TALCOTT PARSONS La estructura de la acción social:

Some parents could not remember how they had felt arriving at the first hearing. Others had no idea what to expect. Many of the rest described being ‘confused’, „scared’ or „in a daze’ and some were terrified that their child was going to be taken from them.

By the second hearing, all but one parent had accepted the FDAC offer. Some described several motives, reflecting a mix of positive choice, drift and external pressure. They spoke of:

 the chance to retain or regain their child

 wanting help for their own problems

 being attracted by the FDAC approach

 following the recommendation of their solicitor or another professional

 drifting into the programme

 feeling coerced or with no other option, or

 having negative experiences of previous care proceedings or current practice.

The most frequent motive was the chance to keep their child. This was so for a quarter of parents, closely followed by seeing FDAC as an opportunity to sort out their own life.

I wanted to change my past behaviour with alcohol problems so I was willing to work with FDAC.

I decided to take part because I needed to do something different. I was willing to do anything that would make me a better mum and to take on responsibility for asking for help.

When the opportunity came up it was like a godsend. A year ago I was at the bottom. I lost my kids. I had no confidence. I was doing drugs, drinking. I couldn‟t get any lower. To be quite honest I was like a tramp.

There were many different aspects of FDAC that parents thought would help with their own problems, and they had learnt about these through the team’s explanations and information leaflets. None predominated, but they included:

 a family-oriented approach

 being listened to, and

 a specialist service that understands the problems, gives hope, gives help to deal with problems with the local authority.

Solicitors, too, were a helpful source of information, especially in providing information and advising parents who were unsure what to do. They told parents that the FDAC process was likely to be ‘quicker‟ and ‘more relaxed’ and ‘would provide more support’ and be ‘a more positive experience’ than ordinary care proceedings. They had also told parents that they could withdraw from the scheme if did not work out for them.

A number of parents joined on the basis that it ‘can‟t do any harm’ and some talked of being willing to ‘give it a try’, while others were less positive:

Because it wouldn‟t make any difference whether I stayed with this court or went to another court. They would still have made me go to the mother and baby home.

I didn‟t feel Ihad much choice.

The influence of unhappy past experiences of care proceedings was raised by several parents as a reason for choosing FDAC. Some had been through more than one case and 15 mothers had had children removed by the court. Parents said they had seen the judge only rarely, had felt treated as ‘junkies‟ or ‘prostitutes‟, and were made to feel that there was very little chance of being allowed to keep their child. They also talked of feeling unsupported outside court and left to sort out their own treatment.

I‟ve been to an ordinary care case before and normally you wouldn‟t get any advice. This is what I think I need. In the other court no-one actually works with you. All that the social workers said was „go to rehab‟.

A couple of years ago I lost two children … and there wasn‟t a lot of help around then. They just took kids away from us without working with the parents. It felt like a losing battle.

All I can compare it to is normal care proceedings. This is much more intimate, more supportive. The regularity of hearings means that problems can be raised before they arise, in comparison with other courts where hearings are very few and far between. So if you have any problems by the time you get to the next hearing, the problem has often been left so long that it is hard to address. A current stressful relationship with the local authority was the other reason for joining. The worry for parents was about feeling threatened by the local authority and worn down by the expressed negativity and sense of pessimism about the outcome of proceedings:

Right at the beginning it felt as if they were trying to find the case to put against us instead of trying to help us. We were screaming out for help. We were both really chaotic but we didn‟t know how to pull ourselves out.

When I left rehab social services were telling me that I‟d never get my daughter back but FDAC and the guardian set up a meeting and all the professionals and my drug worker came. They were good and they agreed I should have an

assessment. Social services couldn‟t be the only one to disagree so the assessment went ahead.