Interventions with Perpetrators of Domestic Abuse

Interventions with Perpetrators of Domestic Abuse

Agreed Approaches for Highland

The Strategy Group is asked to:

· Adopt Respect’s standards for working with perpetrators of domestic abuse in Highland

· Agree that the Respect standards are the minimum standards for working with perpetrators of domestic abuse in Highland

Introduction

Working with perpetrators of domestic abuse can be complex and can increase risks that the victim faces. In recent years, the knowledge base on how to promote interventions that challenge perpetrators behaviour, whilst promoting the safety of women and their children, has developed considerably. This paper sets out the standards of practice for work with perpetrators of domestic abuse in Highland agreed by the Violence Against Women Strategy Group, as part of the Safer Highland strategic partnership for Community Planning. It also includes practices that must not be used or adopted. The agreed approaches outlined here are to be used by NHS Highland, The Highland Council, Northern Constabulary and the voluntary sector partners included within the Violence Against Women Strategy implementation structure.

Standards for Interventions

Training is available through the Highland Community Planning Partnership to support staff in challenging men’s behaviour and to raise awareness of the potential for the collusion of services in his abuse. This is open to all staff who have attended Violence Against Women awareness training. The “Working with Perpetrators Course” is an awareness course and does not enable participants to begin to work with perpetrators of abuse as an intervention or in any therapeutic sense.

In Highland, we have adopted the Respect[1] minimum standards, which are nationally agreed standards for working with domestic abuse perpetrators, as guiding principles for all perpetrator work. These are outlined in the section below.

Perpetrator Programmes – Standards

There is a great deal of expertise in Scotland that has been developed by agencies such as CHANGE, DVPP and SACRO in working with domestic abuse perpetrators. These agencies have worked together, in conjunction with Respect (the standards agency for perpetrator programmes) to develop an accredited model for supporting men to change their behaviour and to increase women and children’s safety. This is called the ‘Caledonian System’.

The Caledonian System will not be available to all perpetrators of domestic abuse in Highland. Any intervention in Highland will include the following standards from Respect:

Respect’s Philosophy:

· Domestic Abuse is unacceptable and must be challenged at all times

· Men’s violence to partners and ex-partners is largely about the misuse of power and control in the context of male dominance

· Violence within same sex relationships or from women to men is neither the same as - nor symmetrically opposite to - men's violence to women

· Men are responsible for their use of violence

· Men can change

· We are part of a community response, which needs to be consistent and integrated at all levels

· Everyone affected by domestic abuse should have access to support services

· All work with perpetrators and victims of domestic abuse must actively promote an alternative, positive and constructive model of human relationships

· Practitioners working in the field of domestic violence should attempt to apply these principles to their own lives

Respect’s Principles & Minimum Standards for group work include:

· An understanding of what constitutes violent behaviour

· That the perpetrator is 100% responsible for his behaviour

· That violent behaviour is a choice, functional and intentional

· Challenging of tactics which seek to deny minimise and/or blame

· Challenging and changing the attitudes & beliefs which support his abuse

· Acknowledging and questioning the social and gendered context of domestic abuse

· Challenging men’s expectations of power and control over partners

· Developing men’s capacity to understand the impact of their violence on their partners and children both in the long and short term

· Encouragement to learn and adopt positive, respectful and egalitarian ways of being

· Projects should avoid collusion with the perpetrator’s rationale

· Perpetrator work which specially addresses the issue of domestic abuse should only be undertaken alongside specialist, resourced, associated support work with partners /ex-partners.

· Each male client should attend the perpetrator programme for at least 75 hours over a minimum of 30 weeks.

· Anger management is an inappropriate intervention in domestic violence cases because perpetrators do not have a problem managing their anger. Instead they make choices to use violence and abuse as a mechanism of power and control over their partner. If they really couldn’t control their anger they would hit out at other people too.

Risks Associated with Perpetrator Programmes:

Perpetrator programmes offer hope to women that their violent / abusive partner can change.

