Harwin Judith, Barlow Charlotte
Centre for Child and Family Justice Research, Law School, Lancaster University, Lancaster, United Kingdom.
School of Justice, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, United Kingdom.
Front Psychiatry. 2022 Oct 19;13:989813. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.989813. eCollection 2022.
This review article focuses on the inter-relationship between substance misuse, domestic abuse, and child maltreatment, especially in the context of care (child protection) proceedings. It reviews what is known about the prevalence and impact of co-occurring domestic abuse and substance misuse on adult and child victims, and the response of criminal and family law and intervention programmes in supporting families to address these problems holistically. Special attention is paid to the role of Family Drug and Alcohol Courts (FDACs), a radical problem-solving approach to care proceedings, which provide integrated interventions to the range of co-occurring problems that trigger the proceedings. Despite clear evidence of the greater harm to children when exposed to these two parental difficulties, the review has found a lack of systematic information on the prevalence of co-occurrence and a lack of effective integrated interventions, including within care proceedings. It argues that the FDAC approach is well suited to respond to co-occurring substance misuse and domestic abuse in care proceedings and it has the potential to break down silos across sectors. However, in the absence of empirical evidence, this premise would need testing. A particular focus of the review has been on efforts to overcome silos in practice, law and policy. Promising initiatives are described in criminal and family law to improve the response to domestic abuse that build on the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the first dedicated domestic abuse legislation in England and Wales. All of them are based on problem-solving approaches used in other jurisdictions. Despite these initiatives, the review concludes that there remain significant barriers to effectively align law, policy and practice to ensure that domestic abuse strategy recognizes and responds to the overlaps with substance misuse.
这篇综述文章聚焦于药物滥用、家庭虐待和儿童虐待之间的相互关系，特别是在照护（儿童保护）程序的背景下。文章回顾了关于家庭虐待和药物滥用同时发生对成年及儿童受害者的普遍性和影响的已知情况，以及刑法和家庭法的应对措施，还有干预项目在支持家庭全面解决这些问题方面的情况。特别关注了家庭毒品和酒精法庭（FDACs）的作用，这是一种针对照护程序的激进问题解决方法，它为引发这些程序的一系列同时出现的问题提供综合干预措施。尽管有明确证据表明儿童在面临这两种父母方面的困难时会受到更大伤害，但综述发现缺乏关于两者同时出现的普遍性的系统性信息，也缺乏有效的综合干预措施，包括在照护程序中。文章认为，FDAC方法非常适合应对照护程序中同时出现的药物滥用和家庭虐待问题，并且有潜力打破各部门之间的壁垒。然而，在缺乏实证证据的情况下，这一前提需要进行检验。综述的一个特别重点是在实践、法律和政策方面努力克服壁垒。文章介绍了刑法和家庭法中基于2021年《家庭虐待法》（英格兰和威尔士第一部专门的家庭虐待立法）的有前景的举措，以改善对家庭虐待的应对，所有这些举措都基于其他司法管辖区采用的问题解决方法。尽管有这些举措，综述得出结论，在有效协调法律、政策和实践以确保家庭虐待战略认识到并应对与药物滥用的重叠方面，仍然存在重大障碍。
