression that depletes energy to
contain children's behaviour and engage with the outside world,
or trying to bring up children, one of the hardest jobs in the
world with a learning difficult that makes most planning, budgeting,
household management, hygiene, immensely difficult and downright
impossible at times.
Engagement of statutory agencies is sporadic,
often absent unless the risks posed to the children's wellbeing
are so severe as to warrant permanent removal.
Families with anti-social behaviour live all
over the country but we find that those who live in more rural
regions have significantly less help available, they will not
travel to keep appointments at family centres in a market town
a bus ride away, they tend to evade their "regulators"
by being out when an intended visit is made. Professionals can
easily get discouraged and disheartened and turn their attentions
to more rewarding families elsewhere.
ENGAGING FAMILIES
WITH ANTI-SOCIAL
BEHAVIOUR
Plainly, it helps enormously that FWA is a voluntary
organisation, once this is made clear families who have rejected
and repelled Health Visitors, Home—School Liaison officers
are often ready, grudgingly, to work with FWA's home based support
workers, offering as they do both very practical help coupled
with technical expertise on behaviour change techniques.
We work in families own homes as this is where
the problems lie, we work intensively, sometimes visiting every
day until we are sure we understand enough of the problem to make
a difference, we are reliable, keep our promises and maintain
a system of rewarding the behaviours we have agreed with family
as positive and pro-social. We use targets and charts with stars.
We take photographs for an album that records before and after
"clean ups", we hire skips to get rid of unwanted furniture
that makes its way into gardens, we clean WITH families not for
them, we show people what cleaning materials to buy and how to
use them.
We do the same with cooking, helping families
learn how to buy cheaper foods requiring preparation, helping
them with a grant for a cooker and beds. We instil order from
chaos as we believe that chaotic surroundings distract from the
key task to hand for parents—that of parenting consistently
and lovingly.
EFFECTIVENESS
Where we can engage families we stand a very
good chance of enabling them to make a number of changes to their
lives that improve their children's odds of being less anti-social
than their parents.
We measure what we do against our agreed plan
with the family and shift our targets and expectations as we can
in order to get them to achieve more, but only if we assess that
it can be sustained.
PRACTICE ISSUES
A number of crucial practice issues have emerged
as we have carried out more work in their field, it is crucial
we have discovered that workers are given very large amounts of
support, supervision and training. Working with chaotic families
where violence and aggression are never far from the surface is
a huge drain on workers, we will work in pairs, less for physical
safety reasons but to stop workers from being completely overwhelmed
by competing demands and to stop us missing vital opportunities
to effect change.
One issue that we find ourselves circumscribed
by is the lack of opportunity to work longer term, very few local
authority funders who finance this work, have the capacity to
allow us to work for the period of several years that it takes
to shift patterns that have been handed down over generations
or are rooted in a profound and enduring mental health problem.
Many can only fund work that allows us to work for six months,
only one authority has encouraged work to continue for 18 months.
Inter-agency working is of immense importance
too as we are most effective when we work as part of a team, where
there is an inter-agency plan, whether that be for child protection
or as part of an adult mental health approach or, again, as part
of a community safety strategy.
We rarely recommend that these families are
moved, much to the anxiety of the neighbourhood, as these families
seem to respond best to change in the locality, their lives have
often been characterised by being moved on and moving can be seen
and experienced by them as a positive reward for anti-social behaviour.
Of course there is much more to say, FWA would
be delighted to give evidence should the committee wish it.
I enclose a case study, fairly long, but demonstrating
the complexity of the issues and effect that a family with serious
anti-social behaviour has on a community and the agencies who
work with them.
23 November 2004
Annex
FWA CASE STUDY:
THE ANNISTER-BELGRAVE
FAMILY
Family composition
Mr Edward Annister, (55) co-habiting with Lyn
Belgrave (23) (birth and step parent)
| Fred, 17Ged 14 and Harry 14 "the twins"India, female child (16)
| All Mr Annister's children by his first wife, Edie, who died in a house fire four years' ago
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Mr Annister and Ms Belgrave's children are Jeanie, 3 and
Keithie, 6 months.
There are regular visitors who sometimes stay for a week
or so at a time including Lloyd Belgrave, Lyn's brother
It is highly likely that Lyn and India are both pregnant.
Property
Living in an Inner London authority in property privately
rented from another member of the extended family. The family
live in a three storey terraced house in a short street that links
two main roads, the family occupy the middle of terrace house.
They have a very small front garden area that has no hedge, fence
or wall but gives out directly on to the pavement.
They have a small back garden with a garage/lock up at the
back, there are alleyway access points to the back garages, a
feature of every house, between every four houses, the Annister's
have an alleyway to the left of their house.
