§ Ms Margaret Moran (Luton, South)I begin by quoting from survivors of domestic violence. A child who was involved in domestic violence said:
My worst moments were when my dad said he was going the throw the baby out of the window, and when he said he was going to cut my mum's ears off and poke her eyes out.Those are the words of a child terrorised by domestic violence.A parent said:
After he was released from prison for stabbing me, he saw my daughter at the probation office under supervision. After a while they persuaded me to let him have her on his own. Things went OK for a long while but when she was eleven, she became very depressed and unhappy and tried to get out of seeing him. It turned out he had started hitting her on contact visits.Another parent reported:On every occasion he came to the house he would force his way in. He continued to abuse me physically and verbally in front of the kids. I had to call the police to remove him after contact visits, and on several occasions he raped me. I still belonged to him, or so he thought. The thought of him coming to collect the children from the house terrifies me. At the moment his parents collect and bring back the children, but from May the court has ordered that he can come to the house. Once again I will be unsafe and at risk from this person.All those are the words of survivors of domestic violence, as expressed in a recent online consultation initiated by the all-party parliamentary group on domestic violence. That e-consultation, Women Speak, links survivors of domestic violence with parliamentarians in order better to inform our policy, legislation and practice on the subject.
§ Ms Debra Shipley (Stourbridge)I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way so early in her presentation. I record my great respect for her work on violence in the home, in particular the effect on children. Does she agree that the online consultation, Women Speak, was a huge eye-opener for all of us who were involved? I promoted the Protection of Children Act 1999 with the help of my hon. Friend and I thought that I knew a lot about violence against children, but the direct information that came over was appalling. It is extremely important that we have direct contact with survivors, so that we can learn how to tackle the issue.
§ Ms MoranI thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Ms Shipley) for that important intervention, which emphasised that we heard the powerful voices of women who have experienced domestic violence and its impact on their children. In a month, more than 1,000 contributions from throughout the country and almost every conceivable community were made to the online consultation. It highlighted subjects on which policy is not being implemented, and gaps in legislation. The debate results from the voices that we heard. I hope that we shall listen to them carefully because it is almost unique to hear directly the full and frank testimony of survivors in the circumstances that we are considering.
The issue that emerged from the consultation cried out for action. The survivors called for an end to the courts almost automatically granting a violent parent 109WH access to children through child contact orders. We must heed those calls and take action to protect women and children who are at further risk of violence and abuse. More than 90 per cent. of contributions from survivors that referred to child contact raised fears that they and their children were at continued risk of violence or abuse. That is a powerful statement, which we should heed. Women and children who have fled violence, ostensibly to a place of safety, continue to be subject to violence and abuse. There is evidence of women even being murdered as a result of child contact orders.
Changes to the Children Act 1989 are urgently needed. Neither the Act nor the guidance refer to domestic violence. The Act does not require the court to consider the safety of the parent or any other children in the family. The measure, which was intended to protect children, is generally good. Yet it fails to protect the children who need most protection—those who have experienced domestic violence. Consequently, judges almost always grant child contact orders as being in the children's best long-term interests, even if a parent is known to be violent within the family.
Research evidence shows that the courts do not recognise that women are at greatest risk of fatality after separation, and that when there is violence in the family, there is a higher than average likelihood of violence towards, or abuse of, children. The case of Georgina McCarthy, who was murdered almost two years ago today, illustrates the problem. Every agency tried to protect her, but she was murdered and her child was abducted as a result of a child contact order by the courts.
In 1999, a survey of 130 survivors found that 76 per cent. of 148 children ordered by courts to have contact were said to have been abused by the violent parent. Research by Hughes et al in 1989 showed that child abuse and woman abuse occurred together in 40 to 60 per cent. of cases.
Eleanor's ex-husband broke into her house in 1995 and subjected her to five hours of violence. While he was in prison, her daughter, aged four, revealed that her father had sexually abused her. That was confirmed by medical evidence and contact was stopped. However, in 1997, the court decided that there was insufficient evidence of sexual abuse by the father and restored supervised contact. The effect on the child was devastating. Contact was stopped again and social services decided to prosecute the father. The Crown Prosecution Service dropped the charges because it did not wish to put the child in the witness box. A judge ordered supervised contact in a family centre. Eleanor appealed because none of the local contact centres provide supervision. Despite that, she has received a notice, arid will be sent to prison if she does not comply with the order.
Contact is refused in fewer than 2 per cent. of child contact cases. In 1997–98, contact was granted in almost 33,000 out of 36,000 cases. That figure is an underestimate because many women are advised by solicitors that there is no point in contesting a contact order and that it is in their best interests to agree informally to contact. For example, solicitors persuaded Sarah Heatley, who was worried by her husband's violent behaviour, to agree to contact without a court hearing. Her two children were murdered during a child contact visit.
