Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of the Reducing Parental Conflict programme in supporting at-risk children of alcohol dependent parents.

The Reducing Parental Conflict programme aims to improve child outcomes by reducing parental conflict that is frequent, intense and unresolved.

In 2018 the DWP and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) launched the Children of Alcohol Dependent Parents (CADeP) programme. This included funding of £5.7 million for 9 areas (13 local authorities), to reduce parental conflict alongside improving existing systems of treatment for parents with alcohol dependency.

To ensure that the learning from the programme was shared, DHSC commissioned an independent evaluation of the innovation fund. This evaluation has been published and can be found at Evaluation of the Children of Alcohol Dependent Parents programme innovation fund: full report - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

The following findings of the evaluation were of particular interest to DWP in relation to the RPC elements of this programme:

• There were improvements in the timely identification of alcohol dependent parents and their children, and improved integration and quality of local systems and interventions, especially between substance misuse services and children’s services.
• Positive improvement to family dynamics where parents gave accounts of their children being happier following whole-family interventions delivered by the RPC programme.
• Positive feedback from children who participated in whole-family interventions. RPC practitioners were successful in building trust and confidence amongst at-risk children of alcohol dependent parents.

The current phase of the Reducing Parental Conflict programme runs between 2022 and 2025, with up to £19 million to fund training, delivery of support, co-ordination and evaluation. This supports Local Authorities to choose activity that best suits local need.

This government remains committed to strengthening the support available to children and families, working with local authorities through government funded programmes including Reducing Parental Conflict, Supporting Families and Family Hubs /Start for Life.