In the seminar, Professor Clive Diaz from the University of Oxford and Dr. Alice Loving from the Swansea University will give a lecture entitled “Parental Advocacy in Child Protection: International Evidence and Emerging Findings from England, Wales and Ireland”. After the keynote, doctoral researcher Tanja Koskinen from the University of Helsinki will give a comment speech. There will also be time for a joint discussion. Please see an abstract and biographies for Diaz, Loving and Koskinen below.
Time:
Wednesday 10 June 2026 from 14:00 to 16:00 (EET).
Place:
This seminar will take place both in person at the Faculty Hall (Faculty of Social Sciences, room 1066, Unioninkatu 37) and on Zoom. The link will be sent to all registered participants.
Registration:
Please register to the seminar by 1 June 2026 here:
Abstract: Parental Advocacy in Child Protection: International Evidence and Emerging Findings from England, Wales and Ireland
How can child protection systems strengthen parents’ voices while maintaining a clear focus on children’s safety and wellbeing? Drawing on research from the UK, Ireland and the USA, this lecture examines how parental advocacy can address longstanding tensions between families and child protection services. Parental advocacy seeks to enable parents to participate meaningfully in decision-making, ensure their perspectives are heard in key forums such as child protection conferences, and support them to challenge information they experience as inaccurate or unfair. In doing so, it has the potential to rebalance power dynamics between parents and professionals.
The presentation outlines the theoretical foundations underpinning our work on participation and procedural justice, alongside findings from realist-informed studies across England, Wales and Ireland. These studies included surveys, interviews, focus groups, workshops and observations of child protection meetings involving parents, social workers, advocates and senior leaders. Two broad models emerged: professional advocacy, more common in Wales and Ireland, where trained advocates operate within structured frameworks; and peer advocacy, more prominent in England, where advocates draw on lived experience. Evidence suggests that both models can strengthen parental participation and improve communication.
By sharing international evidence and emerging findings, the lecture invites discussion about how different advocacy models may inform ongoing developments in child welfare systems, including in Finland. It contributes to wider debates about building more participatory, transparent and trust-based approaches in child protection practice.
Bios:
Professor Clive Diaz is a Senior Academic Leader at the Rees Centre, University of Oxford. He is a leading researcher in children’s social care, specialising in children and young people’s participation, parental advocacy, and the implementation of national policy in frontline practice. His work is recognised for shaping debates on rights-based practice and for influencing policy and service design across Wales, England, and Ireland. Clive brings together academic, practice, and therapeutic expertise, drawing on his background as a psychodynamic psychotherapist and former senior local authority social work leader. Clive has published over 25 peer review journal articles and has been Principal Investigator for research studies worth £1.2 million.
Dr Alice Loving has worked within the field of Child Protection for fifteen years, working directly supporting families in the community and within a mother and baby residential setting. She completed her PhD within the Social Care department at Royal Holloway University, which focused on exploring influencing factors on the outcomes for parents working with social services. Alice delivers mentalization-based video intervention to families working with children’s services, which has in many cases prevented children being placed into foster care. She is CEO of ‘Nurturing Nature CIC’, which she set up with a view to expanding the availability of this type of parenting intervention. She currently holds a post at Swansea University, as Research Officer, evaluating the implementation of parental advocacy programmes in UK Child Protection.
Tanja Koskinen (M.Soc.Sc.) is a doctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki. In her doctoral dissertation, she focuses on experiential expertise in social work and child welfare, with a particular interest in the views of young people and parents and the ethical dimensions of expert‑by‑experience activities. She has extensive professional experience in both client work and expert positions within child welfare. She has also worked as a senior planning officer in development projects focusing on child welfare and intensive support services, with a particular interest in dialogical development practices. Koskinen collaborates actively with international researchers whose work focuses on experts-by-experience, child welfare and participatory practices.