110WH For a woman and her children, the apparent safety of a hideout or women's refuge is illusory because, in a few weeks, she is likely to receive a summons that requires her to respond to her ex-partner's application for contact with the child. The nightmare begins again.
Violent partners frequently use contact orders to track down and harass the fleeing partner. A child's address is often disclosed accidentally by order of the court. There are examples of some courts giving out the addresses of refuges, thus endangering many women and children. By applying for seek-and-find orders, men can require the police, social services or the Department of Social Security to disclose a child's address to the court. Those orders were never intended for that purpose. Even if the address is kept secret, it is easy for the violent parent to locate the child and the abused woman through the source of the child contact order and the location of the court in which the hearing will be held. Pity the five-year-old who thought she could protect her mum by telling her father that they lived in Bedding rather than Reading; imagine the intolerable pressure on a child so young and desperate.
Families who flee violence are more vulnerable to being tracked down by their abusers because the courts almost invariably issue child contact orders. They have been used as a method of harassing families. A writer from Kent told us that her ex-husband's consistent attempts to find her through repeated court orders to obtain child contact over five years destroyed her life and the lives of her children. Contact was eventually prevented by a sharp-eyed community psychiatric nurse, who faxed the court a damning report on the schizophrenia of the violent ex-partner. Otherwise, the mother would have faced imprisonment if she had prevented child contact. How many other families' lives have been destroyed? How many children's formative years have been lived in fear and uncertainty because of the contact orders?
The Department of Health has accepted the impact of domestic violence and the strong link between it and child abuse. That is reflected in the Department's training pack, "Making an Impact", which is intended for professionals who work with children. Sadly, the message is not getting through to some people, even when there is every reason to believe that the child has been abused.
It is clear that many judges are unaware, when they issue child contact orders, that supervised contact becomes unsupervised in six months. Only about 1 per cent. of contact centres offer supervised contact. Even if they were safe, many are run by volunteers. Excellent though volunteers are, many are untrained and cannot offer the safety and security that women who have been abused and children need. The centres urgently need wholly safe environments and well-trained staff. Child counselling should also be provided. Sadly, such provision is lacking and underfunded. Perhaps the Lord Chancellor's Department could examine that with colleagues in other Departments, for the safety of the women and children involved.
Abido Choudhry fled to a refuge after years of violence. Her husband was granted supervised contact with the three children. After six months, those contacts became unsupervised. The oldest child complained to social services of their father's mistreatment during contact, but the court ordered overnight stays. As a 111WH result, two of the children were abducted, are now thought to be in Pakistan and are unlikely ever to see their mother again.
Women and children should not be put in such danger by our courts. Those regrettable incidents are not isolated. They were entirely predictable and could have been prevented if we had adequate legislation and court procedures to deal with domestic violence.
The Government's consultation paper, "Contact between children and violent parents", which outlines good practice guidelines, is welcome and may lead to better court procedures. They are urgently needed, but they are not mandatory. That is why we need to change the Children Act 1989. Such a change has been made in Northern Ireland and, indeed, in many other countries. It is perverse and dangerous that such changes should be delayed here. We are, in effect, condoning de facto court-approved child abuse.
The law is preventing the police, social workers and child protection agencies from doing their job of protecting the most vulnerable. The case of Georgina McCarthy—murdered by her ex-husband, despite all the attempts of every agency—had a tragic inevitability, and such cases may happen again, perhaps tomorrow.
The recent consultation by the Lord Chancellor's Department on the issue, undertaken by the advisory board on family law's Children Act sub-committee, is also welcome. It proposes guidelines to be followed in cases where domestic violence is alleged, but many of the agencies believe that legislation is still needed. Those agencies include Women's Aid, which is to be congratulated on all its work on the issue, and a wide range of women's and children's organisations under the Best Interests coalition. I understand that the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children is also involved and is due to start a campaign on the issue. Those bodies are supported by the powerful voice of the women—the survivors—whom we heard in the all-party online consultation.
If we are to introduce guidelines, as is proposed, what will be the mechanism for monitoring their impact? The sad fact is that, at the moment, little or nothing is done by the Government to monitor the impact of the Children Act in cases of domestic violence. Research has been done by academics on a small scale and by Women's Aid. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Minister will liaise with her colleagues in other Departments to ensure that we track child contact outcomes where domestic violence is an issue. Sadly, my parliamentary questions on the subject have elicited the fact that social services reports, undertaken as part of part VIII reviews under the Children Act, are not collected, tracked or monitored, so information about the impact of child contact orders on domestic violence is not collected systematically.
