1. Preface and Introduction

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Preface

Introduction

1.1

Status of the document and Every Child Matters: Change for Children programme

1.1.6

The Protection of Children in England: Action Plan

1.1.8

An integrated approach

1.1.10

Shared responsibility

1.1.12

Co-operation

1.1.14

Government guidance

1.1.16

Government initiatives

1.2

Support systems

1.2.2

Vetting and Barring Scheme

1.2.5

Integrated Children’s System

1.2.7

Team around the child and lead professional

1.2.13

Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families

1.2.16

Common Assessment Framework

1.3

Support structures

1.3.1

Children’s trusts

1.3.9

Children and Young People’s Plan

1.4

Principles underpinning these procedures

1.4.1

United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child

1.4.5

Individual professional responsibility

1.4.6

A child-centred approach

1.5

The Procedures in practice

1.6

Glossary

1.7

Policies, procedures, guidance and protocols

Introduction

1.1.1

This 4th edition of the London Child Protection Procedures sets out the procedures which all London agencies, groups and individuals must follow in order to safeguard children and promote their welfare in the home and within the community. The Procedures apply to professionals coming into contact with or receiving information about children 0 to 17 years, including unborn children and adolescents up to their 18th birthday.

[The Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000 amends the Children Act 1989 and requires a responsible authority to continue to provide various forms of assistance to care leavers from the age of 18, if they have previously been eligible or relevant children. Also councils have powers to assist with the expenses associated with education and training up to 24 years.]

1.1.2

Safeguarding children and promoting their welfare means protecting them from maltreatment, preventing impairment of their health and development, and ensuring that they grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care. Protective responses may be through:

• Direct service provision to children (e.g. providing education, healthcare, leisure or social care services for children);
• Working with adults who are parents;
• Providing any other services to adults.

1.1.3

This 4th edition of the Procedures incorporates the Government guidance Working Together to Safeguard Children (DCSF, 2010), available at: www.workingtogetheronline.co.uk.

Working Together to Safeguard Children (DCSF, 2010) reflects the Government's Every Child Matters: Change for Children programme, designed to support front-line professionals, planners, commissioners, senior management and leaders in all agencies to achieve the best outcomes for children. That is, for every child to:

• Be healthy;
• Stay safe;
• Enjoy and achieve;
• Make a positive contribution;
• Achieve economic well-being.

1.1.4

These procedures are concerned primarily with the 'staying safe' outcome, and reflect the Government's strategy of strengthening the framework for single and multi-agency safeguarding practice. This 4th edition of the Procedures draws on the supplementary guidance:

• Safeguarding children and young people who may be affected by gang activity (DCSF, 2010),
• Safeguarding disabled children: Practice guidance (DCSF, 2009),
• Safeguarding children and young people from sexual exploitation (DCSF, 2009),
• Child protection, domestic violence and parental substance misuse (DCSF, 2008),
• Safeguarding children who may have been trafficked (DCSF, 2007),
• Statement on the duties of doctors and other professionals in investigations of child abuse (DCSF and DH, 2007),
• Safeguarding children from abuse linked to a belief in spirit possession (DCSF, 2007),

which have now become supplements to Working Together to Safeguard Children (DCSF, 2010).

The Protection of Children in England: Action Plan

(see: The Government’s response to Lord Laming)

1.1.6

In November 2008 Lord Laming published The Protection of Children in England: A Progress Report . The report reviewed the progress that had been made across the country to implement effective arrangements for safeguarding children following from the Government response to the Victoria Climbie Inquiry. The inquiry revealed themes identified by past inquiries which resulted in a failure to intervene early enough. These included:

Poor co-ordination; a failure to share information; the absence of anyone with a strong sense of accountability; and frontline workers trying to cope with staff vacancies, poor management and a lack of effective training (cm 5860 p.5).

1.1.7

The Progress Report contained 58 recommendations for improvement relating to: leadership and accountability, support for children, inter-agency working, children's workforce, improvement and challenge, organisation and finance and the legal framework. The Government accepted all the recommendations and published an Action Plan to tackle them; 23 of the recommendations are addressed through the publication of Working Together to Safeguard Children (DCSF, 2010) guidance.

An integrated approach

1.1.8

The way to proceed in the face of uncertainty is through competent professional judgements based on a sound assessment of the child's needs, the parents' capacity to respond to those needs - including their capacity to keep the child safe from significant harm - and the wider family circumstances.

1.1.9

Effective measures to safeguard children are those which also promote their welfare. They should not be seen in isolation from the wider range of support and services already provided and available to meet the needs of children and families:

• Enquiries under s47 of the Children Act 1989 may reveal significant unmet needs for support and services among children and families. These should always be explicitly considered, even where concerns are not substantiated about significant harm to a child, if the family so wishes;
• IIf processes for managing concerns about individual children are to result in improved outcomes for children, then effective plans for safeguarding and promoting children's welfare should be based on a wide ranging assessment of the needs of the child, parental capacity and their family circumstances.

