Child contact centres

The Child Contact Working Group (facilitated by the Lord Chancellor’s Department) has considered the definitions currently used for describing contact. The commonly used definitions are ‘supported’ and ‘supervised’. Indeed, child contact centres will invariably describe their facilities and the services they offer in these terms. However, there is no consistency, or indeed, agreement on their meaning. Some contact centres use the term ‘supervised’ to describe intensive one-to-one supervision, appropriate to cases where, eg domestic abuse or mental health problems are in issue. However, the term ‘supervised’ can be interpreted by its very nature, as simply meaning that a person is on hand to oversee a contact session. The dangers inherent in using such a broad term are obvious, eg cases may be referred to centres which do not have the facilities and expertise appropriate to the type of case. The Working Party’s concerns in this area have been reinforced by a series of conferences and seminars over recent months during which other interested groups and organisations have raised similar fears.