Paper
Promoting increased safeguarding of children London minority ethnic faith communities
- issue: Issue 3 / 2008
- authors: David Derbyshire
- keywords: United Kingdom, diversity, communities, religion, safeguarding
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abstract
Background. This contribution presents the work undertaken across a number of London stage agencies to raise awareness of safeguarding of children within minority ethnic and faith groups. The author acted as project co-ordinator of the London project in 2006 and 2007. The death of Victoria Climbie in London in 2000 led to a high profile public inquiry which was critical of the failures of professional agencies to prevent the death. One of the features of the case involved Victoria being taken to two churches in London by her carer for the purpose of exorcism of devils. Other cases in London achieved similar high profile. In June 2006, the UK Government published a study into child abuse in the UK associated with adult beliefs in spirit possession.
There was also concern about trafficking of children into the UK, about use of violence where honour was brought into question by girls engaging in relationships outside family norms and about the absence of a prosecution relating to the practice of Female Genital Mutilation.
This chapter is concerned with finding means of reaching excluded communities from minority ethnic communities in London to achieve improved safeguarding of children. It involves an innovative use of community social work mixed with a clear focus on the state's need to inform and protect. It highlights limitations to evidence in terms of children at risk and of effective interventions and draws attention to a series of improvements needed in policy, practice and performance management of services to safeguard children from risks associated with specific forms of child abuse.
Purpose. What are the key questions?
- How prevalent are forms of child abuse associated with female genital mutilation, beliefs in spirit possession, child trafficking and honour violence towards children?
- What harm do children suffer?
- What are the characteristics of children and families and communities where these forms of child abuse are noted?
- How effective are interventions?
- What could be done to safeguard children more in future?
Methods. This was an action research project which succeeded in combining on-going evaluation of activity with case files research around interventions used and outcomes for children. The project consisted of a central co-ordination service provided by the author with engagement of 8 specific posts employed by 8 different London councils to promote improved safeguarding of children around these areas. These post holders used a variety of techniques to engage with minority ethnic community and faith community groups.
The co-ordinator also researched 35 case files taken from four local councils and the police service in London. The co-ordinator finally met with groups of practitioners with experience of dealing with these issues in order to investigate further how children could be better made safe.
Key findings and implications
- The project established effective links with a range of minority ethnic community and faith community groups and was able to provide community education about keeping children safe to these groups.
Examples - Congolese community groups and faith organisations benefited from procedures and training around child safeguarding. A protocol for safeguarding children in mosques and madrassahs was drawn up for sharing across London.
- Development of rapport with such groups to improve children's safety over time requires sustained input longer than a single year's project.
Examples - All of the faith groups contacted expressed reservation about investing time in persuading congregation members to overcome distrust of statutory agencies if the attention to the issues was to last only for the one yewar for which funding was made available. A number of the local authorities concerned did manage to identify further funding to continue the initiative as a result of this issue.
- Professionals require access to specialist assistance around these forms of child abuse and development of guidance.
Example - One authority used their adviser partly to advise on particular cases where concerns of one of the forms of abuse in the project came to light. This did require a qualified social worker to be in post but it improved responses of social workers either to understand family values and support families better or to realise the true level of dangers in which some children were placed, particularly when there was evidence of unexplained injuries against a background of concern about parental belief in spiritual possession of the child. The adviser was also able to discuss with social workers the emotional impact on children of being told they are possessed.
- Professionals need to be ready to intervene earlier and with more confidence when first are of concerns about trafficking and spirit possession.
Examples - There were some reported cases where indications of concern could have been identified earlier. In one case, a police officer noted a flat had its windows blackened by large sheets of paper and was told by the mother this was to keep out evil spirits who were trying to invade the mind and body of one of her children whom the mother said was locked in her bedroom for her own safety. The police officer did not refer this on but 6 weeks later the child's school referred as a matter of concern large marks on the child's back later found to have been caused by an attempt to beat devils from her.
In other cases, children spoke to school staff about beliefs in spirits but social work agencies were operating only in respect of concerns where there was a degree of evidence which allowed them to use the child protection register or to use child care law., These however were cases where one would not be presented with evidence unless a social worker asked for the information. This was of course an issue in the Victoria Climbie case where minimal efforts were made to support the child after little effort was made to assess risk through discussion with her and observation of the relationship between Victoria and her carers.
- There is a need for a review of how young people and children are treated when arriving in the UK with accounts of arrival which are unlikely to be true as some of these children are children art risk of abuse and their needs not always identified.
Examples - One young person was provided with care whilst aged 16-17 after reportedly fleeing a brothel where she had been set to work by an older "boyfriend". Care staff did not take seriously reports from other residents about the young woman being visited late at night by unknown men or the young person's own assertion of concern that her "boyfriend" had sent her texts and was back in the UK. This young woman went missing and stated in a mobile telephone conversation with her keyworker that she had returned to Eastern Europe.
One young person reported that she had been brought to Heathrow airport by an uncle who had deserted her there. She claimed later that day to have been approaching the Immigration department in a different part of London and to have met by chance some people she knew from her life in Angola. This young person went to live with this couple who subjected her to two years of life as a domestic servant from which she escaped and was placed in care.
- Criminal law agencies need to review the very high threshold for taking legal action as there were no prosecutions for child abuse in respect of any of the 35 cases studied and few police investigations.
Example - Even where it was highly likely as in the above case that adults had worked to traffick young people, the prosecution service advised that successful prosecution would be too difficult as it would not be possible to prove involvement in trafficking.
- Social work professionals need to ensure that attempts to work in partnership with families do not obscure efforts to challenge and confront child abuse suspicions and need to work in ways which avoid Euro-centrism, namely the belief in this situation that children will be advantaged by living in Europe rather than Africa.
Example - In a number of cases where young people were suspected of having been trafficked into the UK, social workers and immigration officers and police officers did not ask questions about means of arrival into the UK - there was an implicit acceptance that life must be better in the UK when for some young people, this was not likely to be true in view of the emotional consequences of the dislocation from family and home country involved. However, it would be wrong to suggest that social workers alone can change this situation as only Government policy can determine how best to deal with young people whose account of entry into the UK is dubious and especially where the young person ahs gone on to claim asylum in the UK.
- Local professional agencies need to continue to work together and take local leadership on these issues - the local communities are not ready to assume this mantle.
Example - ocal community faith groups continued to hold reservations about working with statutory agencies. In one case, the police made 12 attempts to obtain advice from a faith leader a particular set of concerns in his faith group until in the end the police instead used a different adviser.
Key references
Stobart, E. (2006). Child Abuse Linked to Accusations of Possession and Witchcraft. Department for Education and Skills, UK. www.everychildmatters.gov.uk.
Contacts: David Derbyshire, NCH, Turner House, 22 Lucerne Road, London N5 1TZ, E-mail: david.derbyshire@nch.org.uk, Phone 020 7704 2386.