Child Protection Guidance 2021

Part 4: Specific support needs and concerns 152 National Guidance for Child Protection in Scotland 2021 Version 1.0 September 2021 4.127 Children affected by parental alcohol and drug use may experience neglect, feelings of fear, blame, abandonment, anger and shame. Children who may not be recognised as Young Carers may have to care for children, or for adults. Secrecy and denial are recurrent features within families affected by alcohol and drug use. Divisions occur within families where there is pressure to contain knowledge of substance use. Children’s potential to experience and develop trusting, secure relationships are compromised. Many parents feel marginalised outside the home, and inside the home they do not know how to acknowledge or discuss their substance issues with their children. Stigma accompanying parental alcohol and drug use affects children, locks in secrecy and remains a barrier to connection with universal services, treatment and support. 4.128 Child protection approach. Although specialist assessment and support may be required, key elements of the general approach to assessment, and of the steps indicated in parts 2b and 3 of this Guidance, apply. 4.129 Parents value clear, consistent and honest messages about their progress when delivered in the context of trusted relationships and intensive support. Parents need holistic help that takes into account damaging early‐life experiences (Dawe et al (2018). Parenting and fatherhood‐focused interventions should be considered within substance abuse treatment programmes, unless there are compelling (e.g. child safety) reasons not to do so. Child protection planning should not be exclusively reliant on maternal change and responsibility. Aims, methods, steps, choices, expectations and lines of communication should be crystal clear to all involved, especially parents and children. Components will be tailored to needs and resources. ‘Parents Under Pressure’ is an example of an intensive, modular, community-based programme which has been subject to robust evaluation (Barlow et al 2018). 4.130 Capacity to change and decision-making. It may be very difficult to predict parenting capacity with confidence. When assessment relates to the risk of significant harm, the assessment should include an evaluation of capacity to change within a timescale that will meet the child’s needs. A combination of practices may be required to support safe decision-making and to offset the risk of selective attention to information confirming previous judgements. This combination may include the use of approved, structured risk assessment tools, careful assessment of family functioning, and involvement of families in shared decision-making around the nature and focus of Child Protection Plans. 4.131 Professional judgement about the likelihood of significant harm involves multi-agency consideration of the interaction, accumulation, immediacy and likely continuity of risks and strengths in each situation. Parental needs may obscure the child’s needs. Drug use may bring on mental health disorders in a reciprocal and cyclical manner. Mental disorders can also lead to drug use, possibly as a means of ‘self-medication’. Parents experiencing anxiety or depression may rely on alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs to temporarily alleviate their symptoms. Both drug use disorders and other mental illnesses are influenced by overlapping factors such as genetic vulnerabilities, early trauma, or the current experience of domestic abuse. 4.132 Connected child protection. Follow-up support is required for parents who have involuntarily lost their children through child protection and permanence processes, in order to anticipate and prevent a repeat cycle of risk, separation and loss.