In many cases this is unrealistic. One of the main reasons women give for staying in a violent relationship is that their partner has promised to change. When men attend a perpetrator programme (or any other form of intervention such as counselling or anger management) many women will understandably put their trust in the professionals to protect them and their children.

Women also tend to be overly optimistic about programme outcomes. Gondolf’s multi-site evaluation found that 95% of women expected their partners to complete the programme – yet less than two thirds completed 3 months of programme sessions. The very fact that he is attending a perpetrator programme might lead a woman to have unrealistic expectations and make unsafe choices regarding her relationship that she wouldn’t otherwise have made. It is vital issues of safety and risk are explored with women who’s partners or ex-partners are attending perpetrator programme and programmes must never be run without adequate associated partner support.

Perpetrators can abuse their attendance on a perpetrator programme to further manipulate or control their partners and others

Some of the ways they might do this include:

· Promising they will attend as a bargaining chip / way of saving the relationship

· Lying about their attendance

· Lying about programme content / what happened in the group

· Telling her that they do not need to attend because the workers say he’s ‘cured’

· Telling her that everyone thinks it’s she who has the problem and she should stop nagging him/winding him up etc

· Using the material on the programme to criticise and control her behaviour

· Using jargon / concepts learnt on the programme to manipulate her

· Learning to “talk the talk” without “walking the walk”

· Using attendance on the programme as a way to influence other professionals’ decisions (i.e., Social Workers, Courts)

Ways that perpetrator programmes can increase safety:

Changing his behaviour

Perpetrator programmes cannot ‘cure’ violent men or guarantee dramatic transformation, as behavioural change is a long and complex process. However, research demonstrates that, of perpetrators who complete a domestic abuse programme:

· some will stop their physical violence and significantly reduce their abusive and controlling behaviour

· the majority will stop their violence but maintain some level of abusive and controlling behaviour

· some will continue their violence

Although not all men will end their abuse, domestic abuse perpetrator programmes can reduce dangerousness.[2]

Monitoring men and holding them to account

When men regularly attend a perpetrator programme, their behaviour is under scrutiny. As well as following a curriculum of material designed to help them stop their violence, programmes require men to disclose any violence or abuse they have used during the last week.

To assess risk, perpetrator workers can use:

· men’s disclosure and / or changes in how they behave in the group

· men’s use of blame, minimisation and denial

· information from the man’s (ex)partner (which should be treated with care to ensure that her safety and / or confidentiality are not compromised)

· information from other professionals, such as the police or social workers

The fact that perpetrator workers are focussing on men and holding them to account on a week to week basis for their behaviour towards their (ex)partner and children, can mean that risk factors are picked up and acted upon more quickly.

Supporting women partners and ex-partners

Perpetrator programmes are worth doing because they are successful in changing the behaviour of some men. However, they can also raise the risk as outlined above.

Therefore, perpetrator programmes should never be run in isolation. They should always be integrated with specialist, pro-active, associated women’s services.

These services can help off-set some of the risks mentioned above by helping women to:

· develop realistic expectations about their partners’ behaviour change

· monitor the degree to which their partner is changing and make decisions accordingly

· assess risk and safety plan

The perpetrator programme and associated women’s services should be integrated and work hand in hand, sharing information in order to increase safety.

Risks Associated with Perpetrator Programmes that do not meet Standards – Includes the Reasons why Highland has adopted the Standards

Changing his behaviour

Interventions that do not take into account change theory will be unable to effectively monitor and assess a perpetrator’s willingness to change as well as if he has actually changed.

Whilst men deserve the opportunities to change, not all will want to. A screening process must take place before any man is included in a perpetrator programme. With Caledonian, this process involves 6 months individual preparation work with a support worker who is fully trained.

Monitoring men and holding them to account

A key element of successful perpetrator programmes is encouraging men to disclose the abuse they have perpetrated and challenging their attitudes and beliefs about the acceptability of such actions. Men should be held to account by the people running the programme, other men on the group, and by their partners (via the associated partner work). Programmes that cover different methods of abuse, but do not challenge attitudes and beliefs or promote disclosures do not meet the standards.[3]

Monitoring also needs to take place over time and programmes should not be shorter than the timescales outlined in the Respect standards.