Shared responsibility

1.1.10

Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children - and in particular protecting them from significant harm - depends upon effective joint working between agencies and professionals that have different roles and expertise; or who are in different geographical areas.

1.1.11

Individual children, especially some of the most vulnerable children and those at greatest risk of social exclusion, will need co-ordinated help from health, education, children's social care, the third sector and other agencies, including youth justice services.

Co-operation

1.1.12

In order to achieve joint working there need to be constructive relationships between individual workers, promoted and supported by:

• A strong lead from elected or appointed local authority members, and the commitment of chief officers in all agencies - and in particular, the local authority's Director of Children's Services and Lead Member for children's services;
• Effective local co-ordination by the Children's Trust or equivalent (see 1.3 Support Structures), and Local Safeguarding Children Board in each area.

1.1.13

For those children who are suffering or at risk of suffering significant harm, or causing or at risk of causing physical or sexual harm to others, joint working is essential, to safeguard and promote welfare of the child/ren and, where necessary, to help bring to justice the perpetrators of crimes against children. All agencies and professionals should:

• Be alert to potential indicators of abuse or neglect;
• Be alert to the risks which individual abusers, or potential abusers, may pose to children;
• Share and help to analyse information so that an assessment can be made of the child's needs and circumstances;
• Contribute to whatever actions are needed to safeguard and promote the child's welfare;
• Take part in regularly reviewing the outcomes for the child against specific plans;
• Work co-operatively with parents, unless this is inconsistent with ensuring the child's safety.

Government guidance

1.1.14

The above elements, and others from the Every Child Matters: Change for Children programme, are supported by the five documents:

• Inter-Agency Co-operation to Improve Well-being of Children;
• Guidance on the Duty to Safeguard and Promote the Welfare of Children;
• Children and Young People's Plan (CYPP is optional but this document can be used to inform a single, strategic, overarching local plan for children's services (see 1.3 Support Structures));
• The Role and Responsibilities of the Director of Children's Services and the Lead Member for Children's Services;
• Chapter 3: Local Safeguarding Children Boards in Working Together to Safeguard Children (DCSF 2010).

For more information, see www.everychildmatters.gov.uk.

1.1.15

These should be read together with Standard Five: Safeguarding and Promoting the Welfare of Children in the National Service Framework for Children, Young People and Maternity Services (DH, 2004) (the Children's NSF).

The full Children's NSF is available at the Department of Health website.

Government initiatives

1.1.16

The reports of Government initiatives in 2009/10 aimed at supporting reduction in harm to women and children include:

• Together We Can End Violence Against Women and Girls: a Strategy
• Rape: the victim experience review
• Review into sexualisation of young people
• Taskforce on health aspects of violence against women and children
  
  

1.2.1

Effective support systems form a key component of the Government's strategy for integrated front-line working to safeguard children. The strategy includes a core set of systems and activities to be adopted by local authorities and their partner agencies:

• Vetting and Barring Scheme (currently under review)
• Integrated Children's System;
• Lead professional;
• Assessment Framework;
• Common Assessment Framework.

Vetting and Barring Scheme

See Vetting and Barring (ISA Website)

1.2.2

The Vetting and Barring Scheme (VBS) aims to ensure that unsuitable people do not work with children, whether in paid employment or on a voluntary basis. The VBS involves the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA) and was created under the Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006. The VBS is currently under review and its implementation is suspended pending completion of the review. However, the ISA continues to carry out its work.

1.2.3

Under the VBS:

• It is a criminal offence for individuals barred by the ISA to work or apply to work with children or vulnerable adults in a wide range of posts - including most NHS jobs, Prison Service, education and childcare. Employers also face criminal sanctions for knowingly employing a barred individual across a wider range of work;
• The three former barred lists (POCA, POVA and List 99) have been  replaced by two new ISA-barred lists; and
• Employers, local authorities, professional regulators and other bodies have a duty to refer to the ISA, information about individuals working with children or vulnerable adults where they consider them to have caused harm or pose a risk of harm.

1.2.4

For more detail see section 15.7.3 Independent Safeguarding Authority. The ISA website is www.isa-gov.org.uk

Integrated Children's System

See Integrated Children’s System improvement guidance for local authorities.

1.2.5

The Integrated Children's System (ICS) is the national IT system for LA children's social care to record and manage children's cases, using an e-social care record to file information from referral, assessment, planning, intervention, review and closure, for each child. The system builds on the Looking After Children materials -

[Looking After Children materials: assessment and action records (DH 1995), introduced in order to provide local authorities with a systematic means of gathering relevant information about children looked after away from home].

- and the Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families (Department of Health et al, 2000) (see section 6. Referral and assessment).

