Parental Issues – Safeguarding Network

Often young people are struggling with issues at home that affect their well-being and how they behave. Sometimes the pressures on families (such as poverty, or the additional requirements in caring for a disabled child) create additional pressures at home.

The following pages provide more information on a range of parental issues. Consider how these may impact on the children or young people you are working with. While it may be important to provide some emotional support and practical steps to support parents, schools should always consider how the work they are undertaking improves the life of the young person and keep their welfare central to any action they take.

Children with family members in prison

Homelessness

Parental drug and alcohol use

Parental learning difficulty

Parental mental ill health

Resources

The Children’s Commissioner’s 2018 Report into Childhood Vulnerability

The Children’s Commissioner has published a report on children’s views about their daily lives – how it affected their emotional wellbeing, school life and relationships with friends, and the ways in which they attempted to cope.

Young people highlight the impact of high levels of tension and unpredictability at home, about situations that could explode at any time and of an evolving sense of shame as they began to understand that the chaos and neglect that they took for granted wasn’t the same for all children. Children often said they had to find ways to cope which meant that they had to grow up too quickly. For all this, they knew that the alternative without their parent would be painful and often went to great lengths not to tell others for fear of being separated.

Despite the problems at home and the impact it had on them, they were also very clear about how much they loved and trusted their parents, but are torn between loyalty and love, and the need to seek help.

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Training resources for Safeguarding Leads to use in team meetings;
Reference documents for additional information;
Handouts for staff summarising each topic;
Quizzes to test staff understanding.

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