Contact centre

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Family law

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Contact centre is also a common euphemism for call centre

A Contact centre is a place where a non-resident parent can have supervised contact with his (or her) children. Its role is to support and promote contact between those parents, grandparents, guardians and children that do not live together.

Use of a contact centre may be ordered by a family court in cases where:

contact is being resumed after a break and there are concerns in regard to appropriate behaviour with the child
when there are allegations of
- domestic violence
- child abuse (particularly child sexual abuse in relation to the child and supervision is necessary.
where there is implacable hostility between parents.

1 United Kingdom
2 Australia
3 See also
4 External links
5 References

[edit] United Kingdom

The centres are local projects, run by charities such as Family Mediation and the WRVS, and are not statutory institutions. However it is common for solicitors to direct their clients to contact centres as well as for courts to order parents to allow the other parent contact with their children at such centres.

The contact centres are largely staffed by trained volunteers - many from church groups - and are regarded as a neutral ground. Such centres are intended to be transitional, though where mutual or unilateral hostilities between the parents persist, it can require further court appearances in order to 'move on' from the contact centre.

The first contact centres in Scotland opened in 1988. There are more than 280 contact centres throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is estimated that 12,000 children use them every year. All staff and volunteers are checked by the Criminal Records Bureau prior to starting work at the centre. Most families are referred to contact centres by solicitors. Other families are referred by the courts, CAFCASS officers, family mediators and social workers. The majority of contact centres do not charge for the use of their services but are dependent upon donations or grants to continue their work. Some are supported by local community initiatives.

Some fathers' rights campaigners in the UK argue that shortages of places at contact centres are used as reasons to prevent them seeing their children and that frequently the only reason given for using a contact centre in those cases is that the mother demands it. Rather than devoting funds to extend the network of contact centres, some fathers' rights campaigners argue that contact centres should only be used for a specific small minority of cases, such as where there are health reasons why the father cannot care for his children unaided.

It has been reported that in Sunderland there is a situation where it is usual to award of children of certain ethnic groups to the father and use the contact centre for mothers to see their children.

[edit] Australia

Children's Contact Services (CCS) are funded under the Government of Australia's "Family Relationship Services Program" (FRSP). The services help with handover of children and also provide supervised contact.

At 1 February 2004 there were 35 FRSP-funded Children's Contact Services and a number of non-Australian Government funded services.