Social work involvement - how long for and what can I do?

[dadgettinghelp]

Today is my son's first Christmas and I can't be with him today. Let me be clear - I'm not looking for sympathy but I am looking for advice. Earlier this year I was arrested and charged for IIOC. I'm currently on bail and one of my conditions is no unsupervised access to under 16s. The police investigation is due to conclude soon. Social work have been involved in our case and since then my wife and I have separated and I have moved away. We are subject to a child protection plan and as such I see my son twice a week in a contact centre. My ex and I are still amicable and although she in no way condones anything I have done she supports me and believes in me. Since 'the knock' I have engaged in working with Stop it Now as well as my local Community Psychiatric Nurse. I know 100% I am not attracted to, or a danger to children and working with these people has helped me to see I was using pornography to self medicate for low feelings and that this spiral of behaviour led me down a dark path. I accept responsibility completely but have worked to understand the 'why'.

I've done so much research in finding out about porn addiction/compulsive behaviour and have also found out loads of statistics about how low a risk 'internet offenders' are. Reoffending rates are seriously low, and progression to contact offending even lower. The notion that internet offenders will progress to contact offences is simply wrong, but that's how I'm being judged and I feel powerless to defend myself.

Having implemented the CP plan it seems social work are very reluctant to move away from it and their reason is always "we don't know the risk" or "we don't know what you might do". I've asked them to conduct a risk assessment (because I feel they're just trying to fob me off) but have been told they won't conduct any risk assessment until conviction - is that right?! I feel like I'm being judged on all the things I HAVEN'T done as opposed to the things I've openly admitted I HAVE done. Their reports don't truly reflect our situation - they cherry pick, inflate and assume to support their narrative instead of reporting on the facts. In their most recent report they questioned if I was "controlling" based on one conversation where I allowed myself to get upset. Not angry or confrontational but just upset like any dad being kept away from his son.

I'd like to be able to move contact out of the contact centre to my ex-wife's home supervised by her mum or my mum. This will allow us all to live a more normal life whilst working within the restrictions placed on me. My ex completely agrees with this idea but the problem is I don't think social work will listen to us.

Is my idea about contact achievable? Are social work going to continue to restrict me 'just in case'? Is it going to be like this until my conviction is spent? Can I push back if social work are being unfair?

Help?

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear dadgettinghelp,

Welcome to the parents’ forum and thankyou for your post. I am sorry to hear about the difficulties that you and your family have been experiencing.

You have explained that you were arrested and charged with an offence relating to IIOC. You are currently on bail with the condition that you are not to have any unsupervised contact with any children under 16 years old. You believe that the police investigation is due to conclude soon. Your son is subject to a child protection plan and you are currently having supervised contact with him in a contact centre. You would like to be able to have contact with your son at your ex-wife’s home supervised by your ex-wife or your mother, however you are worried that children’s services won’t consider this as an option.

Firstly, it is highly likely that children’s services will wish to complete a risk assessment on you given the nature of the offence. You don’t mention if they are doing so already, but this will be integral to any recommendations they make regarding contact between you and your son. Children’s services may take information from professionals involved to complete this assessment, including probation officers and police officers responsible for any sexual harm prevention orders. The risk assessment will also consider your ex-wife’s safeguarding capacity and her responses to the situation. It is important that you co-operate with the risk assessment process and work with children’s services towards the best outcome for your son. You may find this guide to working with social workers helpful.

It is important for you to understand that children’s services do not have the legal authority to demand that contact is managed in a certain way (i.e. supervised or unsupervised, and in what location) but they are able to make recommendations. However it is also important to note that if you and your ex-wife do not comply with the recommendations suggested by children’s services then this may escalate their concerns about the risk of harm posed to your son. This may, for example, result in children’s services applying to court for a court order in order to safeguard your son.

Whilst your son is subject to a child protection plan children’s services should be working with you and your ex-wife to come up with a plan for the shorter and longer term about what would be best for your son (including contact arrangements). The contact arrangements that you are suggesting should certainly be considered by children’s services and I would advise that you discuss this in the next core group meeting, or that you arrange a meeting separately with your ex-wife and the social worker to discuss this option. You may also wish to involve the social worker’s manager in this as well. It may also be helpful to put forward your suggestion in writing before the meeting so that the social worker can have some time to consider this and discuss with their manager if necessary.

I hope that you find this helpful and should you wish to speak to an adviser, please telephone our free confidential advice line on 0808 801 0366. The advice line is open from 9.30am to 3pm Monday to Friday. You are also welcome to post again in this forum.

Best wishes,

Suzie

[dadgettinghelp]

Hi Suzie,

Thank you for your reply. I had considered writing down my wishes re contact and giving them to the social workers ahead of further discussions so I'm happy that you have also suggested this as a good idea - I'll certainly do that.

Our case handling by social work has not been great to be honest - organisation and information sharing between social workers and managers has been haphazard at best. At the moment we are in the process of being handed over to a new social work team - the maternity team seemed keen to put a (strict) plan in place and aren't very interested in even engaging with me anymore as they're handing over to the children and families team. I hope once we are handed over we can work better with the children and families team - I found that the manager of the maternity team had a less than professional manner at times which permeated through the decisions and actions of others. So, I'll outline my wishes regarding moving forwards with contact and share it with the new team once we have been handed over.

I would love the social workers to conduct a risk assessment. The maternity team have been conducting a vague assessment using tools like signs of safety and parenting capacity which aren't really a good fit and don't seem to feed into their reporting and planning. I had suggested they conduct a non-offending parent assessment as well as a specialist assessment of me - I suggested that they could approach an external agency like the Lucy Faithful Foundation although I am aware that there are a number of specialist tools that can be used to asses risk. This has all been in response to their "we don't know the risk" argument, but they don't seem interested. The maternity team manager stated that no risk assessment would be undertaken until conviction but at the last case conference the chair requested that the new social work team could investigate and assess risk so now I'm confused!

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear dadgettinghelp

Thanks for your further post. I am glad that my previous response was helpful.

It will be important to clarify with your son’s new social worker what their understanding and plan is around any future risk assessment. There seems to be a discrepancy between the Child Protection Conference Chair’s recommendation and the current social work team’s response. Is the Chair’s recommendation noted in the minutes of the conference or recorded on the current child protection plan for your son?

You are also right to inform the new social worker of your proposals in relation to moving to supervised contact in your son’s home, supervised by one of his grandmothers. With their consent, you could provide the grandmothers' contact details to the social worker to formally ask that they be assessed as potential supervisors. It is a good idea to put such requests in writing. And as mentioned in my earlier response, the core group is a useful forum for discussing options and updates.

I hope this helps.

Best wishes

Suzie