Strengthening support for parents: Reflections on the baby Victoria Marten review and joining the dots across work to support parents in pregnancy and where parents face recurrent care proceedings.
We welcome the recommendations from the national review into the death of baby Victoria Marten by the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel, published this month. Although the circumstances surrounding her death were extreme and rare, the review notes that that the professional and system-wide safeguarding difficulties highlighted are widespread.
The review rightly highlights the need to provide trauma responsive, 'personalised' support to parents whose children have been removed to help them make lasting changes and build more positive futures for themselves and their families. This is a longstanding gap in the system – and one that many services across the country have been working hard to address.
Baby Victoria’s four older siblings had already been placed in care. While the review recognises the commitment of professionals in safeguarding those children, it also highlights how repeated pregnancies and removals had, by this point, ‘become a repeating pattern with devastating consequences’. This points to the cumulative and often overlooked impact of trauma on parents who experience child removal more than once (Mason et al., 2020).
Recurrent care proceedings
Research over the past decade has shown that recurrent care proceedings are a significant issue across England and Wales. Landmark studies by Broadhurst and colleagues and later work by Alrouh, Bedston, Philip and others found that around one in five mothers who appear in care proceedings are likely to return to court with a new baby within ten years, and that one in eight fathers are also at risk of returning within five years.
More recent research by Ireland and colleagues shows that about half of mothers have another baby after a first set of care proceedings and half of these go on to appear in a new set of proceedings within eight years. These patterns reflect a growing need for sustained, compassionate, trauma-informed support for parents who experience separation from their children to help break this cycle. Providing timely, relational support at these points can reduce trauma, help parents stabilise and recover, and, in some cases, create opportunities for reunification.
Reflecting on the evidence
There is now a growing body of evidence demonstrating the value of this work, both in moral and financial terms. A recent literature review of research evaluating services that support parents who have experienced recurrent care proceedings shows that help and support can improve parental capacity and family stability, reduce the number of babies entering care, and generate significant long-term savings for local areas.
This growing evidence base has helped to inform and drive action across the sector. Working in collaboration with those innovating practice with parents across the country, a number of organisations have been working to improve support for parents experiencing repeat removals. These include the Centre for Child and Family Justice, University of Lancaster, University of Essex, Family Rights Group, Nuffield Family Justice Observatory (NFJO), Birth Companions, Pause, and MBRRACE-UK and of course ourselves at Research in Practice.
All contribute research, guidance, advocacy, and practical tools and work to raise awareness of the issue, share emerging evidence, and emphasise the urgent need for coordinated, trauma-informed support for parents before, during, and after care proceedings. Read a summary of the roots of this work.
The importance of specialist local services
Over the past 10 to 15 years, a growing number of local authorities, NHS Trusts and voluntary sector organisations have developed specialist local services to support parents who have experienced the removal of a child, alongside the national work in this space by Pause. These services recognise that without sustained, compassionate support, parents can remain trapped in cycles of trauma, loss and repeat removals. Where parents are offered relationship-based, trauma-informed help, families have greater chance of making the changes they need to keep their families together. This strengthens parents’ chances of maintaining relationships with children they are separated from, keeps open the possibility of reunification in the future, and reduces the risk of further care proceedings, including by preventing the recurrence of removals for subsequent children and supporting better outcomes for those children, while statutory services also benefit from reduced demand.
Baxter et al.’s review of impact, cost savings and outcomes across 13 evaluations shows how these services generate significant cost savings through avoiding care proceedings and placements of children taken into care. Estimates of costs avoided in locally developed services gave similar results to Boddy et al.’s Innovation Programme funded evaluation of Pause, which found that for every £1 spent, the programme generated an estimated £4.50 in savings over four years, rising to £7.61 over an 18-year period. Significant additional cost savings in relation to parent outcomes are also described by Boddy et al.
However, delivering this kind of proactive and sustained, multi-agency support cannot be achieved through already stretched local authority children’s social care budgets alone.
