Born into care in Scotland: circumstances, recurrence and pathways

6. Recurrent care proceedings

There is international concern about what is commonly termed the 'repeat removals' problem – the successive removal of children from their parents' care through care proceedings. Research by Broadhurst and colleagues at Lancaster University established that around one in four mothers was at risk of recurrent care proceedings (under Section 31 of the Children Act 1989) following an initial set of proceedings, within seven years in England (Broadhurst et al., 2015) and within eight years in Wales (Alrouh et al., 2020).^[16] More recent work has also looked at the risk of recurrent care proceedings for fathers, finding lower rates of returns to court, but with the inherent difficulties of missing or less reliable data, or fathers absent from proceedings (Bedston et al., 2019). Based on data from the family justice system, these studies only captured parents re-appearing in court with another child, they did not observe how many families went on to have another baby who did not enter care proceedings.

The SCRA data used in this study allowed us to adopt a slightly different approach, as records include the details (where known) about parents' other children, irrespective of whether those children had been involved in the Children's Hearings System (CHS). For each infant in the sample, information was extracted from the case file records on whether their mother, and father where possible, had any older children and/or new children born after the infant. We then looked at whether and when any of these children had been looked after away from home.

Mothers

We found that almost a third (22, 31%) of the infants' mothers did not have any previous children, thus the sample infant was their firstborn. The infant was the second child for a fifth (20%) of the mothers, with the remaining half of mothers (49%) having two or more older children. These figures for first and subsequent births are very similar to those for mothers of infants who entered care proceedings in Wales (Griffiths et al., 2020). In the two-year period after the infant in the sample became looked after away from home via the CHS, 12 mothers (17%) went on to have another baby, with ten of these mothers also having older children.

Analysis provides a picture of young motherhood compared with the general population, which is consistent with previous findings for England and Wales (Broadhurst et al., 2017; Griffiths et al., 2020). Over half (56%) of the mothers of infants in the sample had their first child as a teenager (less than 20 years old), with an average age of 21 years (range between 13 and 34 years, n=62, as date of birth was missing for eight mothers). In their study, Broadhurst et al., 2017 found that 45% of the mothers in England who experienced recurrent care proceedings were younger than 20 years old when they had their first child.

Mothers were aged between 16 and 53 years old at the birth of the infant in the case file sample (mean=27 years, n=62 as date of birth was missing for eight mothers), with almost one in five (18%) less than 20 years old. By comparison, less than 4% of all births in Scotland in 2016/17 were to mothers aged less than 20 years old (National Records of Scotland, 2021). Although we did not specifically collect information on whether parents were in care when the infant in the sample was conceived, it is notable that significant proportions were care experienced (37% of mothers and 24% of fathers).

First-time mothers were, understandably, younger when the sample infant was born than mothers with previous children – between 16 and 34 years old (mean=22 years, n=20), compared with between 19 and 53 years old (mean=30 years, n=42). But age at birth of their first child did not differ significantly. For the mothers who had older children, the length of their childbearing period (the age gap between the birth of their first child and the infant in the sample) varied between 1 and 34 years (mean=9.5 years, n=48).

Nine out of ten of the 48 mothers with older children (44, 92%) had had at least one child previously removed from their care. The majority had had one or two children previously looked after, but ten mothers – around one in five (21%) of those with older children – had had three or more children previously removed. Thirteen mothers had full siblings of the sample infant (children with the same partner) previously accommodated (60% of the 22 mothers with full siblings) and 31 had maternal half-siblings (children with a different partner) previously accommodated (79% of the 39 with a maternal sibling). In the two-year period after the infant in the sample became looked after away from home via the CHS, 12 mothers (17%) went on to have another baby. Seven of these mothers also had that child removed from their care.

Almost half of the mothers with older children (22, 46%) were known to have had a previous child removed before they were a year old, including five mothers who had had two previous infants removed from their care.

Overall, there was a group of first-time mothers who did not have any older children (22, 31%) and a very small number (4, 6%) who had an older child who had not been taken into care. But a large proportion of the mothers of the infants in the sample (44, 63%) had previous children removed from their care, including some with multiple removals over a significant period of time. Twelve mothers (17%) went on to have another baby within two years of the study infant becoming looked after away from home, and seven of these infants were also removed from their mother's care.

Fathers

We also attempted to gain an overview of how many of the fathers of infants in the case file sample had older children, and whether they had previous children taken into care. This was more challenging, as no information was recorded for 12 fathers, and even where they were involved, information on fathers was often less well recorded in the case files or unknown to social workers.

Almost two-thirds of the 58 fathers of infants in the case file sample (for whom any information was available) were known to have an older child (36, 62%). The study infant was the second (known) child for 36% of the fathers, with a quarter (26%) of the fathers known to have two or more older children. In the two-year period after the infant in the sample became looked after away from home via the CHS, five fathers (9% of those who whom any information was available) were known to have had another baby

Where dates of birth were recorded, fathers were calculated to be aged between 16 and 58 years old at the birth of the infant in the case file sample (mean=30 years, n=49) and between 13 and 40 years old at the birth of their first (known) child (mean=25 years, n=47). The extent of missing data was too great to calculate the age gap between fathers' first child and the infant in the cohort sample.

Of the 36 fathers who were recorded as having older children, 20 (56%) were known to have had at least one child previously looked after away from home. This is lower than the proportion of mothers, and could be an underestimate due to missing data. Thirteen fathers had full siblings of the sample infant (children with the same partner) previously accommodated (60% of the 22 fathers with full siblings) and three had paternal half-siblings (children with a different partner) previously accommodated (18% of the 17 fathers with a paternal half-sibling). A fifth of the fathers with older children (8, 22%) were known to have had a previous child removed before they were a year old. Again, there is insufficient data to be confident of how many children were previously removed from fathers' care. Four of the five babies known to have been born to fathers in the two years after the study infant became looked after away from home had been removed from their care.

In summary then, no information was recorded on the fathers of 12 infants (17%) in the case file sample, 22 fathers (31%) were not known to have older children, 16 (23%) had older children but none were known to have been looked after, and 20 (29%) were known to have had at least one child previously looked after away from home. Five fathers were known to have had another baby within two years of the study infant becoming looked after away from home, with four of these babies no longer in their care.

Key findings

• Almost a third (31%) of the mothers of infants in the sample had not had a previous child.
• There was a general picture of young entry to motherhood, and for some mothers with previous children, long periods of childbearing.
• The vast majority (92%) of mothers with older children had at least one child previously removed from their care, with a fifth of these mothers having three or more children previously removed.
• Almost half (46%) of the mothers with older children were known to have had a previous child removed before they were a year old.
• In the two-year period after the infant in the sample became looked after away from home via the CHS, 12 mothers (17%) went on to have another baby. Seven of these mothers had that child removed from their care.
• Less information was known about fathers' older children, and no information was recorded for 12 of the infants' fathers.
• Almost two-thirds (62%) of the fathers (for whom information was available) were known to have had previous children. Five fathers had another baby in the two-year period after the infant in the sample became looked after away from home.
• Of the fathers known to have older children, over half (56%) were known to have had at least one of their children looked after away from home.