«Some parents are happy that the KESB gets involved»

Mr Lätsch, how many children and young people in Switzerland live in difficult family situations?

In 2019, the KESB, social and psychological services, victim support and family counselling centres provided institutional measures or assistance to around 80,000 children and young people due to a risk to their welfare. In our dark field survey, 13.5 per cent of young people reported that they had been neglected or abused by their own parents in their previous lives. If these results are taken as a basis, around 200,000 children and young people throughout Switzerland have been exposed to difficult family situations.

In which cases does the KESB intervene?

If there is a risk report. In other words, if there is a suspicion that the physical or psychological well-being of a child or young person is at risk, for example due to neglect, maltreatment or abuse. Alternatively, it may be a child or adolescent with behavioural problems or mental disorders with whom the parents appear to be permanently overwhelmed. An intervention is only carried out if this suspicion is confirmed and the KESB comes to the conclusion that an official measure is required to improve the situation.

What does an intervention by the KESB mean for the child or young person and the parents?

If the KESB opens an investigation in a family, the authority implicitly questions whether the parents are fulfilling their role. This is irrespective of whether the suspected threat to the child's welfare actually exists and how the proceedings turn out. For the parents, contact with the KESB initially means an imputation. Being summoned by a public authority and having to provide information about private details is perceived by many as a drastic intrusion into their family's autonomy. In many cases, parents are also afraid that their children will be taken away from them. Many of those affected feel misunderstood and powerless. However, there are also parents who are happy that the KESB is getting involved because they hope it will relieve the burden on their child and themselves.

And what is it like for the children?

For children and young people, the impact of the procedure depends on how much they realise. A distinction must also be made between the objective and subjective dimensions: Objectively, it can be very good for a child if the authorities get involved. Subjectively, questioning the parents means uncertainty. In addition, many children and young people are reluctant to speak negatively about their situation for fear of possible consequences. It is therefore all the more important that professionals use age-appropriate dialogue techniques and are clear and authoritative in their approach.

Around 200,000 children throughout Switzerland are exposed to difficult family situations.

The KESB is often criticised in the media: employees act insensitively, relatives are ignored in the assessment of a case, children are placed without compelling reasons.

I follow this with mixed feelings. On the one hand, critical reporting is in principle a sign of a healthy democracy. On the other hand, the cases are usually only described from the subjective point of view of the parents concerned, as the child and adult protection authorities are not allowed to comment on ongoing proceedings due to official secrecy. In addition, parents only turn to the media when they feel they have been treated unfairly by the KESB. This means that the many positive cases, which we also see in our studies, are hardly ever reported on. In addition, the advantages of the KESB over the former lay authorities are rarely mentioned.

What advantages do you mean?

The new child and adult protection law has created an authority that can be criticised. In the past, there were 1,400 local guardianship authorities, usually staffed by laypeople, some of whom had little professional distance to the people concerned. What's more, hardly anyone outside their own municipality was interested if parents had a problem with the local guardianship authority because the authorities were made up and functioned differently everywhere. And in the municipality itself, parents often thought twice about whether they really wanted to get involved with the influential authority, which was often identical to the municipal council. The greater distance between the KESB and the municipalities certainly does not only offer advantages, but in this respect the current system scores points.

And what about the general comparison between the new and the old system?

The introduction of the KESB has strengthened the legal position of parents and children. In the old system, the practice of the guardianship authorities could vary greatly from municipality to municipality. Conversely, there were many authorities that were not confident in making decisions due to a lack of expertise and therefore delegated them to the social services. Today, we have interdisciplinary authorities made up of experts, most of whom work on a supra-regional basis, and in the vast majority of cantons they deliberately do not include municipal representatives because they wanted to decouple child protection from local financial issues. However, this professionalisation also has disadvantages: In the old system, the authority knew the family and knew where suitable help was available locally. Today, the KESB must compensate for their distance from the community by gathering as much local knowledge as possible. In many places, this is already much more successful today than in the first few years after the reform of child and adult protection law.

The regulations for reporting risks to the KESB have been adapted. Which approach was chosen?

Previously, only teachers, social services or victim support organisations were obliged to report if there were indications that a child's welfare was at risk and they were unable to remedy the situation in the course of their work. In 2019, the reporting obligation was extended to professionals in crèches, sports clubs and music schools, for example. In addition, people who are subject to professional secrecy, such as doctors, psychologists or midwives, no longer have to be released from their duty of confidentiality to make a report. Any person can continue to make voluntary reports if the physical, psychological or sexual integrity of a child appears to be at risk.

If someone makes a report to the KESB, they must expect the authority to give their name to the family concerned. Why?

Because this is prescribed by procedural law. If the KESB informs you that someone is going to visit you to find out whether your child is at risk, you will want to know who has raised this suspicion. If anonymity were the rule, a neighbourhood dispute might lead to a report of endangerment. It is crucial that the authority informs the person making the report that their name will normally be disclosed to the family concerned.

In special cases, anonymous reports to the KESB are also possible.

How do you ensure that the environment still dares to make such reports?
make such reports?

In special cases, the KESB may refrain from disclosing the origin of the report. For example, if it must assume that the person making the report would be in danger as a result. In exceptional cases, anonymous reports are also possible. The KESB must also investigate these.

