The Experiences of Low Income Single Mother:The Impact of the CAS ‘Duty to report’ when using and accessing External Support Services

The primary goal of this research project was to explore how the CAS ‘duty to report’ regulation impacts the decision of low income single mothers without prior CAS involvement to access and use support services external to CAS. Feminism was employed as the major theoretic principal and was used to gain an understanding of how such regulations can govern specific behaviours when single mothers access or use support services external to CAS. The need for this study derives from a lack of qualitative research that directly explores this phenomenon. Six individual, qualitative, semi-structured interviews were conducted for the purposes of this research project. The results emphasized the participants’ experiences and the findings spoke to the challenges of single motherhood in relationship to ‘duty to report’ and the perception of those who have an obligation to report.