Domestic abuse, child custody and social services.

[frustrated2025]

I posted on another thread a while back about a friend who is migrant in the UK. Her husband dumped her overseas , knowing her spousal visa had expired (he controlled it all). This is known as Transnational Marriage Abandonment considered by the home office as a form of domestic abuse.Her children are primary school age and in the UK. She's been separated from them for nearly 2 months with no contact. She is applying for a special visa for victims of domestic abuse and will have recourse to public funds on her return (once approved).

She has minimal English, he basically controlled her every movement and abused her in a number of ways. She hates him but needs to get back to the UK so that can at the least have access to her children. She knows that it is very unlikely (like zero) that she can take them back to her country as they have British passports (even though they weren't born in the UK).

I think that Adult Social Sevices should be involved with her on her return but have no experience of this. Basically, is she returned to the family home she could be attacked or worse. She needs help to access housing, legal aid and also the police to prevent him trying to approach her again. Obviously it will need to go to family court for it to be decided what happens to the children.

Does anybody have experience of Adult Social services and this type of scenario?Am I right in thinking that this is the type of thing they can support her with?

She would be best advised to speak to specialist charities who help victims of transnational marriage abandonment rather than ask on MN for advice on adult social services as what is on offer from social services depends on where she will be coming back to in the UK.

If she has a specialist solicitor in leave to enter under the DV concession cases then the solicitor should be signposting her for the help she needs as they will know her area of the country and the support she needs. They will either have an in-house legal aid lawyer who can help her get a non molestation injunction to prevent further domestic abuse and a child arrangement order or they can refer her to a local family legal aid lawyer

@Reginald123 She can't apply for the DV concession as this is for migrants already in the country. She has no access to legal aid as he has left her destitute. She WOULD have had access to legal aid if he has adandoned her in the UK or she had excaped and go to a refuge for example.

She will not be able to access any form of legal aid until she lands in the country.
I am trying to plan for this moment in terms of, do I contact social servies prior to her returning? By the way, not reaching out to MN expecting accuracy but interested in case there are any adult social workers who can just give me insight into domestic abuse cases. We've been in touch with domestic aid charities with knowledge of TMA but all lawyers require a fee as she is not in the UK and she doesn't have the money to pay.

It wouldn't be adult social care, it would be her local domestic abuse service who would support her. They will have a contract from the council to provide support.

Edit - it's possible to raise an adult safeguarding alert for domestic violence when the victim is particularly vulnerable which potentially she might be considered however that doesn't mean she would be allocated a social worker to support her. They would probably refer her to MARAC if she met the criteria and she would be referred to the DA service as a result.

@GuestFeatu Ah! Brilliant. Thanks for that. Exactly the sort of info I was hoping for. Is the best place to look the council website to see who they have a contract with?

I would google domestic abuse service + her local authority area and see what comes up.

I know it isn't the ILR DV concession she is using but the leave to enter route for TNA but the point I was making is that she has an immigration solicitor according to your post and if the lawyer knows what they are doing they should be signposting her for the help she needs.

For example there are specialist charities in London who are experts in this area whereas a local authority domestic abuse service is unlikely to have come across a TNA case as the law and immigration rules only changed recently and they will probably say they can't help her until she is in the uk.

Have her lawyers been asked what support there is to sort out the practicalities of somewhere to stay on arrival in the uk if she can't stay with you or a friend? The rest - the occupation order and non mol injunction and CAO application can be dealt with on day one of her return - especially if her immigration lawyer can refer her to a specialist family lawyer