Housing crisis is ruining chances of vulnerable children, says top judge

 
8 April 2013

London's housing crisis is damaging the prospects of some of the capital’s most vulnerable children by depriving them of a safe place to live, a judge has warned.

Judge Nicholas Crichton said the shortage of social housing meant that some parents hoping to be reunited with children in care were living in tower blocks with “drug dealers knocking on the door”.

He said this made it harder to return the children safely to their families and forced other parents to move to unsuitable hostels or bed and breakfast accommodation.

Judge Crichton presides at the Family Drug and Alcohol Court in London, which helps rehabilitate parents with drugs or alcohol problems.

“There is a serious shortage of housing in London and that makes it hard to find suitable accommodation for the families we work with,” said the judge. “There is no point sending them back to high-rise tower blocks where they are going to have drug dealers knocking on the door.

“These parents want to keep their community support, their family support, and their children in the same school and it is no good saying that we can find them homes somewhere else. So we have got people living in hostels and bed and breakfast, which is not a good way to bring children up. Alcohol and drugs are the main problem, but the shortage of housing does not help.”

Judge Crichton’s court, which was set up five years ago, seeks to help parents who have lost custody of their children by organising treatment. Each parent’s programme has three months of “stabilisation”, usually involving abstinence, followed by three months of working with staff to identify relapse “triggers” such as debt and domestic violence.

After nine months, it is hoped that parents can be reunited with children on a trial basis, before returning them permanently after a year.

Judge Crichton said his court’s work could also prevent addicts having more children. “Mothers who had children removed very quickly often want another one to replace them,” he said. “In this financial climate, the cost to the taxpayer is immense.”

Judge Crichton said that he wanted to set up two “safe houses” to provide mothers with suitable accommodation for their children.

But he warned that the end of government funding for his court last year and the limited finances of the councils which pay for it meant that there was not enough money.

The boroughs that fund the court — which has an annual budget of about £500,000 — are Camden, Islington, Southwark, Westminster, and Hammersmith and Fulham.

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