Supporting Parents Community of Practice
Many of the practitioners and managers leading this work come together through the Supporting Parents Community of Practice (CoP), now in its fifth year, to share knowledge, resources and innovation to improve practice with, and outcomes for, families.
The CoP was established in 2020. Initially funded by Public Health England, the work has been supported since 2021 by the Segelman Trust. The project is a partnership between Research in Practice and the Centre for Child and Family Justice, University of Lancaster, with longstanding involvement from Pause, Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, and the University of Essex.
Today, the CoP involves 75 services across England and Wales and 194 members. That services involved in the CoP vary in their models and approaches is a strength with members benefitting from hearing a range of perspectives.
The CoP provides a safe and supportive online space for professionals to share practice, reflect on challenges, and learn from each other. Practitioners can explore everyday practice issues through topic-based ‘Community Conversation’ sessions, while separate sessions with external speakers bring the latest research and innovation directly to them.
The CoP is supported by a Steering Group made up of established CoP members from local authority and third-sector recurrent care services. The group helps shape the programme, ensuring sessions are relevant and reflective of practice needs, and supports smaller group discussions to encourage deeper reflection, shared learning and collaboration.
Alongside the main CoP, a pre-birth Community of Practice has been established to focus on the unique needs of services working with parents during pregnancy, with the aim of improving practice to support parents to keep their babies where possible and to minimise trauma, and keep connection where separation does take place. This group has a slightly different membership but shares the same ethos around peer learning and support. It now includes 41 services and 79 members.
If you run a service and would like information about these CoPs, please get in touch via email.
Supporting parents with compassion and breaking the cycle
Work moves forward at pace between all those committed to making change that truly enacts the commitments to working with family which the National Social Care Framework and Working Together require.
Birth Companions are bringing many of these stakeholders across health and social care together in a funded project to develop a national care pathway for women who have involvement from children’s social care in the first 1001 days, and their babies, with outputs expected in late 2026. Building on the growing evidence base, including research around maternal deaths, as well as drawing on innovative practice in local areas, the pathway aims to promote compassionate, consistent and well-coordinated care across systems.
The Giving HOPE boxes – developed from the Born into Care research and co-produced with mothers with lived experience of separation close to birth – are being introduced by local areas across the country to help practitioners provide compassionate, trauma-informed care when mothers and babies are separated close to birth.
A range of resources from Research in Practice to support effective and compassionate practice with parents in the pre-birth period and those experiencing repeat care proceedings can be found below.
Improving outcomes for families
If we are to improve outcomes for families by giving parents the best possible chance of keeping their baby, it is critical that parents are supported in a trauma-informed way through compassionate and timely help – both when concerns arise during pregnancy and where separation is the outcome.
Equally, the period after a child has been removed is one of heightened vulnerability. Without meaningful support, parents can experience unresolved grief and shame that make change harder and contribute to cycles of repeat removals. Providing consistent, relational support at this stage can help parents to stabilise, begin a journey of healing from past traumas, and an acceptance of why they were separated from their child, and, in some cases, lay the foundations for reunification in the future.
By connecting pre-birth work with support for parents facing recurrent care proceedings, local areas can create a coherent pathway of engagement and change. Through the Supporting Parents and Pre-birth Communities of Practice, practitioners and services are already building this joined-up picture – sharing resources, evidence, and innovation to improve practice and outcomes.
As the baby Victoria Marten review highlights, the system must do more to ensure that no parent is left unsupported. The knowledge and commitment already evident across the organisations involved in these communities of practice show what is possible: a compassionate, trauma-informed response that not only addresses immediate risks but also supports parents to make lasting changes and build more stable, hopeful futures for themselves and their families.
Explore Research in Practice resources to support practice with parents experiencing repeat removals
Mapping of locally developed recurrent care services
This 2021 report provides the first national overview of specialist services in England for parents who have appeared in one or more sets of care proceedings. It explores why these locally developed services were created, how they are delivered, and who they support.
