Child-Focused Policing: Domestic Abuse Response

In 2023, the Home Office commissioned national research, delivered by Ipsos UK, the University of Central Lancashire, and the National Centre for Social Research, to understand how frontline police respond to domestic abuse incidents involving children.

Although the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 identifies these children as victims, concerns persist about how consistently officers recognised and safeguarded them.

This concern sits alongside ongoing legislative reform.

The Crime and Policing Bill currently progressing through Parliament reinforces the seriousness of harm involving children and vulnerable victims, signalling continued national focus on improving police responses, even where statutory duties have not yet been explicitly defined.

Using surveys, interviews, case file reviews and direct engagement with young people, the study details a picture of current practice across police forces in England and Wales. Although the final report, highlights strong commitment from officers, it highlights that there is significant variation in practice, confidence and guidance.

The report findings offer essential insight into where improvements are most needed. In this article we summarise the key issues and outline the next steps required to strengthen police responses to reported domestic abuse cases when children are involved.

The key findings from the report include:

Responding to domestic abuse incidents involving children

• Over half of frontline officers (56 %) said they responded daily to domestic abuse incidents, and about 23 % said they attended incidents with children physically present every day.
• Officers report that they do not always receive information whether there are children at the address en route. Children may not be known to be present when police arrive.
• At the scene, officers largely follow the priorities set out in the College of Policing Authorised Professional Practice (APP): de-escalation, separating parties, and securing the scene.
• While operational guidance remains the primary framework for frontline decision-making, proposed reforms within the Crime and Policing Bill further emphasise the need for police to recognise children’s exposure to harm, including where abusive or sexual behaviour occurs in a child’s presence. This reinforces the importance of identifying and recording children at the earliest point of police contact.
• When children show ‘harmful behaviours’, for example, child-to-parent or sibling violence), there is some guidance. However, many officers were unclear on the thresholds, and support services for these children were inconsistent.

Interaction with children at the incident

• Most officers say they try to speak to children, however only68% of survey respondents agreed it was part of the responding officer’s responsibility). The likelihood of speaking to children varied; half said they would always speak to children physically injured; only 37% said they would always speak to children who heard or saw the incident but weren’t injured.
• There was no clear consensus about waking children who appear asleep during an incident. Some officers reported they did, while others based their decisions on risk. This lack of consistency is particularly concerning given wider legislative developments that increasingly recognise children’s exposure to abusive behaviour as harm in itself. While the Crime and Policing Bill does not prescribe how officers must engage children, it strengthens the legal context in which children’s presence and experience should be treated as significant.
• Officers noted difficulties in talking to very young children, children with additional needs/disabilities, or those for whom English is not their first language. Some officers felt under-trained for these conversations.
• Young people interviewed reported negative experiences: feeling ignored, not asked how they felt or what they needed.

Recording information about children

• Almost all officers knew of guidance in their forces about recording information on children present (91%).
• However, the actual recording was inconsistent: for example, in one force, only 2 of 36 case files had details of the conversation with a child present.
• The standard tools used (DARA / DASH- Domestic Abuse Risk Assessment/ Domestic Abuse, Stalking and Harassment (and Honour-Based Abuse) Risk Assessment) focused on adult victims; some forces used child-specific forms, but there is no consistent national standard. As legislative reforms continue to strengthen offences involving harm to children and exposure to abusive behaviour, the absence of consistent, child-focused recording risks undermining both safeguarding outcomes and the evidential quality of police records.
• Barriers to recording included time pressure, returning to the station, other urgent calls, and a lack of clarity about what constitutes sufficient detail.

Referring children onwards

• Most forces had a central referral mechanism: once a child is identified, a referral is made to a central referral unit (CRU) or equivalent.
• Local authority stakeholders generally held positive views about the accuracy of information, but highlighted that details about the child’s emotional state, context and needs were inconsistent.
• Importantly, only 9% of officers said they regularly told children about the next steps or what support was available. This gap sits uncomfortably alongside wider criminal justice reforms that emphasise victim engagement, understanding and confidence in statutory responses — principles that must apply equally to children affected by domestic abuse.

Training on domestic abuse and children

• While most officers receive some domestic abuse training (as part of initial training), fewer receive training that specifically deals with children at domestic abuse incidents or how to talk direct to children.
• Many officers and partner stakeholders described this as a significant gap: training about the impact of domestic abuse on children, non-physical forms of abuse (coercive control), and how to speak to children in trauma-informed ways
• As the legislative landscape continues to evolve, including through the Crime and Policing Bill, police training will need to keep pace with growing legal recognition of children’s exposure to harm, even where statutory operational duties are not yet explicitly set out.

The report concludes that frontline officers have an important role in safeguarding children at domestic abuse incidents, and that there are many examples of good practice. However, the variation in training, guidance, recording and referral means that children’s welfare is not always consistently prioritised.

Priorities for Improvement

The report includes recommended next steps, targeted to organisations who support professional development and operational improvement. These priorities are particularly important in the context of ongoing criminal justice reform, where expectations around recognising and responding to harm involving children are increasing.

This report shines a much-needed spotlight on how children are engaged, recorded and referred when police respond to domestic abuse. While many officers work hard and take children’s welfare seriously, the research identifies variability in practice, gaps in training, and weaknesses in recording and referrals.

For improvement to be realised, investment is needed in training, operational guidance, multi-agency collaboration and a culture that consistently centres children’s welfare. Legislative reform alone will not deliver better outcomes for children unless it is matched by consistent, child-focused practice on the ground.

If we can ensure that children in homes where domestic abuse occurs are not the ‘silent’ victims but are spoken to, seen, heard, recorded and supported, then the policing and safeguarding response will be significantly strengthened.

Sara Spinks

SSS Author & Former Headteacher

2 March 2026