Legislation and policies of the English government on the question of families and minors[1]
English legislation, in particular on domestic violence perpetrated on minors, took a decisive turn several years ago (2000) due to an emblematic case regarding a child called Victoria Climbé when for her case 3 housing authorities, 4 social services departments, 2 teams for the protection of minors of the Metropolitan Police Service, a specialized centre run by the NSPCC national service for the prevention and care of children and 2 hospitals were activated but the child died due to the violence suffered.
Victoria was in England for a total of 10 months, arriving in April, 1999 with her great aunt Marie-Thérèse Kouao and dying on February 25th, 2000. In April, 2001 the government decided to open its own official inquiry on Victoria’s death and, once the proceeding was over, published Lord Laming’s final report in 2003.
During the relativelly brief period of her stay in England, Victoria was visited by a numerous variety of agencies acting independently and, thanks to the lack of coordination and exchange of information not to mention the understaffed agencies using untrained personnel, she managed to slip through the nets which should have protected her. In practice, contrary to what happens with other minors who may remain hidden to the agencise, Victoria was well known by many of them, as Lord Laming wrote, adding that “the tragicc thing is that these services, at the end of the trial, knew little or nothing more about Victoria than they knew when she was sent to them, starting with the Ealing Social Services by the Unit for Homeless persons in Aprile, 1999”.In April, 2001, Lord Laming started the inquiry on Victoria’s death and the results were published in 2003).
- A Committee for Minors and their Families – directed by the Cabinet with representatives of the government departments
- Committee for Minors and their Families – chaired by the local authorities and composed of important officials of the police, social services. health services and habitation/penitentiary instruction services.
- Responsibility– lthe development of a well defined responsibility for protecting minors and the well-being of families. The directors of the services will be held personally responsible for the efficiency of the services and the disposition their organizations carry out to ensure that the best protection possible is offered to every minor.
- Exchange of information – concern has been expressed during the inquiry, about the exchange of information on people (for examply, theinhibition by Human Rights and the Act Protecting Data) since, apparently, legislation on the matter holds back the exchange of information between the agencies or artificially increases concern to the point that information can not be exchanged due to the Law on Minors Protection.
- Data bank – this will be instituted at a national level and will cover the formation of a specific framework of the needs of minors regarding health, development and instruction. The government is commissioning work to control whether this system is valid of not.
- Services financing – the services have not received sufficient financing – this is something the local authorities must examine and modify since the accent must always be on the front-line services.
- Criteria of elegibility – many agencies limit their contribution on the basis of elegibility criteria and this signifies a sort of limitation which finds no justification be it ata a legislative level be it at an instruction one; the circumstances of every case must be evaluated based on the validity of the referrent (the agency involved), the grade of risk and the urgency of the answer. In order to correctly estimate any need, the local authorities must be more directly engaged in the local communities, with the obligation of defining needs and the ways of facing them.
- Services availability – in Victoria’s case, the office hours of the London boroughs of Ealing, Brent and Haringey were 40 hours per week and this means that for the remaining 128 hours there was only one employee without any specific experience. Consequentlt it is recommended that the local authorities arrange things so as to offer an emergency coverage system operating 24 hours per day resembling the services already offered by the police/health institutions.
- The Agency and its personnel – this situation puts the client and the personnel in a condition vulnerability. In fact, in many agencies it is feared that the agency personnel is used in inadapt circumstances and this problem must be faced. If agency personnel is used, they must be given valid support and adequate supervision.
- Training and Supervision – The promotion of the best pratices is vital for the improvement of the services. The key area is training at which we must aim. Balance between theoretical instruction and practical training with an inductive programme for new personnel handling their role in protecting minors and their support families is required. Supervisio is the corner stone of the practices for doing good social work and must be organized so that it works efficiently at all levels of organization.
Practical guide and documentation – the reports are often voluminous and heavy; the task is that of supplying very busy personnel in each agency valid and practical help of a directive depth. The challenge is to offer material which really helps the people to do their job.
The legislative impact Each minor is important – Lord Laming’s report recognizes that “the common denominator responsible in each case (Maria Colwell, Jasmine Beckford, Lauren Wright and Ainlee Walker) for the lack of rapid intervention was the limited coordination, lack of exchangeof information, the absence of personnel with a strong sense of responsibility or front line operators able to fill in for the lack of personnel, the bad management and absence of efficient training.” The report received a mixed welcome from many organizations.
Security and Justice – the government proposals on domestic violence are:
Prevention – work in the first place onunderstanding why domestic violence can happen and, secondly, with the victims and authors to avoid it being repeated.
Protection and Justice – increase legal protection for victims and their families.
Support – for victims in their reconstruction of their own lives.
Numerous parts of the document have been explored, including instruction, multi-agency activities, information, support and legal protection as well as preventing the crime being repeated.
