Child Maintenance, Children & Young People: The power of partnerships. Part 1, The why…….
I regularly find myself deep in child maintenance legislation, and one phrase comes up time and time again: "the welfare of the child." It’s meant to be at the heart of all decisions. Yet, all too often, that focus gets lost, buried in processes, systems, and stigma.
Back in late 2023, a parent being supported was concerned that child maintenance was being spoken about to their child in a negative context and asked if I could help explain to the child what child maintenance is. The parent felt that if the explanation came from a neutral person, it could reduce potential conflict. This really struck me. Given my role, I understand how emotive the conversation around child maintenance can be. The issue was mirrored in discussions happening in the Transforming Child Maintenance (TCM) Partnerships OPFS led single parent expert panel.
From my work supporting parents and delivering training to practitioners, I know there's a wealth of information on child maintenance out there, but it’s often overwhelming, inconsistent, and inaccessible. (Stay tuned for more on the systems change work we're doing to tackle those issues!)
So, when searching for children and young people’s specific information, I found a different issue … there just wasn’t any!
This gap matters, especially considering that a 12-year-old and above, in Scotland, can apply for their own child maintenance (this is rarely known!) but the system, process, and information available is no different than that of a parent or guardian, creating an instant barrier.
So, if there is no information available for children and young people, how do we ensure that their right to participate in all decisions that affect them is upheld? (UNCRC Article 12). I’ll be honest though; it’s just me delivering the Child Maintenance Project in Fife, and time can often be limited so, as an experienced family worker, I supported the parent best I could and put trying to answer the wider issue on my ever-growing ‘Park It’ list, and that’s where it sat for almost a year.
In that time, I started Values-Based Leadership training along with inspiring leaders from three other local like-minded organisations. It was through this training that we were given the opportunity, and time, to put our skills into practice and pitch a project idea to the group with the hope of creating some amazing collaborative work. Of course, my ‘Park it’ list made an appearance and the child maintenance information for young people stood out, not only because I really wanted to help bridge this gap but because the organisations in the training included 2 youth organisations, a financial inclusion service and us at Fife Gingerbread, a perfect mix of specialisms that would be required in this piece of work. So, I pitched the idea to the group, sat at my wee table, and waited nervously to see if anyone would join. And they did, Rebecca from Fife Young carers (FYC) was followed by Jodie from FYC, and thus, the beginning of a wonderful collaboration.
Look out for the second part of this blog soon – Part 2: From Idea to Action….