Investigating the impact of family drug and alcohol courts (FDACs) on parental offending: a data linkage study

近年来，在儿童面临风险或受到实际伤害时触发的环境保护程序显著增加。这些诉讼通常涉及父母滥用药物、家庭虐待和精神健康问题，并经常导致儿童被安置在其他永久性家庭。家庭毒品和酒精法庭（FDACs）是一种创新的整体解决问题的护理程序方法，研究发现，通过在法庭案件中处理导致护理程序的父母问题，家庭团聚率高于普通护理程序。国际证据也证实了同样的结果。在过去的十年里，教育部在英格兰各地投资了FDAC的扩张，家庭司法部长希望在每个地区都能看到FDAC。司法部也对解决问题的法庭感兴趣，并为妇女罪犯、家庭虐待犯罪者和药物滥用者设立了试点。证据中的一个重要差距是fdac（或其国际对等的“家庭药物治疗法庭”）对犯罪行为的影响，尽管众所周知，参与护理程序的父母也经常有犯罪记录。拟议的研究为纠正这一知识缺陷提供了一个重要机会。主要的研究问题是接受FDAC是否与母亲和父亲的犯罪和再犯罪的变化有关。为此，这项为期24个月的研究将调查，与接受普通护理程序和服务提供的父母相比，接受FDAC是否减少了犯罪的可能性，犯罪的频率、类型、严重程度和由此产生的制裁。本研究将探讨性别、既往照护史、家庭团聚稳定性等中介影响。为了实现这些目标，我们将在对现有数据源的二手数据进行分析的基础上进行为期24个月的数据链接研究。它将汇集来自三个行政数据源的个人父母记录，FDAC, Cafcass（儿童和家庭法院咨询和支持服务）和PNC（警察国家计算机记录），以创建一个纵向队列研究，包括大约1700名父母。该研究的另一个主要目的是展示开展研究的潜力和可行性，该研究将大规模敏感数据（特别是那些来自法院、使用个人父母数据的弱势群体的数据）联系起来并进行分析，以创建一个新的纵向队列研究数据集。潜在的应用和效益拟议的研究解决了一个重大的社会和经济问题。参与FDAC，普通护理程序和刑事司法系统的父母是本研究的最终受益者，因为它将使人们更好地了解他们的需求以及满足这些需求的方法。政策制定者、地方当局和警察局长将获得新的证据，为未来对海外援助基金的投资决策提供依据。这项研究将为FDAC对犯罪的影响提供第一个基准，为在FDAC工作的从业人员、英格兰、威尔士的普通护理程序和刑事法庭工作的从业人员以及经营家庭药物治疗法庭的国家提供新的见解。这项研究将很好地从新的纵向数据集的潜力中吸取教训，特别是在家庭司法和刑事司法系统的数据可用性、覆盖范围和协调方面。新的纵向数据集将提供许多重用的机会，例如承担FDAC干预的成本/收益。

ContextCare proceedings, which are triggered when there is risk or actual harm to the child, have increased significantly in recent years. These proceedings typically involve parental substance misuse, domestic abuse, and mental health difficulties and frequently result in children being placed with alternative permanent families. Family drug and alcohol courts (FDACs) are an innovative holistic problem-solving approach to care proceedings and research has found that by treating the parental problems that led to the care proceedings during the court case, family reunification rates are higher than in ordinary care proceedings. International evidence confirms the same results. The Department for Education has invested over the last decade in the expansion of FDACs across England and the Head of Family Justice wishes to see an FDAC in every area. The Ministry of Justice is also interested in problem-solving courts and has set up pilots for women offenders, domestic abuse perpetrators and substance misusers. An important gap in evidence is the impact of FDACs (or their international equivalent 'family drug treatment courts') on offending behaviour, although, it is known that parents who are involved in care proceedings frequently have offending records too. The proposed study offers a major opportunity to redress this knowledge deficit. Aims and objectivesThe overarching research question is whether receipt of FDAC is associated with changes in maternal and paternal offending and reoffending. To this end, the 24-month study will investigate whether, compared to parents who go through ordinary care proceedings and service delivery, receipt of FDAC decreases the likelihood of offending, its frequency, type, seriousness, and resultant sanctions. Mediating influences such as gender, previous history of care proceedings, and stability of family reunification after receipt of FDAC will be explored. To address these aims, we will undertake a 24-month data linkage study based on an analysis of secondary data from existing data sources. It will bring together individual parental records from three administrative data sources, FDAC, Cafcass (Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service) and the PNC (Police National Computer records) to create a longitudinal cohort study, comprising approximately 1700 parents. Demonstrating the potential and feasibility of carrying out research that links and analyses large scale sensitive data, particularly those from courts on vulnerable populations using individual parental data, to create a new longitudinal cohort study dataset is another main aim of the study.Potential applications and benefitsThe proposed study addresses a significant social and economic problem. Parents with involvement in FDAC, ordinary care proceedings, and in the criminal justice system, are the end beneficiaries of this study, since it will generate greater understanding of their needs and ways to meet them. Policy-makers, local authority and police commissioners will gain new evidence to inform decisions about future investment in FDACs. The study will provide the first benchmark of the impact of FDAC on offending, with new insights for practitioners working in FDACs, ordinary care proceedings and criminal courts in England, Wales and in countries which operate family drug treatment courts. The research will be well placed to draw lessons on the potential of the new longitudinal dataset, particularly regarding data availability, coverage, and harmonisation across the family justice and criminal justice systems. The new longitudinal dataset will provide a number of opportunities for reuse- e.g. to undertake a cost/benefit of the FDAC intervention.