Supporting women partners and ex-partners

Where there is no associated partner support, men’s behaviour is not being adequately monitored. This increases the risk to women and reduces individual men’s accountability for their behaviour. It is better to not offer any intervention to men rather than offer a partial service, which is risky at best and potentially fatal at worst, for women.

Steps to be Taken to Ensure Perpetrator Programmes meet Standards

· All perpetrator programmes in Highland will meet the Respect standards

· Approval for implementing perpetrator programmes will be sought through the Violence Against Women Strategy Delivery Group

· Training for implementing perpetrator programmes will be sourced from current programmes, which have been evaluated and meet the Respect Standards

· Steps will be taken to improve current provision, if failing to meet standards

· Where current provision cannot be improved to meet standards, referrals to the service will be stopped, the service will not receive funding or resources from the Community Planning Partnership agencies

Review

The research base included within these standards will be reviewed once every two years, to ensure that any new evidence is taken into account, which may alter the approach to perpetrators of domestic abuse in Highland.

Paper prepared by:

Gillian Gunn

Violence Against Women Development & Training Officer

28th January 2010

Appendix 1

Why Domestic Abuse Happens

Domestic abuse, as well as other forms of Violence Against Women, is a gender issue. It is most often perpetrated by men and most often experienced by women.

Many reasons have been suggested for what ‘causes’ domestic abuse. Much of this research evidence is based on identifying external factors, which attempt to explain a perpetrator’s behaviour, rather than acknowledging that all people, in all circumstances, make choices about their behaviour, and, consequently, need to take responsibility for those decisions. A number of factors are sometimes cited (highlighted below) and these are issues that may contribute to or trigger violence in certain circumstances. However, they are not direct causes of domestic abuse, which is functional, planned and deliberate behaviour, which can include physical and sexual violence and emotional and psychological abuse. The types of issues included in this research and, which would not be accepted by the Community Planning Partners in Highland as the main reasons domestic abuse happens include:

· Alcohol/drugs[4]

· Mental ill health

· Individual pathologies[5]

· Stress/unemployment/poverty[6]

· Economic status (i.e. ‘class’)[7]

· Uncontrollable anger[8]

· Behaviour of the victim of abuse[9]

Therefore, interventions focusing on any of these issues are not accepted by the Partnership as increasing the perpetrators accountability for the abuse or improving safety for women and children. This automatically excludes the following interventions for perpetrators of domestic abuse:

· Anger Management

· Couples Counselling

· Mediation

· Substance misuse treatment programmes (when used in isolation)

All the approaches above have been proven unsuccessful at stopping domestic abuse and are unsuccessful at reducing it). Conversely, these interventions increase risk to women by instilling a false sense of hope that he will change (thereby having the potential for the women to make choices she wouldn’t have otherwise made); reducing his accountability for the abuse; further blaming her when these approaches have not stopped abuse even when he has been ‘cured’; failing to monitor with her any changes in his behaviour and/or provide her with safety planning information.

The Community Planning Partnership, as with the Scottish Government, accepts the reasons for the continuation of domestic abuse and Violence Against Women in our society today as being:

· Gender Inequality

· An abuse of power

· Privacy of the home and resistance to becoming involved in what is seen as a private matter

· Attitudes and beliefs of some men as to their gender entitlement over women

· Ineffective sanctions for perpetrators of abuse

It must also be remembered that all forms of Violence Against Women themselves are barriers to achieving gender equality in Highland, Scotland and internationally.

Appendix 2

Perpetration and Victimisation – Gender Differences

Research highlights that interventions that are successful in challenging and ultimately changing men’s abusive behaviour acknowledges gender differences in society and focuses on his attitudes and beliefs about himself as a man and his partner as a woman and his perceived entitlements within these relationships.

Whilst women can be violent, and men can experience abuse from female and male partners, there are clear gender differences in both perpetration of abuse by men and women and the experiences of abuse between men and women. The main differences include: