A child is being beaten

Heres a section out of the book a child is being beaten written by K S Perinpanayagam and I'd like to hear your views

A short history of the adolescent services from 1965
Chapter 3
Page 88

A short history of the adolescent services from 1965

This chapter gives a short history of the adolescent services starting in 1965, when the government White Paper "The Child, the family and the young offender" was published and the approved schools system was abolished. It was the birth of psychodynamics in the service for adolescents - treatment was being designed to deal with the cause. This progresive move did not last long. Restriction of punishment in schools followed by an upsurge of indisipline, misunderstandings about psychodynamics and the socio-political mood of the time led to a demand for harsh treatments. This was eventually given clinical validation by the report of the health advisory service of 1986. This report discarded psychodynamics as of no importance, leaving "Reward and Punishment" Behaviour therapy as the only alternative. The chapter ends with an evaluation of the kind of reward and punishment behaviour therapy used for adolescents - operant conditioning.

The need for something new and different in the adolescent service, a method that seeks and deals with the cause, began to be recognised by the government in the mid sixties when the success rates of the approved schools had fallen to 38%, from 85-90% in the early twentieth century (Mays, 1975). The government of the day investigated the nature of this apparently inexplicable phenomenon and in August 1965 published a "White Paper, The Child, the Family and the young offender". The White paper stated:

The government attaches great importance to further development of the service concerned with the prevention and treatment of juvenile delinquency and with other similar problems affecting children and their families.... juvenile delinquency has no single cause, manifestation or cure. It's origins are many and the range of behaviour which it covers is equally wide. At some point it merges almost imperceptibly with behaviour which does not contravene the law. A child's behaviour is influenced by genetic , emotional and intellectual factors, his maturity and his family, school, neighbourhood and wider social setting. It is only a minority of children who grew up without ever misbehaving in ways which maybe contrary to the law (2HMSO,command 1968.)

The importance of the relationship between the offender, the offence, and the cause was being recognised. The idea of clinical treatment for delinquency and adolescent disturbance on a wide scale was brought in for the first time.

Together with the publication of the White Paper the approved schools were abolished. The emphasis was shifted from training out or suppression of the delinquency, as in the approved school system - behavioural method- to recognising and dealing - psychodynamics method. This was the begining of formal recognition of the concept of psychodynamic treatment for disturbed youngsters.

There was a new found freedom in the clinical field for responsible experimentation and research in the treatment of delinquency and adolescent conduct disorders. The causes and rational treatment was being sought. I was the registrar at the northgate clinic in NW9, at the time. Under the leadership of Dr Brian O'Connell, medical director, the staff had the freedom to use a variety of methods of investigation and treatment - Behaviour therapy of different types, psychodynamic methods of different kinds, and medication, with non dogmatic, open minded discussions of the highest calibre. Every youngster in treatment was thoroughly investigated, including electroencephalograms- brain wave tests.

It seemed as if a certain philosophy of treatment with an emphesis on meaningful relationships with the offender had a breadth of view - psychodynamics- was the begining to be recognised all over the country, in the NHS and the social services as the most enlightening and effective.

Together with the White Paper and the abolishment of the harsh treatment of adolescents became unpopular. There was a softer mood in the country which extended to all adolescents. The authorities made a clean sweep of it and corporal punishments in schools were also restricted by law. This was a triumph for those adolescents who were delinquently inclined as well as for the ordinary robust, exuberant, youngsters who were in the natural adolescent state of rebellion against authority, who had been controlled by the stringent disaplin in schools, and there was an explosion of adolescent indisiplin and hooliganism.

In the midst of this adolescent indisiplin and increasing delinquency, there was an election promise by the Conservative Party that the prevailing delinquency and crime would be dealt with effectively.

And there was a change in government in 1979. Simply stopping the delinquency in any available way seemed the only thing to do.

HARSH TREATMENT RE- INTRODUCED


The short sharp shock and tough measures for dealing with adolescent disturbancies and dilinquency were introduced no sooner the new government came into power.

However in the Conservative Party manifesto of 1979 was the promise "in certain detention centres we will experiment with tougher regimes..." and reserch was organised by the government.

Then even though there was no formal recognition and acknowledgment once again that punishments and harsh treatment of adolescent disturbance did not bring any useful result, there was no change of policy. It was in this climate that the psychodynamic approach to adolescence was rejected by the psychiatric establishment, ( Bridges over troubled waters, Horrocks, 1986 ) giving clinical authenticity to the socio-political momentum of the time. The only behaviour therapy which could be used en mass - the reward and punishment type, operant conditioning, came in once again, and this time in opposition too, and with the exclusion of the psychodynamic approach.

It is in this time that Pin Down occured in the early nineties, in which concientious staff used the most draconian methods to control youngsters in childrens homes. They thought they were doing their duty, in accordance with the higher authority. In the event they were dismissed from the service, even though the fault was not theirs.