Contact Centres

On 13th Feb 2006, Maria Eagle, Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Children and Families), Department for Education and Skills, issued a list of contact centres funded by her department.

Contact Centres exist to provide a neutral venue for re-starting contact between parents and children during and after family break-up. Almost all Contact Centres are affiliated to the National Association of Child Contact Centres (NACCC), though there is no central control over how they are run. Staff are all volunteers except in a few centres run by the Probation Service. Most centres are run on a local basis by the WRVS and church groups.

There are 270 NACCC member centres in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Most do not charge their client families and are subsidised by grants from local sources. Around 90% of a Contact Centre's client-base are fathers. Half attend under the provisions of existing court orders. The remainder are referred by solicitors, social workers and court welfare officers, with some referrals through Family Mediation and Relate. Very few centres accept self-referrals.

Resources are limited, and there is little provision for older children. Nearly all centres offer a 'handover' service allowing children to be collected and returned by the father without meeting the mother. This service is invaluable where the parents are at loggerheads but the opening times of the centres usually restrict the available options - many are only open on Saturdays.

One problem encountered by those who use the centres is that there is very rarely a time limit laid down in their court orders, and they are likely to be expected to attend for a period of six months or more. While this would arguably be appropriate in the 12% of centres which undertake supervision of parents deemed a risk to their children, in most cases all that is required is a method of re-starting contact after the tribulations of a separation or divorce, and a few weeks would seem to be reasonable. But unless there is agreement from the resident parent a further court application will be required. At least one father endured contact at a succession of centres for three years.

When NACCC conducted its first survey of its members in 1998 it was found that there was no information on outcomes in 50% of cases. Of the cases where the figures were available 60% of parents continued contact in normal circumstances after leaving the centre, while the remainder either gave up or returned to court to try again.

Contact Centres are set up for the benefit of the children and generally operate a policy of confidentiality. The majority allow Court Welfare Officer attendance at sessions but provide no information other than attendance details. Around 10%, however, provide detailed factual information and 4% carry out assessments for courts.

This is expected to change in the near future. Contact Centres are a growth industry and their independence is threatened. In exchange for a tranche of taxpayers' money they may soon be required to submit written reports on contact for use in court. At a conference at the Department of Health in December 1998 the chair Mrs Justice Bracewell made it clear that these reports, written by well-meaning but untrained staff, would be subject to the same rules of evidence that apply to Welfare Reports - there will be no right to cross-examine the author or dispute the contents.

Contact Centres are meant to be a means of re-starting contact. Many family industry professionals, however, appear to see them as an alternative to proper contact, and it is increasingly common for mothers to demand their use as word gets around that contact can be controlled in this way.

Having to see your children at a Contact Centre is a humiliating experience - which may explain why so many ex-wives insist on it - and the NACCC themselves say that Contact Centres should be used "where concern has been expressed about the visiting parent's ability to care for a child during contact". As a result, such concern is often expressed in response to a father's application for contact in order to control and restrict it. But a Contact Centre is a bitter pill which must sometimes be swallowed in order to get any contact at all.

National Association of Child Contact Centres
Minerva House, Spaniel Row, Nottingham NG1 6EP
Tel: 0115 948 4557

Inside Story

One father's personal experience of using a Contact Centre

The Father

My son's mother works full-time and pays a childminder to look after our son during the day. She insists that I only see him in a Contact Centre, saying that I am unable to look after him competently. I travel to Surrey from Swansea every Saturday to see him. I leave at 9.30 in the morning and get back at 9.00 in the evening. My son is fortunate enough to see his father between 2 p.m. and 4 p.m. I am also a registered childminder, authorised to look after children in my son's age group between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. on weekdays, and earn a living doing precisely that. At the time of writing I have successfully completed 30 weekly 400 mile round trips to ensure that my son can enjoy a relationship with his father.

The Child

So what of the child's point of view? It seems clear that they soon get bored seeing an estranged parent in such an artificial environment. Although the Centre provides toys and games there is a restriction on activities, and the child is confined to the building. On a Saturday any child would prefer to be doing something else: going swimming, going to the park, going to the cinema or the shops, or just kicking a football around with Dad. The visits soon become a chore. Prolonged use of Contact Centres turns the relationship between father and child into an endurance test.

The Centre I attend is in fact a church hall. There are usually four volunteers present who give up their Saturday afternoons on a rota basis. As a rule they do not interfere with contact but sit in the hall reading or chatting, and only intervene when it is strictly necessary. All are over 50 and most are women. Their time and effort is appreciated.

The Handover

In many cases it is stipulated that the father has to be in the Centre as the mother arrives - the child is exchanged through a 'neutral zone' in the corridor - and may not leave the building after contact until a defined period has elapsed.
 

The Mothers

The Contact Centre does not offer supervised contact. But many mothers remain for the contact period, sitting in an ante chamber adjacent to the hall. Their excuse is that they are close at hand should anything go wrong and can 'rescue' the child from its father if necessary. Much of their time is spent comparing notes about their exes. When the weather is fine they sit out on the lawn while father and child are confined indoors.

The Assessment

In addition to the 'clocking on' log the volunteers write a short note in the file on whether the contact was a 'success'. Complaints from the mother are as likely to be recorded as anything else, though they are not actually present during contact. The file cannot be used in court to show that contact was successful due to the Centre's policy of independence. The only information that is officially passed on is the date and duration of the contact session.

The Release

In my experience, new fathers come to the Contact Centre under the impression that the number of visits will be finite. The Centre is, after all, intended merely to reintroduce children to estranged parents. The expectation is that, upon successful assessment, they will be allowed to continue with normal contact in their own homes.

Anonymous Father, January 1999

Updated 29-02-2000 and 16-Feb-2006