The Ministry of Justice has published an analysis of the experience of children and families in its Pathfinder pilot, which was launched in Dorset and North Wales in February 2022 to improve the court experience and outcomes in private family law proceedings.
Initial figures release by the MoJ suggested the pilot had been successful in reducing the time it takes from court application to final order, in some cases by more than half. However, the findings of the research, which included semi-structured qualitative interviews with 39 parents and carers and nine children involved in the pilot across both sites, have been less positive.
The findings identified seven themes in the qualitative data assessed by the panel, six relating to the key policy goals of Pathfinder and one concerning the broader family justice system.
The initial pilot was designed in response to recommendation from the Harm Panel report to reform private law by trialling a more problem-solving, investigative approach to better support victims of domestic abuse and other harms.
In the Pathfinder courts, the usual Child Arrangements Programme (CAP) was suspended and replaced with a revised, three-phase process for relevant cases, incorporating information gathering and assessment, decision and/or intervention, and review.
The pilot focused on improving the experiences of children and families throughout the family court experience, particularly for parent survivors of domestic abuse and their children.
A multi-agency approach was adopted to improve coordination between family courts and agencies, along with a more efficient court process to reduce delays, and a focus on reducing the re-traumatisation of abuse survivors and cutting down on the number of cases returning to the family courts.
The Pathfinder model prioritised earlier information gathering by professionals to gain a better understanding of the safeguarding and welfare needs and risks for families, centring the views and experiences of the child throughout proceedings, and direct funding for domestic abuse services to support those affected.
The analysis found that while most participants had positive experiences with family court advisers (FCAs), they reported negative experiences when they believed social workers, FCAs, judges or magistrates downplayed or ignored their concerns.
Most of the children interviewed said their interactions with FCAs had been positive, and parents said the child impact report (CIR) had helped children express their wishes regarding contact arrangements. Children and parents reported clear improvements in capturing the child’s perspective under the Pathfinder model compared to previous CAP experiences.
However, the analysis identified mixed experiences when it came to the children’s wishes and perspectives being considered in final outcomes.
Participants in cases involving domestic abuse had mixed feelings about whether the Pathfinder goal of reducing re-traumatisation had been met, with many reporting more opportunities to reintroduce traumatisation, particularly regarding attending court. Mothers also pointed out issues with trauma-informed practices and understanding during court proceedings.
Most participants felt multi-agency collaboration needed improvement, with parents predominantly reporting negative experiences with information sharing across agencies, especially regarding safeguarding and welfare concerns. They suggested these concerns were often downplayed or ignored by professionals from different agencies.
Parents with prior experience of CAP found the Pathfinder process to be more efficient. However, some domestic abuse victim survivors felt the court process moved too quickly from the outset, preventing them from fully sharing their experiences during the court process.
The analysis of returning cases and review stage found parents were generally positive when they achieved the outcomes they wanted. However, some expected to return to court because their desired outcome had not been achieved or enforced. Despite being informed that their cases would be reviewed by professionals, many participants found that the review stage was very rarely implemented, causing frustration and a sense of feeling unsupported after the court process, particularly for domestic abuse victim-survivors.
The research team has set out nine key measures that it says offer valuable opportunities for wider learning:
- Maintaining focus on the child.
- A continued emphasis on reducing re-traumatisation for domestic abuse victim-survivors.
- Implementation of special measures.
- The importance of domestic abuse services.
- A continued emphasis on multi-agency working.
- Balancing the length of the process.
- Sharing information about the process with the families at all stages.
- Reconsidering the review stage.
- Improving the understanding of the harms of alienating behaviours.
“These insights aim to guide the potential implementation of Pathfinder in other pilot sites and support ongoing improvement in existing pilot sites,” the authors of the research said.
And, while they acknowledged some of the findings echo those of the process evaluation, “the implications for policy and practice based on the experiences of those who participated in this study may provide valuable opportunities for wider learning.”