Working with recurrent care-experienced birth mothers
Developed through a Change Project, our resource pack bring together materials from project sessions, alongside reflections, exercises, films, and an evaluation guide to help those establishing or strengthening services for parents affected by recurrent care proceedings.
Reconceptualising parental non-engagement in child protection
This briefing builds on findings from Broadhurst et al’s (2017) research on vulnerable birth mothers in recurrent care proceedings. It makes the case for reconceptualising parental ‘non-engagement’ with services - proposing that an understanding of how some parents’ experiences of adversity and trauma in their own childhood can help to understand why they may find service engagement difficult.
Pre-birth work
In January 2025, we published a suite of Change Project resources to help local services develop and improve their pre-birth work. They offer practical tools and guidance for service managers, strategic leads, commissioners, and frontline practitioners.
The materials – including videos and audio clips featuring parents, practitioners and academics – are grounded in evidence from the Born into Care research, practice guidelines and other research and guidance in this space. This includes this Birth Charter for women with involvement from children’s social care from Birth Companions.
The resources are organised into ten key messages for effective pre-birth practice:
- Understand and use your data.
- Provide help and support early as you can.
- Pre-birth work requires a specialist focus.
- Pre-birth work requires a co-ordinated multi-agency response.
- Ensure your practitioners have the understanding and skills to engage families.
- Dynamic assessment and support go hand in hand.
- Pregnancy as an opportunity for change.
- Seeing beyond the mother.
- Provide support to minimise the trauma of separation and keep reunification in mind.
- Post-separation support is essential to prevent further trauma and recurrent care proceedings.
Each key message includes reflective questions, practical examples and suggestions to help develop good practice locally.
Baxter, V., McPherson, S., & Cox, P. (2025b). Evaluating a virtual community of practice for recurrent care practitioners. Journal of Social Work Practice. https://doi.org/10.1080/02650533.2025.2541170
Bedston, S., Philip, G., Youansamouth, L., Clifton, J., Broadhurst, K., Brandon, M., & Hu, Y. (2019). Linked lives: Gender, family relations and recurrent care proceedings in England. Children and Youth Services Review,105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2019.104392
De Backer, K., Felker, A. M., Rose, E., Bull, C., Labisi, O., Kitchen, K., Mason, C., Montgomer, E., Sandall, J., Easter, A., Knight, M., & Vousden, N. (2025). Characteristics, outcomes, and maternity care experiences of women with children’s social care involvement who subsequently died: national cohort study and confidential enquiry. BMJ medicine, 4(1), e001464. doi: 10.1136/bmjmed-2025-001464
Mason, C., Taggart, D., & Broadhurst, K. (2020). Parental non-engagement within child protection services—how can understandings of complex trauma and epistemic trust help?. Societies, 10(4), 93.
Philip, G., Youansamouth, L., Bedston, S., Broadhurst, K., Hu, Y., & Clifton, J. (2020). I had no hope, I had no help at all: Insights from a first study of fathers and recurrent care proceedings. Societies, 10(4). https://doi.org/10.3390/soc10040089
Baby Victoria: National review outlines urgent recommendations
Better engagement with and support for parents before and after child removal can break cycles of harm and reduce repeat risk. Recommendations from a national child safeguarding review call for urgent action to better protect vulnerable unborn babies and infants.
Services for parents who have experienced recurrent care proceedings: Where are we now? Findings from mapping of locally developed services in England – Research Report (2021)
This report provides an overview of existing, specialist services in England for parents who have appeared in one or more sets of care proceedings (commonly referred to as recurrent care proceedings).
Working with recurrent care-experienced birth mothers: Resource Pack (2019)
In 2017, a team at Lancaster University published the final report of a Nuffield-funded research study into Vulnerable Birth Mothers and Recurrent Care Proceedings (Broadhurst et al, 2017). The Lancaster team, Research in Practice and colleagues from the University of Essex wanted to collaborate to support the use of the research findings to inform more effective ways of working with this population.