Parents with Learning Disabilities

Families where one or both parents have a learning disability can often have very complex needs as a result of a range of issues including poverty, discrimination, depression, poor self-esteem, and unemployment (Macintyre and Stewart, 2012; Wade, Mildon and Matthews, 2007). These families are often over-represented in care proceedings (Cox, Kroese and Evans, 2015) due to a perception that the parent(s) do not possess the skills and knowledge necessary to parent effectively rather than them being purposefully neglectful or abusive (Feldman, 2004). Parenting capacity assessments are often triggered when there are concerns about the welfare of a child. It has been suggested that parents with learning disabilities have to meet stricter criteria than other parents to demonstrate their ability to parent (Tarleton, 2007). It is also estimated that between 40% and 60% of parents with a learning disability have their children removed from their care due to being assessed as unable to provide an adequate standard of parenting (Wilson and colleagues, 2013).

According to the Scottish Government (2008), being a ‘good enough’ parent requires parents to be able to provide basic physical care, love and affection, security, guidance, boundaries, and age-appropriate responsibility and independence. Some parents with learning disabilities require support to develop some of these ‘good enough’ parenting skills including:

The ability to provide a safe home environment, adequate nutrition, and positive and nurturing interactions
Being able to recognise and treat medical emergencies
Having a basic understanding of child development (Feldman, 2004)
When provided with appropriate support, many parents with a learning disability can improve their skills and knowledge and learn to parent more effectively (Murphy and Feldman, 2002; Coren, Thomae and Hutchfield, 2011). Ensuring that parents with learning disabilities have access to services based on the principles of supported parenting was a key recommendation in the Scottish Government’s learning disability strategy, The keys to life (Scottish Government, 2013). The strategy recommended that the Guidelines for supporting parents with learning disabilities (SCLD, 2015) be used by professionals to ensure positive outcomes for families. The guidelines are built on the principles for supported parenting:

Support should be available from pre-birth
Support may need to be ongoing and required at every stage of a child’s development
Support must be based on respect for parents and for the emotional bond between them and their children
Parents should be viewed as a resource and not the problem
Support should be for the family as a whole rather than individuals
Parents should be supported to be in control and to experience being competent
Support should focus on building strengths
Families are best supported in the context of their own extended families, neighbourhoods and communities
More recently, Section 12 of the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 places a duty on local authorities to secure services for children at risk of becoming looked after, thus highlighting the needs of parents with learning disabilities in mainstream legislation and policy.

This Insight aims to bring together the key research findings on supporting parents with learning disabilities to aid practitioners in considering approaches for working with this group of vulnerable parents. Examples of good practice from a recent scoping exercise carried out on behalf of the Scottish Government, commissioned by SCLD and written by the authors (Stewart and colleagues, 2016) is drawn on throughout.