Local authority Social Services involvement
Fred and India have had several episodes of being looked
after by local authorities (by at least two London, one Scottish
and one Shire county authority). At present none of the children
are candidates for accommodation or care proceedings despite significant
anxieties about their wellbeing, especially the younger children,
as the mother has very poor care skills, finding it hard to dress
and undress the baby, set routines or think about safety issues.
The family has been known to Social Services departments for over
20 years, Edward Annister talks about growing up in care, he remembers
his social aunt and uncle with great and, for him, unusual warmth.
Criminal activity
Fred, 17 and his twin brothers are all known to the YOT.
None have engaged with any programme for any length of time and
when they do attend they come together and create an air of anarchy,
other service users are pleased when they leave. One of the twins,
Harry is a ringleader; female members of the YOT have expressed
serious anxiety about his overtly sexualised behaviour towards
them. The oldest brother Fred has driving related convictions
(accomplice in car theft, driving without a licence, driving without
insurance); he was cleared in March 2003 of several counts of
burglary and going equipped.
The twins have received many cautions and have been bound
over after breaches of the peace (football damage, threatening
other young people, demanding money with menaces, school related
offensive behaviours). Edward Annister and his very wide extended
family are presumed to be engaged in criminal activity, or living
on its proceeds. Edward has spent over 10 years in prison, short
and medium sentences for robbery, burglary, fraud, deception and
more recently for a violent assault to which he pleaded guilty.
Lloyd, a regular visitor to the house, Lyn's half brother, is
credited with a history of violence although he does not appear
to have a criminal record, Lloyd suggests that his current business
is "legit" although his sister believes it involves
drug importation from Pakistan.
Educational history and involvement
Edward speaks of a history of school moves, being looked
out for by his older brothers, hating teachers apart from one
form teacher who seems to have encouraged and supported him in
becoming interested in angling. None of his older children/young
people have a good educational history, Fred left school at 15
as did India, both had lengthy periods of suspension and exclusion,
India spent two terms in a Pupil Referral Unit which she enjoyed
and, interestingly, made use of. Both twins are currently without
school places as their names were removed from the roll when they
failed to return to school after a lengthy holiday in the summer
term. Jeanie, the three year old has not yet been offered an allocated
place at nursery school, it seems that Lyn has not registered
her with any local schools or nurseries and does not intend to
yet as she thinks that Jeanie is "too little".
The effect of the Annister family on other people
There has been a lengthy list of complaints, ranging from
noise nuisance, hostility and threats of violence to burglary
and extortion from neighbours, local newsagents, off-licences
and pubs. These started when the family first moved into these
premises about 10 years ago and have continued unabated ever since,
one school teacher suggested that the family "owned"
the council, otherwise no one would allow them to continue with
their threatening and disruptive behaviour. The neighbours, near
and far are very intimidated by the family and rarely speak to
them, all are agreed that the family should be "made to move
away"; this is longed for by everyone who cannot believe
the family will every change.
Periods of peace and quiet descend when the family goes away
on holiday. Police know the family well and are called to the
house regularly, often once a week by neighbours who hear fighting
or suspect a family member has committed a criminal act. Neighbours
from up and down the street, and from further away, have complained
about noise, violent behaviours and dumping of rubbish. A recurring
complaint is the noise of cars coming and going from property,
car doors slamming late at night and loud, violent arguments in
the street. Neighbours have learned to keep away from any members
of the family some walking some distance to avoid their front
door and using any other alley way rather than the one next to
the Annister's house to cut through to get to the garages. The
front garden area gets cluttered with rubbish, including large
items of unwanted furniture that Lyn says are fly tipped by others.
The rubbish is cleared away when enforcement measures are instigated.
The behaviour of the twins is a major concern to neighbours
in that they seem to lead a gang supposedly responsible for petty
and serious vandalism and thefts/burglaries in the neighbourhood.
There are several large dogs on the premises that are also perceived
as aggressive and liable to bite, one is kept in the small back
garden as a guard dog. The family's "pole" position
on the street means that they seem to know everyone else's comings
and goings.
Statutory Change and Enforcement measures tried to date
Education Social work interventions have stopped short of
legal intervention although this has been threatened. Social services
have had to use child protection procedures after serious allegations
about Lyn's care and all three oldest children have spent time
"looked after" by local authorities although it is not
clear to anyone what necessitated this and no records have followed
the family.
Probation Services have been involved with Edward for many
years. Housing officers have visited to assess the safety of the
property. They are repelled, as is anybody that comes from "the
council". Noise abatement notices to remove cars and other
large broken items from the roadside has also been thwarted. YOT
members are working hard to keep the twins involved in programmes
of behavioural change and anger management, as this is not supported
by the wider family any gains here are unlikely to be permanent.
