Home Truths

Programme outline

9.00

registration and refreshments

9.30

Chair’s Welcome

9.40

Keynote address 1:
Jane Booth, corporate director, Cafcass

10.00

Workshop 1 (see below)

11.00

Break

11.20

Workshop 2 (see below)

12.30

Lunch

1.15

Conference drama: Out of Harm’s Way

2.00

Workshop 3 (see below)

3.00

Break

3.15

Keynote address 2:
John Dunworth, domestic violence lead, Home Office

3.45

Workshop 4 (see below)

4.45

Chair’s closing remarks

5.00

Conference Close

Workshops - detailed information

Workshops 1

You can choose to attend one of the following:

Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conferences and Independent Domestic Violence Advocates
This workshop will provide an overview of Marac through a case study which shows how to identify a person at high risk and what is likely to happen at the Marac and what the IDVA would do in the circumstances of the case study.

Sara Wood is IDVA Team Leader, Domestic Violence Team, Community Safety Partnership, Derby

The Proud Labyrinth
This experiential workshop invites participants to follow the journey of a group of women and young people in their pathway to recovery from domestic abuse. Working with Clare Campbell, of Wild Woman fame, the survivors produced a Labyrinth walk highlighting what makes them proud about their journey. As a community art resource the Labyrinth is an awareness raising and therapeutic tool for everyone who walks it. The workshop will be led by some of those involved in the process - facilitators, supporters and survivors and will, we hope, inspire participants to celebrate and communicate the strengths and achievements of all who are part of their services.

This workshop will be facilitated by members of Vale Royal Women's Aid

A multi-agency approach to conquering domestic violence
This workshop will look at

Rachel Martin is Domestic Violence Co-ordinator, Against Domestic Violence and Abuse in Devon; and Roy Tomlinson is Community Safety Officer, Devon County Council

"Responsible or in Need of Protection? Examining the Needs of Homeless Young People who have Experienced Domestic Abuse"
Dr Helen Baker, is a lecturer in the Liverpool Law School at the University of Liverpool, has worked in the field of domestic violence since 1997 and is co- author of Evaluating Service Provision for Children Who Experience Domestic Violence in Rural Areas, published by Save the Children in 2003. She has also published work which examines the difficulties with consulting with children who have experienced abuse in relation to improving service provision in The Journal of Social Welfare and Family Law in 2005. Her current work focuses on the needs of children and young people who have become homeless as a result of abuse in relation to housing service provision.

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Workshops 2

You can choose to attend one of the following:

Reducing domestic violence homicides and serious assaults: The London experience
In 2001, Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London, launched the first pan- London domestic violence strategy. Since that time, domestic violence homicides in the capital have reduced by 57% (against a national rate of around 16%) as well as a sharp reduction in serious assaults. This workshop will explore some of the strategies employed to achieve these remarkable results.


Davina James-Hanman is the first Director of the Greater London Domestic Violence Project which she took up following five years at London Borough of Islington as the first local authority Domestic Violence Co-ordinator in the UK. In her current position, she has responsibility for developing and implementing the London Domestic Violence Strategy for the Mayor of London.
She has worked in the field of domestic violence for two decades in a variety of capacities including advocate, campaigner, conference organiser, crisis counsellor, policy officer, project manager, refuge worker, researcher, trainer and writer. She has published innumerable articles and two book chapters, both on different aspects of inter- agency work and formerly acted as the Department of Health policy lead on domestic violence. In addition, she is an Associate Tutor for Centrex, the National Police Training Agency, an external examiner for the post- graduate certificate in domestic violence at the University of Westminster and a member of the Attorney-General's Diversity Advisory Group.

Domestic Violence in Pregnancy: An Issue for Health Care Professionals
This workshop will look at pregnancy and the work carried out with midwives around routine enquiry.

Kathleen Baird is a Senior Midwifery Lecturer/Researcher at the University of the West of England in Bristol. She is also a Supervisor of Midwives. Kathleen's main research interests are in the domain of domestic violence specifically domestic violence in pregnancy. Kathleen was a key researcher involved in the Bristol Domestic Violence Abuse in Pregnancy Programme which was funded by the Department of Health and she is presently involved in several research projects around domestic violence and health. She has also developed with colleagues a national training programme for midwives which was utilised for the implementation of routine enquiry in the maternity services. This programme has been utilised for the training for midwives and other professionals in the health and statutory sectors throughout the United Kingdom. Kathleen has been active in domestic abuse awareness training for midwives and other various health professionals including the voluntary sector for many years.

Changing Places
Changing Places is a 10 week change programme for young people identified as at risk of developing patterns of abusive behaviour. Designed and supervised by a former Probation Perpetrator Programme manager the voluntary programme is staffed by multi- agency teams and early outcomes demonstrate effectiveness in preventing abuse and fostering healthier relationships.
This workshop will be facilitated by members of Cheshire Domestic Abuse Partnership


The White Ribbon Campaign
In 1991, a handful of men in Canada decided they had a responsibility to urge men to speak out against violence against women. They decided that wearing a white ribbon would be a symbol of men's opposition to men's violence against women. After only six weeks preparation, as many as one hundred thousand men across Canada wore a white ribbon. Many others were drawn into discussion and debate on the issue of men's violence. There are now White Ribbon Campaigns operating in many countries around the world. The UK Branch of WRC was started in 2004.