How does the KESB then proceed?

If there is no immediate threat to the child's welfare that requires immediate action, the KESB will initiate an assessment procedure. In this process, it is examined whether the child or young person's welfare is at risk, what support services are required and whether child protection measures are necessary. In more difficult cases, in around 50 per cent of investigations, this task is not carried out by the KESB but by specialised experts from social services or other specialist agencies. The relevant person visits the child concerned and their parents, holds separate discussions with the family members and - within the framework of data protection - with other people such as teachers, doctors, therapists or local authorities. The results are recorded in a report. Many investigations result in voluntary help such as educational counselling. Civil child protection measures are only initiated in around half of the cases. These are guardianships in around 80 per cent of cases.

Some experts criticise the KESB for deciding on protective measures in individual cases without having spoken to both parents, the child concerned and the responsible therapist. How can this be?

One of our studies shows that children or adolescents were only included in the assessment in half of the cases. This is not only due to professional errors, but also to a lack of time. In addition, some counsellors are reluctant to interview children because they do not want to cause a conflict of loyalty with their parents. However, the involvement of children or adolescents should not be a question of whether, but only of how. In order to avoid mistakes, there is now an interdisciplinary tool that enables a standardised, professional assessment that still does justice to the individual characteristics of each family.

In 2018, KESB critics launched a popular initiative calling for children to be placed with relatives instead of in a home. The referendum failed. When do you decide in favour of family support and when do you decide in favour of placing the child?

Family support requires the confidence that the parents can guarantee the well-being of their child if they are strengthened in their parenting skills. To this end, a specialist visits the family on a regular basis. An external placement is only considered proportionate if the child is only safe outside the family or can develop much better there. The KESB does not make such decisions lightly. As a rule, it first examines whether a voluntary placement within the family is possible. To do this, the carers must be able to offer stable structures. In most cases, placements both within and outside the family are supported by a guardianship.

How often is an external placement made?

In around 10 per cent of cases, parents lose the right to determine their child's place of residence. In most cases, the child is placed in a foster family or a care home. This can be a temporary measure to take the pressure off the family and look at the underlying problems separately with parents and child. If it is not possible to return to the family in the long term, the parents' custody will be withdrawn as a last resort. For example, in cases of abuse or severe mistreatment by a parent or if the parent has an addiction problem or severe mental illness that seriously impairs their ability to raise the child in the long term.

In the case of the family in Flaach, a misunderstanding ultimately led to the fatal drama. The mother killed her children on New Year's Day 2015 because she believed that they would have to stay in the home until they came of age. She later took her own life in prison. How can such a tragic case be prevented in future?

If a measure is taken, families need to understand what is expected of them and why, what the measure looks like and what needs to happen for it to be cancelled. To do this, the KESB must use certain legal terms, but it should also explain everything verbally in everyday language. The Conference for Child and Adult Protection (KOKES) therefore recommends further training in communication and relationship management for all responsible professionals.

Every tenth child is placed with another person as part of a KESB procedure.

Adequate time and personnel resources are important for effective child protection. However, many KESB employees, investigators and counsellors complain that they are only able to investigate cases minimally or that they are unable to provide sufficient support to those affected. There is also a shortage of well-qualified staff. How can this be improved?

In 2013, many KESB were initially overwhelmed because the new processes first had to be familiarised. In addition, the guardianship authorities had to take on up to four-digit amounts of ongoing cases and staff resources were too scarce in many places. The situation has now eased somewhat because the processes are better established and responsibilities are more clearly delineated. In addition, the staff of many KESBs has been increased. Nevertheless, it is certainly not possible to speak of generous resources. It would be very helpful to have an up-to-date inventory of how many cases KESB employees have to deal with per full-time equivalent and how labour-intensive these are. With a 100 per cent workload, the guardians are simultaneously responsible for 70 to 80 child protection mandates. According to KOKES recommendations, this should be a maximum of 50. The high workload is probably one reason for the frequent staff changes, which in turn jeopardise the quality of the support processes. After all, it takes time to build up mutual trust.

The child, youth and family support services can relieve the burden on the KESB. How can cooperation with these upstream agencies be promoted?

Reports to the KESB are only necessary if the situation in a family cannot be improved with the help of these low-threshold, voluntary counselling centres. Municipalities and cantons have it in their own hands to develop and evaluate regional support services for children, young people and their caregivers through dialogue. If they invest in this area at an early stage, more costly measures by the KESB may not be necessary.

Apart from resources, where is there currently the greatest need for action in the Swiss child protection system?

Over the next ten to twenty years, we need to make a clearer institutional distinction between child protection in the narrower sense and effective child, youth and family support in the broader sense. In other words, we should think about how we can organise and evaluate voluntary support services without neglecting child protection in the narrower sense. In many cantons, this has so far been associated exclusively with the remit of the KESB. In addition, there are different financing models.

What are they?

Some cantons contribute to the costs of child protection measures or cover them entirely, while in others the municipalities pay everything, sometimes without equalising the costs among themselves. The protection of children and young people is a fundamental social concern - for once one on which all political parties are in complete agreement. Child protection is not only worthwhile ethically, but also economically, as it prevents chronic problems for the children and young people concerned as well as productivity losses in adulthood.