Keeping minors safe – this is the governmentìs reply to the inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbé and the Chief Inspector of Police’s report on safeguarding minors. Safeguarding of minors was submitted, until 02.04.04, to specific examination which should furnish an extremely precise guide on minors protection for the education and instruction services.
The law for victims of domestic violence and crime – this law is divided into three parts – domestic violence – penal procedure .-.the victims:
Domestic violence:
Emendments to the Families Law of 1996 have been proposed and foresee that violation of the law on non-harassment becomes a penal crime and that the meaning of the word “associated person” must be extended to include couples of the same sex living together.
It also introduces a new crime – the one of provoking or consenting to the death of a minor or a vulnerable adult.
The introduction of an inquiry on domestic homicide.-.that is an inquiry into the circumstances provoking a death due to violence, abuse or neglect by the family, intimate friends or a person over 16 years of age.
Penal Procedure:
This procedure makes aggression become a crime with relative arrest and extends the availability of the regulations on the order of preventive imprisonment as per the Law on Protection against Harassment of 1997.
Victims:
This part obligates the Secretary of State to issue a code regulating the services to furnish to victims of criminal conduct.
The Law on Minors:
This law is the direct result of the Laming report, i.e. that “Every Minor is Important” and covers a wide range of services and some areas make reference to specific modifications to be made to the previous relations and are:
The High Commissioner for Minors in England must promote the knowledge of the opinions and interests of minors.
The law specifies the duty of the various services and associations to collaborate and in this sense involves important local authorities of England and Wales to institute collaboration relations with the key agencies, legally recognized and other relevant agencies of the volunteer organizations and communities sectors in order to improve the well-being of minors.
Dispositions for safeguarding – this is a new obligation for the local authorities and other key authorities to directly and efficiently involve themselves in the necessity to safeguard and promot the well-being of minors.
Information data bank – local authorities must start up data banks contining basic information on all minors.
The Director of the Services for Minors and the group leader must render the local authorities more responsible and incisive.
Intervention – there will be new powers of intervention concerning the social services for minors to make them similar to those concerning instruction.
City Safe
City Safe coordinates the forum of Services and Associations actively working on the problems connected with safeguarding the weaker groups who, more than others, are potentially victims of aggression and violence.
The idea of starting off a shared coordination and a project springs from dramatic cases involving, in particular, young children.
The situation of victims is often known by the agencies but the lack of a link generates intervention which is slow, non-synchronous and with very limited protection for whoever finds himself in a dangerous situation.
The guiding coordination idea is to put together experiences and resources in order to construct personalized intervention projects but also to unite efforts to get moving with preventive and information/formation on the public opinion.
The figure of the reports filed on domestic maltreatment and a lot of recent research, conducted with highschool students outline a particularly critical situation. In fact, apparently over 50% of the sample interveiwed stated having been present at or have sustained maltreatment in the family and almost half of the young women interviewed considered as a normal thing.
From these observations, the idea of promoting cultural and education actions, especially in the schools grew up thus starting off a sensitization work on the new generations, extending initiatives and comparisons to parents, also.
Victim Support
The association if an NGO and works within the City Safe coordination, in a network system which links the private social associations, the police forces and the local administration services. The association in particular deals with support to crime victims and their relatives, in the face of the fact of theprogressive increase in cases of violence. At a national level, last year, the support offered to victims regarded about 60,000 persons , of which about 10,000 were given assistance in court. In the city of Liverpool the crimes of violence reported passed in 2003 from 1,300 to 3,500. This figure alone certainly indicates an increase in the number of crimes but also an increased habit and facilitation in getting in touch with the police forces.
Victim Support offers victims, free of charge,:
- Counselling and psychological support
- Intervention in habitation and economical emergency situations
- Connection with the police force from the moment of the report onwards
- Assistance during court proceedings
- Assistance in obtaining damages compensation from the author of the crime or for filing the request for indemnity from the state should the author be impecunious.
- Accompaniment to other associations should particular, specific needs equire it.
From Codini Gabriele, Guarnieri Roberto, Bossolasco Rosanna, Galli Susanna, Pavan Simonetta, Bonora Susanna, Antarelli Daniela, Donisetti Laura, Signorino Laura, Adorni Fulvio. “ELDERLY PEOPLE, WOMEN AND CHILDREN VICTIMS OF CRIME, COMPARISON AND EXCHANGE OF EUROPEAN EXPERIENCES”, Provincia di Milano , Laboratorio Salute Sociale, Network Europeo sulle vittime del crimine 2004
[1] drawn from the speech of Michelle Lesbirel Jones, Coordinator of Domestic Violence Prevention at the European Seminar Old People, Women and Children Victims of Crime, Milan, March, 2004.
