Parental substance misuse, domestic abuse and offending: perspectives on the interface between care proceedings and the criminal justice system

Project Dates

June 2024 - May 2025

Funder

Joy Welch Charitable Fund, Lancaster University

Project Summary

Parental substance misuse is a significant socio-economic problem cutting across family and criminal justice contexts. Often co-occurring with domestic abuse and parental offending, interventions are frequently siloed, causing delays, inefficiencies, extra costs, and stress to families. In contrast, Family Drug and Alcohol Courts (FDACs) are a problem-solving court in care proceedings, which unlike standard care proceedings, aim to address these inter-related issues holistically. Government and policy makers in criminal and family justice contexts have a major interest in problem-solving courts.

However, descriptions of the FDAC input when substance and domestic abuse and parental offending co-occur, are lacking. So are the views of parents and professionals on FDAC vs non FDAC care proceedings, and their experience of the interface with criminal justice. This qualitative project aims to address these gaps to generate practice and policy lessons for those working in family and criminal justice sectors.

This study complements our ESRC-funded data linkage study conducted in partnership with the Centre for Justice Innovation (CJI) investigating whether the impact of FDACs on parental offending differs from non-FDAC care proceedings. This has never been done before in England or internationally.

Objectives

Describe and compare how FDAC and non-FDAC care proceedings seek to address parental substance misuse, DA and parental offending holistically and cross-jurisdictionally, and to identify processes, pathways, opportunities, barriers and gaps.
Explore parental and professional perspectives on (a) the contribution of FDAC compared to non-FDAC care proceedings (b) how well the family and criminal court work together to address the needs of families affected by these three issues.
Make recommendations regarding the possibilities of strengthening co-ordinated planning across family and criminal justice sectors informed by national (England) evidence and findings from the fieldwork.

These objectives will be achieved via:

A rapid literature review
Inter-professional online focus groups
Judicial interviews
In-depth interviews with parents
Sense-checking workshops.

Ethics and Governance

The study and the questionnaire for the judiciary have the approval of the Judicial Office.

The study has ethical approval from Lancaster University.

Study Outputs

Project report
Short policy briefing: circulated widely to key stakeholders to maximise impact
Parent/ family findings short report. Parents will have the opportunity to co-produce this and provide feedback on other outputs
Dissemination webinars

Research Team

Professor Judith Harwin (PI) (Lancaster University)
Lily Golding (Lancaster University)
Dr Claire Fitzpatrick (Lancaster University)
Dr Charlotte Barlow (University of Central Lancashire)

External Collaborators

The Centre for Justice Innovation is a partner to this project.

Advisory Role

HHJ Carol Atkinson, Lead Judge for research across Family Justice, is advising on the project, with particular reference to judicial involvement.

Contact

For more information about this project, please contact Judith Harwin. j.e.harwin@lancaster.ac.uk