Child Protection and Welfare Practice Handbook - Health Service ...

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112 Child Protection and Welfare Practice Handbook • It is important to ascertain how a father figure understands his role as a responsible parent and positive role model and carer. • It is important to ascertain a father’s role in the child’s everyday life, how he understands and meets the child’s needs, how much time he spends with the child and the nature of the relationship that exists between them. • It is important to ascertain the degree to which the father and the child’s mother agree on aspects of parenting, particularly boundary setting and discipline. • It is important not to apply different standards of care to fathers. • It is also important to assess significant males in the family unit since often not enough information is known on these people (e.g. new partners). • It is important that all referrals are examined in detail for accuracy and that no information is minimised by professionals, for example, allegations made in ‘custody and access’ cases or ‘bad family or community relations’. Each referral must be investigated on the evidence presented. There may be truth in the allegations and checking for credibility can at times be a challenge. • Time should be spent with each member of the family, both together and separately, explaining the purpose and process of assessment. • Time should be spent observing the interaction between children and carers. • Research has shown that investigations and assessments of child protection and welfare concerns often focus solely on the child’s main carer. Children should always be included in the assessment process, along with their siblings. • Always check differing or inconsistent explanations about any indication of harm to the child. • Explore as many options available to the assessment process to ensure information received has credibility.
Social Work Procedures and Practice 3.6.2 Evaluating child and family progress Evaluating whether risk behaviours and conditions have changed is central to case decisions. Monitoring change should begin as soon as an intervention is implemented and should continue throughout the life of a case until appropriate outcomes have been achieved. The importance of evaluating family progress is to help answer the following questions: Is the child safe? Have the protective factors, strengths or the safety • factors changed, warranting a change or elimination of the safety plan or the development of a safety plan? • What changes, if any, have occurred with respect to the conditions and behaviours contributing to the risk of maltreatment? • What outcomes have been accomplished and how does the case worker know they have been accomplished? • What progress has been made toward achieving case goals? • Have the services been effective in helping clients achieve outcomes and goals and, if not, what adjustments need to be made to improve outcomes? • What is the current level of risk in the family? • Have the risk factors been reduced sufficiently so that parents or caregivers can protect their children and meet their developmental needs so that the case can be closed? • Has it been determined that reunification is not likely in the required timeframe and there is no significant progress toward outcomes? If so, is an alternative permanent plan needed? 3.7 Supervising the assessment Practice Note: Overseeing assessments The questions below (from Macdonald, 2001 as cited in Buckley et al, 2006) provide a measure for judging the quality of an assessment and may be useful as a guide for recording. In the case of an initial assessment, the standard implicit in the questions will be only partly met. Does the assessment: Begin with a clear statement of the purpose of or reasons for the • assessment? (continued) 113
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Index A abuse categories of, 10-14
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Children First Implementation Offic
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hazards, exposure of children to, 1
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NOTES
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What is the Child Protection and We
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