ABSTRACT
A scan of the legislation underpinning the involvement of the State in family life indicates that it is primarily structured around children’s welfare. This reflects the dominant focus of social work policy and practice with families. It is true both with regard to helping families care for their children (family support) and the more interventionist area of child protection. As described in Chapter 1, the state has generally been reluctant to intervene in family life beyond a need to offset risks to the most vulnerable. Child abuse and neglect constitute such risks. In relation to family support, there have been political concerns since the Poor Law days that the more help one affords families the less responsible they become (‘take responsibility away from people and they become irresponsible’: Keith Joseph, 1974). While such concerns centre largely on the provision of financial aid, they have also coloured the ways in which family support has been conceptualized, namely addressing parental inadequacy and preventing undesirable outcomes. Delinquency, child abuse and neglect, and the costly alternative of removing children from the care of their parents, feature large in the list of ‘undesirable outcomes’. Only with the introduction of the Children Act 1989 did policy and practice recognize the need for a more collaborative approach, based on a recognition that all families need support at some time.