Other agencies involvement in attempting change in behaviours
A number of "acceptable" agencies have offered
support to the family and continue to do so, health visitors are
generally seen by the parents as "all right" provided
they don't challenge their parenting in a way that makes them
feel uncomfortable. If they do so they are "sacked"
and never allowed to enter the house again. Teachers and schools
are usually ignored, as are letters. Both parents are illiterate.
A Homestart befriender was working with mother for a while
last year but left and no one else wanted to visit the family
due to low levels of cleanliness and high levels of emotion. No
services that require attendance at a centre or service seem to
work. The family are regular "do not attends" at dentists,
doctors and hospitals.
A mental health outreach worker from local MIND has occasional
contact with Edward who recognises his mood swings cause concern
but Edward does not accept any traditional psychiatric response
to his mental health problems and has been removed to psychiatric
hospital by force under compulsion on occasion in the past.
India, the 16 year old, has had support from a young Women's
Services Development worker who she met at Pupil Referral Unit
and found her sympathetic/engaging, the worker has acted as an
unofficial supported to India but is anxious about her role and
is seeking to withdraw.
FWA's work with the Annister family
FWA Family Support workers have been visiting the family
for six months, acceptable to Edward as they seem like "local
girls" (East End women who are not afraid to speak out) as
a part of the multi-agency Child Protection planning process.
This allowed them access to the information and resources of co-working
agencies. With Edward and Lyn's explicit agreement they have got
the whole family resident in the property to agree in the first
instance:
1. That there needs to be an urgent review of the living
arrangements, the twins were the most vocal about that fact that
there were too many people living together, many of whom had difficult
relationships.
2. The dogs did not have anyone who could regularly walk
them leading to soiling in the house, they needed to be reduced
in number and those that remained should be walked and cared for
properly.
3. Appointments for dentists and doctors needed to be
kept, if only for people under 18, everyone has now been to the
dentist.
4. India could live independently as she wished to.
5. There had to be significant improvements in standards
of cleanliness and levels of noise.
The workers developed a simple contract based on pictures
that all the children drew, a schedule about cleaning, parenting
routines for Lyn, with timings and rewards for Jeanie as she complied
with her mother's requests. This work was actively supported by
the workers over the first three months who visited at least three
times a week and sometimes once a day, twice over the period of
the anniversary of Edie's death they visited twice as Edward was
very depressed and the children worried about him.
Over the next few months the workers tried to incorporate
a sense of change in relation to the outside world; this not surprisingly,
was much harder. Neighbours were denigrated as interfering scum,
ready to call the police but not to speak face to face. Edward
and the boys understood that they intimidated people, they relished
this, they would not accept that their behaviour needed to change
as a much needed part of respite for the community.
The workers said that this was unacceptable—and were
threatened with sacking—that the family had to make a series
of changes for which reward would be a lessening of the interest
of the agencies that were increasingly "turning up the heat"
on Edward and his wider extended family, for example, Inland Revenue,
Customs and Excise, TV and car licensing and a range of other
organisations all of which were invited to look at what was going
in the house by its occupants and their associates.
The change is slow to come, but there are some real tangible
improvements—more environmental rather than behavioural—cars
are parked more considerately (the workers drew a map of where
and how to park), the front garden is rubbish free, Lyn is seen
as the crucial bridge to the outside world and workers are working
hard on her social skills, to enable her to know how to behave
at the local Parent and Toddler group and to improve her own hygiene
so that people respond to her overtures with more warmth and reciprocity.
The Annisters are never going to be ideal neighbours but
have shown some capacity to change.
Some tools and techniques
Workers got the whole family on the floor "writing out"
their family tree so that everyone could who was related to whom,
where names and behaviours were seen from and where the family
might go in future, it also allowed them all to talk about Edie's
death.
Digital camera techniques and video camcorders were used
to show "before and after" cleaning sessions, what a
happy bath time entailed and how both little children enjoyed
it. Increasingly FWA use video to show parents how they are parenting,
this proved very effective with Lyn who had previously failed
to see what she did that provoked her children's undesirable behaviours.
The threat of violence and other issues that affect interventions
The father says "violence is a language to me"
and professionals believe it. The family is a byword for unprovoked,
violent responses to reasonable approaches. Edward's psychiatric
history gives staff from agencies cause for concern (most visit
in twos), his diagnosis has changed over the years but people
understand him to be volatile, aggressive, unreasonable and physically
intimidating.
The quality is evident in Fred and the twins. The family
has never really got over (and indeed doesn't talk about) the
fire, in which their mother died, possibly caused by a smouldering
cigarette. It is the extended nature of the family that seems
to intimidate professionals, one never deals with a single-family
member, and all of them get involved immediately, called from
all over the borough to "help out". The extended family
are equally and often more intimidating than that of the family
under review.
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