Recognition

Ambivalence: When people are always late or missing appointments, or change the conversation away from uncomfortable topics and use dismissive body language. Ambivalence is the most common reaction and may not amount to uncooperativeness.

Avoidance:Includes avoiding appointments, missing meetings and cutting short visits due to other apparent important activity. Or extreme avoidance e.g. not answering the door as opposed to not being in. This may be due to involvement making the person anxious and they want to escape. They may have a problem, have something to hide, resent interference or find changes in staff challenging.

Confrontation:Includes challenging professionals, and provoking arguments. This often indicates a deep seated lack of trust, suspicion or fear of professionals.

Violence:Threatened or actual violence by a small minority of people is the most difficult of behaviours for professionals to engage with. It may reflect a deep and longstanding fear and projected hatred of authority figures. People may have experience of getting their way through intimidation and violent behaviour.

Disguised compliance:When a person gives the appearance of cooperating with agencies to avoid raising suspicions, to allay professionals concerns and ultimately to diffuse professional intervention. This includes agreeing to take action but never carrying them out, lack of significant change despite significant input and people agreeing with professionals’ concerns but making little effort to change.

Collusion is where a person seeks to befriend a professional, or chooses a professional to engage with, so that they may evoke more sympathy from them andbe less challenging leading to the needs of the child being hidden.

Reasons for uncooperativeness

There are a variety of reasons why some families may be uncooperative with professionals, including;

  • Do not want their privacy invaded
  • Have work and family commitments that often clash with professional visits or meetings
  • Have something to hide
  • Don’t think there is a problem
  • Resent outside interference
  • Cultural differences
  • Gender of the professional
  • Lack of understanding about what is being expected of them
  • Poor experience of professional involvement
  • Families believe professionals are not cooperating with them
  • Resent staff changes
  • Dislike or fear authority figures
  • Fear children being taken away
  • Fear being judged as poor parents because of substance misuse, mental health problems or domestic abuse
  • A feeling they have nothing to lose e.g. where a child has already been removed
  • They may be the victim of abuse and may be being controlled
  • They may not have the capacity to understand
  • There may be a language or vocabulary barrier
  • They may be unclear of the professionals role or purpose
  • Having difficulty seeing professionals’ good intent
  • Tactics to avoid professionals have worked in the past.

Response to uncooperative families

Professionals in all agencies can improve the chances of a favourable outcome for the child/ren if they;

  • Build a professional relationship and build on relationships already in place with other professionals
  • Consider excluding family members from visits and meetings.
  • Clearly state their professional and/or legal authority as well as purpose
  • Set clear expectations and establish parent/s understanding
  • Continuously assess the motivations and capacities of the parent/s to respond cooperatively in the interests if their child/ren
  • Confront resistance when it arises
  • Engage with regular supervision from their manager
  • Seek advice from experts to ensure best progress
  • Help the parent to work through their underlying feelings whilst supporting them to engage in the tasks of responsible child care
  • Challenge cultural difference when in conflict with child protection
  • Are alert to underlying complete resistance (possibly masked by superficial compliance)despite every effort being made to engage the parent/s
  • Are willing, in such cases, to take appropriate action to protect the child/ren
  • Curious and persistent about others that may be in the home.
  • Risk assess the visit using information from others involved in the family, including who is in the home, the home environment and any animals or weapons.
  • Consider joint visiting.
  • Remain calm and follow procedure.

The impact on the child

Parents who are uncooperative often try to keep the child isolated from professionals. The child might be absent from school supported by the parent or may fail to attend medical appointments.

Significant periods of absence and failure to attend appointments (DNA) should be monitored and action taken to follow up to ensure that the child is seen.

Professionals need to be mindful of the impact the parent’s behaviour towards the professionals may have on the child and consideration of what the child is experiencing should be included in all assessments. The child may;

  • Have become desensitised to violence
  • Have learnt to appease and minimise
  • Be too frightened to tell anyone
  • Identify with the parent/carer
  • Be coerced into giving fictitious accounts

The impact on a professional

It is important to recognise the impact on a professional that working in these families has.

  • Those feeling under threat may feel that it is personal and become distracted.
  • Professionals may feel they have failed.
  • Professionals chosen by the family as their “ally” may then be unable to identify risk
  • Risk plans must be in place and lone working policy followed.
  • Manager support should be available.

Where a professional has been made to feel fearful or intimidated they must consider how the child feels in that home.

If a professional is at risk of harm the police must be called on 999.

Impact on practice

  • Every “one backs” off leaving the child unprotected, possibly by avoiding visits.
  • Parents are appeased to avoid provoking a reaction
  • The family is “punished” by withholding of services
  • Professionals are divided in how they want to approach the family
  • Assessments are not holistic
  • The voice of the child is missed and there is no consideration for the lived experience of the child.

Multi agency collaboration

  • Any agency faced with incidents of threats, hostility or violence should routinely consider the potential implications for any other agency involved with the family as well as for its own staff and should alert them to the nature of the risk.
  • Similarly where there is a lack of attendance agencies must share information and act together.
  • There must be care taken to avoid collusion with the family and confusion between practitioners. Especially where there are existing tensions between services.
  • If the hostility is not universal then agencies should seek to understand why this might be and learn from each other.
  • Professionals must understand each other’s roles, responsibilities and duties and support each other by joint working.
  • Strategies should be agreed between agencies to ensure that the child is seen and monitored so that any assessments or child protection plans can be carried out in order to safeguard the child.

Where a family remains resistant to involvement by agencies the approach must be to maintain the focus on the child and to review and amend the plan in place to ensure action is taken to safeguard the child.

This guidance should be read in conjunction with the Kent and Medway Safeguarding Procedures.