I ask the Government to find out precisely how many children have been killed in recent years by parents known to be violent before and after contact visits. That information is contained in the part VIII reviews, and we need to study and learn from it if we are serious about tackling the problem. It could also be used to develop detailed risk assessments before contact orders are granted.
112WH The domestic violence intervention project is piloting such a scheme, which crucially includes the women's views about the risks involved in granting access to children, but, sadly, no funding is available to evaluate it properly. That needs to be considered urgently. Vital evidence collected by police and social services when they advise women to leave their homes for their own safety should be provided in writing and the abused parent should be able to use it to seek a court order under section 91(14) of the Children Act, thus requiring the violent parent to seek leave from the court before applying for a contact order. That procedure is little used at present, but the relevant departments could instigate it relatively speedily.
The Department of Health urgently needs to undertake research, perhaps in conjunction with the Lord Chancellor's Department, on children's experiences of different levels of contact where there is a history of violence in the family, including the impact on children's health and development. In that way, we will achieve a sounder basis on which to develop policy to prevent further tragic cases, such as those which I have described.
Finally, but not least, we need adequate funding for refuge services and for counselling children. All of that adds up to an important package that could help to protect our children. However, it is important that we review the need to legislate and to amend the Children Act. The proposals to change future contact involving unmarried parents might be welcome in principle. However, as the Children Act stands, they could also be unwelcome because they could include unmarried parents, who might be involved in even greater incidence of child contact in the circumstances that I have described.
I am pleased to have had this opportunity to raise an issue that, among all the powerful contributions to the all-party group's online consultation with the survivors of domestic violence, is perhaps the most amazing and most appalling. We have heard the powerful voices of the women survivors and their continuing experiences. They fear for their children when child contact orders are issued if there is violence in the family. I hope that the power of the survivors' voices will help to persuade the Government that urgent action needs to be taken to amend the law and protect those women and children.
§ The Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department (Jane Kennedy)Although we are debating a serious issue this afternoon, it is a pleasure to be under your chairmanship, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and to discuss it so constructively. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Luton, South (Ms Moran) for the way in which she has presented her case. She has described in the most graphic terms exactly the difficulties faced by the survivors of domestic violence, and brought their cases to light. This is a rare opportunity to discuss such issues, especially those involving child contact orders and concerns about domestic violence.
I acknowledge the good work that my hon. Friend has done as chair of the all-party group on domestic violence. I am also glad to acknowledge and put on record her work in putting forward to the Prime Minister recently a petition that was signed by more 113WH than 5,000 people and presented to mark the second anniversary of the murder of Georgina McCarthy, whom she has mentioned. I have discussed that serious and appalling case with the hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. George) who visited me with representatives of Women's Aid. Georgina was tracked down and murdered by her ex-husband, as my hon. Friend has said. Her case is a warning to us all that we cannot afford to be complacent. As my hon. Friend's petition points out, Georgina's case is not an isolated example.
In 1998, 75 women were killed by a current or former spouse, cohabitant or lover—more than one a week. However, the problem is not simply one of male violence. It is only fair to say that, in the same year, 37 men were killed by a current or former spouse, cohabitant or lover. To complete that gloomy roll of statistics, in 1998–99, 69 children were killed by a parent—unfortunately, the statistics do not capture whether by their mothers or fathers.
Violence between spouses, or between parents and children, does not always lead to murder, manslaughter or infanticide; but domestic violence is a serious problem, which we take seriously. I therefore welcome the opportunity to explain what is going on, and what the Government are doing. About six months ago, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary launched the zero-tolerance campaign in Liverpool, and it has proved very successful. Although today we are focusing on court decisions and court contact orders, the Government are involved in many other matters.
As my hon. Friend's petition makes clear, there is a significant fear that contact orders are sometimes made inappropriately, and, in particular, that the courts do not always take proper account of allegations of domestic violence. That is a valid concern, as both the judiciary and the Government recognise; but it relates to a difficult area, in which no solution will please everyone.
We can all agree that children and women—and, for that matter, men—ought to be protected from violent parents or former partners. We also know that, other things being equal, it is in the interests of children to maintain contact with both their parents. We know that, when contact is appropriate and is maintained, nonresident parents are more likely to pay maintenance for their children. Parents, too, have a right to their family life, unless positive evidence has shown to the satisfaction of the courts that that would put their children at risk of harm.
We could not agree to create a system in which any parent—it could be a father, as well as a mother—could automatically deny the other parent any contact with their children simply by making an unsubstantiated, and possibly unfounded, allegation of abuse. We must recognise that that could sometimes be used as a device to exclude parents from contact, or to delay that contact. We must also recognise that some blameless parents—most often fathers—have immense difficulty in enforcing contact orders that have been made in their favour, and that the system of enforcement, which is largely ineffective in these cases, lets such parents down.