Christopher Green is Executive Director of the White Ribbon Campaign (UK). Previously he has been a youth worker, community worker, trainer in communication skills, and senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University.
He is a member of the Council of Europe Task Force to combat Violence against Women, which developed the blueprint for a 15 month long European wide campaign which started in November 2006. He is a member of the Violence Prevention Alliance, a World Health Organisation sponsored initiative.

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Workshops 3

You can choose to attend one of the following:

Working with male perpetrators of domestic abuse.
The workshop will offer an overview of the issues involved in working with male perpetrators of domestic abuse and the requirements of a perpetrator programme in terms of community context, structure, content and training. It will include a description of the particular way that Ahimsa and Repair approach this work.

Paul Wolf-Light of Ahimsa has been working with male perpetrators of domestic abuse since 1992. He is responsible for the perpetrator programmes at Ahimsa in Plymouth and is also currently supervisor and consultant for the perpetrator programmes run by Repair in Devon. He is vice chair of the executive committee of Respect, the UK association of domestic violence perpetrator programmes and associated support services.

Domestic Violence - Therapy and Learning in One Course
This workshop will look at how it has been to teach a course on Domestic violence at the University of Greenwich. This is an innovative course, which is accredited academically and as an optional course on many professional post- qualifying programmes. The course was set up because of the conviction that all professionals, but particularly social workers should be aware of the prevalence of domestic violence in society and feel equipped with the relevant knowledge and skills to offer survivors appropriate support and services to prevent further abuse and develop their self esteem and strategies to ensure their future safety.

Lynn Baxter is a qualified teacher, lecturer and social worker. She has over twenty years experience in local authority social services settings, specialising in childcare and protection. Until 2000, she worked for Lewisham as a Child Care Co-ordinator, where she was responsible for developing Child Care policy locally and chairing Child Protection Conferences and Child Care Review meetings for Looked After children. During this and voluntary work with Samaritans and Women's Aid, Lynn was frequently involved in family situations where, in her view, the links between child abuse, family breakdown and domestic violence were obvious, but ignored.
Lynn has also worked as a consultant, free- lance trainer and as a lecturer at Sussex, East London and Greenwich Universities where she has taught and acted as an External Examiner and Assessor on Qualifying and Post Qualifying Social Work and multi- agency Child Care programmes. In the last six years, Lynn has been Course Coordinator for a multi- agency Domestic Violence Course offered at Greenwich University.


Children and Domestic Violence
This general session on new schemes of positive work with young people around domestic violence, including the peer educator pilot project on domestic violence and safety in young people's relationships. Peer educators have been widely used in helping young people develop their own ways of understanding complex and sometimes difficult subjects, such as health education. The project involved training 12 peer mentors from the National Youth Theatre on the subject of domestic violence, adapting their skills so they were able to lead drama activities around the subject with young people, and creating with them a piece of original drama to be performed in schools.
The workshop will also look at prevention work with schools and good practice guidelines for schools along with leaflets about domestic violence for parents and carers and for young people.

Jo Sharpen is Children and Young People's Services Development Officer, Greater London Domestic Violence Project

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Workshops 4

You can choose to attend one of the following:

Domestic Violence Family Safety Units
DVFSUs are a focal point for a 'Co- ordinated Community Response' to domestic abuse, providing advocacy and support both for survivors of domestic abuse and the agencies to whom they disclose. Offering both early intervention and proactive crisis response to those at very highest risk, including Multi- Agency Risk Assessment Conferencing, they work within Cheshire Domestic Abuse Partnership to increase family safety and to meet shared targets with partnership funding.

This workshop will be facilitated by members of Cheshire Domestic Abuse Partnership


Community Group Treatment Programme
The Community Group Treatment Programme was piloted in 2003 after an audit of services for local families in Sutton, South London, uncovered a growing number of children who had witnessed violence in the family home but were unable to access support. The success of the pilot led the council to roll out the programme borough- wide, and it has now helped over 100 children.
The programme is based on a model developed in Canada that offers children the opportunity to attend a 12- week programme to help them explore their feelings in a safe environment. Following referral and a comprehensive risk assessment, the children, grouped by age, attend weekly sessions where they explore topics including safety planning, identification of abuse, conflict resolution and improving self- esteem.


Male Victims and National Standards for Domestic and Sexual Violence
The issue of male victims of domestic violence is one that causes much debate within the domestic violence sector and farther afield. It is a subject where to many observers, practitioners and researchers views have become polarised and entrenched. The continuum of opinion ranges from those who struggle to even accept the concept of male victims, through to the other extreme, who would have us believe that there as many men who are victimised as women. That in effect, men's experiences as victims is just the same or worse than that of female victims. This workshop will examine the validity of these views.

Mark Coulter is Male Victims Development Officer, Respect

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