Parental Partnership, Advocacy and Engagement: The Way Forward

Simon Haworth (), Andy Bilson, Taliah Drayak, Tammy Mayes and Yuval Saar-Heiman
Additional contact information
Simon Haworth: Department of Social Work & Social Care, School of Social Policy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
Andy Bilson: School of Social Work, Care and Community, University of Central Lancashire, Preston PR1 2HE, UK
Taliah Drayak: Independent Researcher
Tammy Mayes: Independent Researcher
Yuval Saar-Heiman: Department of Social Work, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham TW20 0EX, UK

Social Sciences, 2022, vol. 11, issue 8, 1-16

Abstract: This article, written with parents as co-authors, has two aims: (1) to provide a critical view of the English child protection system based on parents’ views and to locate these views within contemporary child protection studies and (2) to present the transformative value of co-production in the context of child protection studies both as a form of critical scholarship and as a means to influence policy and practice. The current children’s social work system in England does not achieve good outcomes for families, and many children and parents frequently experience it as stigmatizing, inhumane, and harmful. The article presents the experience and recommendations for change produced by parents with a broad range of experience with child protection services in England. The Parents, Families and Allies Network worked with five allied organizations in which parents identified the extensive range of problems that the current system presents and ways forward to achieve more supportive, humane, and inclusive practice with families. Seven main themes emerged: a better definition of need and response to need; partnership, participation, and humane practice; improving legal representation and support in legal proceedings; better support in care proceedings; permanence that maintains links; a better response to domestic violence; and the lack of support for disabled children. The article discusses five features of the project that supported meaningful co-production: taking a political stance, choosing clear and feasible aims, incorporating a range of knowledge, the participation of parents with lived experience throughout all phases of the project, and not settling with just knowledge production.

Keywords: parent advocacy; participation; child protection; co-production (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/11/8/353/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/11/8/353/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:11:y:2022:i:8:p:353-:d:882987

Access Statistics for this article

Social Sciences is currently edited by Ms. Yvonne Chu

More articles in Social Sciences from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().