I am glad to say that the Children Act sub-committee of the Lord Chancellor's advisory board on family law, to which my hon. Friend referred, has taken on these knotty problems. Last year, the sub-committee—which 114WH is chaired by Mr. Justice Wall—published a consultation paper on contact with violent parents, which my hon. Friend also mentioned. Around Easter, the sub-committee reported the results of its consultation to the Lord Chancellor, and made its final recommendations. The report has been published. Mr. Justice Wall and his sub-committee will embark on a similar exercise in relation to the enforcement of contact orders.
The report on domestic violence and child contact concluded that legislation was not necessary—a view supported by most respondents—but that there should be guidelines for the talks. The draft guidelines are several pages long, and I shall not quote from them fully, but they include the following main points.
Wherever possible, the court should make findings of fact as to whether allegations of violence are true, and as to the effect of the violence on the child and the resident parent. When allegations are found to be true, the court should consider the harm that the child has suffered and the harm that the child is at risk of suffering, and should make an order for contact only if it is satisfied that the safety of the resident parent and that of the child can be secured before, during and after contact.
When the court has made findings of violence but nevertheless considers that contact is in the best interests of the child, it should consider what additional directions may be necessary to ensure that the order is implemented safely. It should also consider whether to make a non-molestation order under part IV of the Family Law Act 1996. The court should always explain how its findings on the issue of domestic violence have affected its decision. In particular, when it has ordered that there should be contact despite having found that domestic violence has taken place, the court should explain its view that contact is in the best interests of the child.
The sub-committee recommended that the guidelines should be brought into force through a practice direction to be made by the Lord Chancellor and the president of the family division, Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss. However, at the time when the sub-committee was finishing its report, four appeals raising these issues were heard by the Court of Appeal. Judgment has been reserved on those cases. The Lord Chancellor has agreed that the sub-committee's draft report should be made available to the Court of Appeal. We look forward to its judgment, and to finding out whether it lays down any guidelines as a result. The Lord Chancellor has agreed with Dame Elizabeth that, once a judgment has been made, they will consider whether a practice direction to the judiciary would be helpful, and what further action may be necessary.
In its consultation paper, the sub-committee compared the different approaches to domestic violence and child contact in Australia, New Zealand and Northern Ireland. Some people would like the law to be amended so that, like the New Zealand legislation, it included a presumption against unsupervised contact when domestic violence has taken place. It is worth emphasising that that statutory presumption is a presumption against unsupervised contact, not a presumption against contact altogether.
115WH As I said, the suggestion was canvassed in the subcommittee's consultation. Most respondents agreed that legislation was not necessary, and that sufficient safeguards could be introduced by way of guidelines. The Government accept that view.
§ Ms MoranI welcome the sub-committee's findings. The issue, obviously, is whether the guidance will be interpreted differently in different parts of the country—a disparity that would be resolved by some change to the Children Act, but not necessarily by the Australian system. May I press my hon. Friend on the question of monitoring? Might it be possible to consider legislation if the effects of the guidance are not the effects that were intended?
§ Jane KennedyI hope that what I will say shortly will reassure my hon. Friend.
As recently as yesterday, officials in my Department who are responsible for the development of family policy and the effect of the Children Act met staff who are responsible for the administration of the courts to discuss the collection of more information about domestic violence in Children Act cases. It is a live issue in the Department, and one that we are pursuing.
We would be more persuaded that legislation was required if it were the case—as my hon. Friend's petition says—that the courts operate an overriding principle that absent parents should be awarded contact with 116WH their children, and that that principle does not take account of cases in which a parent and children are in danger of experiencing violence. That is not correct. There is no overriding principle that contact should be maintained with an absent or non-resident parent. Section 1 of the Children Act says that the paramount consideration that the courts shall apply in determining any question with respect to the upbringing of a child is the welfare of that child. When considering whether to make a contact order, the courts must also have regard to the so-called welfare checklist, which includes such factors as the child's wishes and feelings, the likely effect on the child of any change in his or her circumstances, and any harm that he or she has suffered or is at risk of suffering.
Although we began the debate early, I realise that we are rapidly running out of time. I would have loved to make many more points; perhaps I can make them in a letter to my hon. Friend.
This is not the end of the story. The Georgina McCarthy case raised several questions about the way in which cases are currently handled, and the Lord Chancellor's Department and the Home Office are considering them. There is much work for the Government to do—much work that they are committed to doing. The subject is critically important, and I thank my hon. Friend for raising the profile of that crucial work.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Adjourned accordingly at Two o'clock.