The whole jigsaw

There’s much to admire about the St Giles Trust children and families project, featured in Saturday's Guardian as one of the newspaper's Christmas appeal charities.

The article tells the story of Juliet, an 18-year-old whose mother is a victim of domestic abuse and is now being supported by the Trust – allowing Juliet to attend university rather than spending her late teens and early 20s looking after her mum and younger siblings, and thus missing out on her education.

So far, so inspiring – and yet in one important sense this story sounds typical of so many where public and/or voluntary services intervene in families’ lives: support is focused on the mother, but (from what we’re told in this article, at least) nobody’s doing anything to engage with the father. 

We’re not talking about an ‘absent’ dad here – the article tells us that Juliet’s siblings stay with him some weekends. We hear that the charity is supporting the mother 'to ensure the children are supported'. But what's happening to ensure the children's safety when they stay with their father?

Has anyone tried to speak to him? Do services know where he's living (and with whom) and whether it's an appropriate place for children to be? Is there a strategy for challenging his alleged abusive behaviour and/or (if the abuse, as implied by the article, was 'light' enough to permit continued contact) for helping him think about how he parents his children after the split, and what he can do to help them cope with the separation?

The article's failure to address the fatherhood angle might suggest St Giles hasn't gone there (yet)...or it might be that the author didn't think to ask the right questions. Either way, let's hope for the kids' sake that this crucial part of the jigsaw is filled in soon.