South Lanarkshire Child Protection Committee (SLCPC) and Gender Based Violence Partnership (SLGBV) have worked together and created South Lanarkshire Safe and Together Steering Group to support the implementation of the Safe and Together Model across children’s services within South Lanarkshire.  Developed in 2020, the Safe and Together Steering Group is multi agency and includes frontline managers from Social Work; Police, Health, Education and Third Sector.

OVERVIEW of SAFE and TOGETHER Model

Safe and Together is a child-centred model that derives its name from the concept that children and young people are best served when we can work toward keeping them safe and together with the non-offending parent.

The Model is aperpetrator focused, survivors’ strengths approach to working with domestic abuse cases. It aims to support staff across children’s services to make good decisions for children impacted by domestic abuse perpetrators. The Safe and Together model consists of a set of assumptions, principles, and critical components that when utilised in domestic abuse cases, help improve identification, assessment, documentation, case-planning and decision-making. 

The model assumes the following:

1. Systems working to protect children and promote their welfare cannot achieve their core mission of safety and well-being of children without being competent and skilful to their responses to domestic abuse.
2. The interests of domestic abuse adult survivors and these systems are often in significant alignment: reducing or eliminating the safety and risk concerns posed to the children by the perpetrator.
3. A double standard around gender and parenting has often posed a barrier to effective case practice in domestic abuse cases involving children.

The three Principles of the model are as follows:

1. Keeping child safe and together with non-offending parent

(Safety / Healing from Trauma / Stability and Nurturance)

2. Partnering with non-offending parent as a default position

(Efficient / Effective / Child-centred)

3. Intervening with Perpetrator to reduce risk and harm to child

(Engagement / Accountability / Courts)

The five Critical Components of the Safe and Together model are recognising and understanding:

1. Perpetrators pattern of coercive control
2. Action taken by perpetrator to harm the child
3. Full spectrum of non-offending parent’s efforts to promote child safety and wellbeing
4. Adverse impact of perpetrator’s behaviour on the child
5. Role of substance abuse, mental health, culture and other socio-economic factors

The National Guidance for Child Protection in Scotland 2021 recognises the Safe and Together Model as a systematic approach to partner with domestic abuse survivors and intervene with domestic abuse perpetrators in order to ensure the safety and wellbeing of children.

Further information on Safe and Together model can be found here…

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