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Domestic abuse can take many forms and involves a range of abusive and coercive behaviours that can occur in all types of relationships. Statutory and voluntary sector services working with children and adults require detailed understanding of abusers’ use of controlling and coercive behaviours, and the consequent generalised and pervasive fear for adult and child victims. Services must understand these components as central to domestic abuse, and how to distinguish between this and parental conflict. A domestic abuse-informed response names the source of the harm and describes the behaviours of the abuser and the impact on adults and children, seeing both as direct victims who are entitled to support. Interventions are focused on holding abusers accountable and offering them support to change. This approach means all services understand and account for all risks, not just physical violence, and risk assessments incorporate information from children and about abusers as well as information from non-abusing parents. Being domestic abuse-informed means not taking an incident-based approach, but focusing on the continuous patterns of behaviour by the person causing the harm.

Children and adults who have experienced domestic abuse are likely to be traumatised. We recognise the term ‘trauma-informed’ is used to mean different things to different people but in this context, we refer to a trauma-informed approach as one characterised by a recognition that people who come to the attention of services have histories, experiences and contexts that are relevant to and impact on their current circumstances. Being trauma-informed means responding to individuals and families in a non-judgemental, non-blaming and strengths-based way that prioritises building trusting relationships and avoids re-traumatisation. Services that are trauma-informed emphasise safety (physical and emotional), trust, transparency, peer support and collaboration (working with, not doing to). They promote empowerment and choice, and recognise cultural, historical and gender differences (SAMHSA, 2014). In relation to those who harm, a trauma-informed approach ensures that the whole person is responded to, but without collusion around their abusive behaviours. Trauma-informed organisations will want to promote a non-blaming culture in relation to staff, and provide clinical and reflective supervision, and support for staff to enable them to work with individuals and families in a trauma-informed way.

Children do not come to services alone: they are part of families. They have relationships with their parents, grandparents and wider networks, as well as with siblings and stepsiblings who they might not live with. Responses must gain an understanding of what ‘family’ means for each child. Children are likely to have strong or complicated feelings about their abusive parent and their non-abusing parent, and they may be traumatised by the abuse and living in a state of permanent fear and anxiety. A whole-family approach does not separate the abusive behaviours of the parent from the impact on children. It considers the parenting of the abuser, as well as the impact of their abuse on the non-abusing parent and their care for the children. Work with the whole family provides direct and specialist holistic support to adult and child victims, alongside specialist holistic support to those causing harm that challenges their abusive behaviours and focuses on behaviour change, while prioritising the safety of child and adult victims/survivors.

An intersectional approach is more than simply recognising the diverse characteristics and identities of children and adults. It is essential to understanding how these intersect and lead to discrimination and oppression. An intersectional approach to domestic abuse means services must seek to understand the unique experiences of each family, including their histories, characteristics, and current context, and to see these in the context of unequal societal structures including racism, sexism, and poverty. It requires practitioners to be aware of their own values, biases, and judgements, have safe spaces to reflect, and receive support to separate these from work with families.