Rees Centre researcher contributes to major new study on mothers involved in the justice system

A protocol paper for the Child Outcomes for Mothers Facing Trial (COMFT) study has been published in the International Journal of Population Data Science.

The study aims to improve understanding of the experiences of children whose mothers are involved in both the criminal and family justice systems.

Dr Bachar Alrouh, Senior Research Fellow at the Rees Centre, is a co-lead investigator on the COMFT study. The newly published protocol paper sets out the study’s aims, methods and approach to linking administrative data across criminal and family justice systems in England and Wales.

Bachar said: “For many families, involvement in the criminal and family justice systems does not happen in isolation.

“Yet we know surprisingly little about how these experiences overlap and what this means for children.

“COMFT will help address this evidence gap and provide new insights into the experiences of families involved in multiple justice systems.”

The research will use linked administrative data to investigate how involvement in criminal and family court proceedings affects mothers, children and caregiving arrangements.

The study brings together researchers from Lancaster University, Swansea University, the University of Central Lancashire and the University of Oxford, with Bachar contributing expertise in family justice, administrative data linkage and the use of large-scale population data to better understand the experiences of vulnerable children and families.

The COMFT project is the first large-scale study to examine the overlap between criminal and family justice proceedings involving mothers.

By linking records across different systems, researchers hope to generate new evidence about how families navigate criminal and family justice proceedings and the implications for children’s care and wellbeing.

A key feature of the project is the involvement of women with lived experience of the justice system.

Through the COMFT-Together advisory group, mothers with direct experience of cross-justice involvement are helping to shape the research and ensure that the work remains grounded in real-world experiences.

The findings are expected to provide valuable evidence for policymakers and practitioners seeking to better support families navigating multiple justice systems and to improve outcomes for children affected by parental justice involvement.

The publication of the protocol marks an important milestone in the project and highlights the collaborative nature of research addressing complex social issues, bringing together expertise from family justice, criminal justice, social policy and population data science.