Challenging misconceptions, building knowledge and using your professional curiosity are three key elements to improve social work practice, says Shabana Abasi, Cafcass senior head of service (HoS). Here she talks about her work with children and families from diverse communities, illustrating aspects of practice where cultural differences can play a big part and why it is so important to have an open dialogue about diversity.
Abasi, awarded an MBE this summer for services to children, joined Cafcass as a practitioner in 2003, quickly progressing to become HoS in 2009. She now leads on equality and diversity for the organisation and has headed aspects of Cafcass’ safeguarding practice around honour-based violence (HBV), most recently creating a presentation to strengthen practitioner knowledge in this area.
She explains: “It looks at the definition of HBV and its distinguishing features from domestic violence (DV) – identifying some of the signs to look out for, using professional curiosity and spotting the triggers for further exploration. It’s important to remember such crimes cut across many cultures, nationalities, faith groups and communities.”
Abasi’s work to challenge preconceptions and encourage understanding of different cultures extends beyond Cafcass through her involvement with a number of voluntary organisations in her local community. In 1995, she joined the Pakistani Resource Centre, which helps support the South Asian community in Greater Manchester with a range of social issues. Abasi has worked closely with agencies such as probation, police and mental health professionals, to build understanding of how frontline services can effectively meet the needs of diverse communities.
“We’ve worked with the Greater Manchester police to deepen their knowledge of South Asian culture and faith groups,” she says. “It can be simple things such as being aware when searching a Muslim home that the book on the top shelf is likely to be the Quran and not placing it on the floor or during stop and searches, being aware that some individuals from these communities may have three or four different names and not to become immediately suspicious on that basis.
“We’ve also shared our knowledge of DV and HBV to ensure officers are better equipped to respond to these situations, as well as raising awareness of child abduction in cases where fathers remove children from the UK on Pakistani passports. Group and one-to-one sessions with Muslim women in women’s prisons have also been organised to help them understand their offending and how to move forward.
“Child protection has been a big focus for us and we run women’s groups in the community looking at the legislation and laws in the UK of how we bring up children safely, while understanding the differences in culture. We also provide support in relation to mental health – the understanding of and attitude to this in the South Asian community is not always the same as Western thinking and individuals with mental health conditions may not recognise this in themselves. For instance, we do lots of work on post-natal depression: how this is regarded in in the community and the implications for women. We have set up advice sessions, health and library services, providing confidential information and signposting how to access support without being stigmatised.”
Abasi is also one of the trustees and directors with the Community on Solid Ground charity, which strives to engage with children and young people to improve their life opportunities, personal development and health and wellbeing. “We want to encourage community cohesion and develop the potential of children through mentoring and inspirational talks from role models, activities and healthy eating – encouraging and supporting them to make positive life choices.
“I’ve most enjoyed our work with parents and carers around bringing up children across two diverse communities or cultures – the first generation were never socialised here and their children are now growing up in a very different environment, so it’s helping them to be aware of differences and supporting their child’s experiences of this – becoming more positive in their approach to parenting.”
So how does she make time to juggle all this? “When you’re passionate about something you find the time. If I have knowledge I can share which will make a positive change to people’s lives I want to do this. It’s important to instil values in children who will carry on when we’re not here and provide positive mentors – building strong individuals morally, socially and psychologically and giving them the skillset to face challenges which I’m sure they will encounter in the future.”
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