1.2.6

The ICS assists the collection, analysis, retrieval and reporting of information on individual cases. It is also a management information tool for planning, commissioning and reviewing children's services. It generates the information for children's social care core information requirements. For more information, see the Department of Education website.

Team around the child and the lead professional

1.2.7

The Team around the child (TAC) is a group of professionals working together as needed to help a particular child to achieve the intended outcomes identified through a common assessment (see section 1.2.16. Common Assessment Framework). The TAC members are jointly responsible for developing and delivering the child's plan, each member being responsible / accountable to their own line manager for delivering the activities they agreed to carry out.

1.2.8

To ensure that these activities are well co-ordinated, and that there is clear communication with the child and their family, the TAC agrees (with input from the child and family) a particular practitioner who will act as the lead professional.

1.2.9

The role of lead professional can be undertaken by any front-line professional involved with a child who has the skills, experience and line management (or equivalent) support, to fulfil lead professional functions. These are to:

• Act as a single point of contact for the child and their family;
• Co-ordinate the delivery of agreed actions;
• Reduce overlap and inconsistency in the services received

1.2.10

The lead professional is accountable to their own agency for their delivery of lead professional functions. They are not responsible for the actions of other professionals.

1.2.11

Lead professionals need the knowledge, competence and confidence to:

• Develop a successful and productive relationship with the child and family (to communicate without jargon);
• Organise multi-disciplinary and multi-agency meetings and discussions;
• Use the Common Assessment Framework (see section 1.2.16. Common Assessment Framework) and co-ordinate the development of  support plans based on the outcomes;
• Co-ordinate the delivery of effective early intervention work and on-going support;
• Work in partnership with other professionals to deliver the support plan.

1.2.12

See Team around the child (TAC) and the lead professional: practitioners' and managers' guides.

Assessment Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families

1.2.13

The Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families (DoH et al, 2000) (the Assessment Framework) provides a systematic multi-agency approach to analyse and record what is happening to a child within their family and the wider context of the community in which they live. See section 6.3. The Assessment Framework and appendix 5 for a summary and diagram of the Assessment Framework.

1.2.14

The assessment stages involve gathering and analysing information about the three domains of the Assessment Framework, these are the:

• Child's developmental needs;
• Parents' or caregivers' capacity to respond appropriately;
• Impact of the wider family and environmental factors on parenting capacity and the child.

1.2.15

Staff in all agencies should be competent in contributing to the assessment of a child using the Assessment Framework.

Common Assessment Framework

1.2.16

The Common Assessment Framework is a nationally standardised approach to conducting an assessment of the needs of a child and deciding how they should be met. It is a simple assessment checklist for use by all professionals in all agencies to clarify concerns they may have about a child and communicate and work more effectively together.

1.2.17

Whenever a professional in any agency becomes concerned that a child may have needs which are not being met by universal services (e.g. education and health services), the professional should complete a common assessment to help them form a judgement about whether their concern is valid.

1.2.18

The common assessment should not delay the process where a professional is concerned that a child is, or may be, at risk of significant harm. In such cases the professional must make a referral directly to LA children's social care using the appropriate inter-agency referral form, in line with section 6. Referral and assessment.

1.2.19

The appropriate inter-agency form should also be used to make a referral to specialist services (e.g. LA children with disabilities teams, child and adolescent mental health services, special educational needs services etc.).

1.2.20

The completed common assessment should be used as a basis for single and multi-agency or multi-disciplinary discussion and decision-making. The outcomes of such discussions may be that:

• The concerns are unfounded;
• The child needs additional support and this can be met within the single agency;
• The child needs support from another agency, or several agencies;
• The child should be referred for a specialist assessment (e.g. LA children's social care, child and adolescent mental health services or special educational needs assessment) or a medical diagnosis.

1.2.21

The Common Assessment Framework is based on the Framework for the Assessment of Children in Need and their Families (DH, 2000), this means that specialist assessments can easily build on the information gathered by a common assessment.

1.2.22

Local authorities and their partner agencies should work towards implementing the common assessment in electronic format (e-CAF, see section 1.6. Glossary) as soon as possible.

Children's trusts

1.3.1

Children's Trusts are currently being reviewed and the likely changes are that:

• Schools will no longer have a duty to co-operate through Children's Trusts
• Local authorities will no longer be required to set up Children's Trust Boards
• Children's Trusts will no longer be required to publish a local Children and Young People's Plan.

1.3.2

Children's Trusts bring together all services for children in an area, underpinned by the Children Act 2004 duty to cooperate, to focus on improving outcomes for all children. The duty will continue with greater flexibility in the local partnership arrangements to improve children's well-being. It is possible that local areas will transfer the activities currently undertaken by the Children's Trust to an equivalent partnership arrangement, such as a Health & Wellbeing Board. See the consultation document: Liberating the NHS: increasing democratic legitimacy in health (July 2010)

1.3.3

Accordingly the term 'Children's Trust or equivalent' is used throughout these Procedures.

Children and Young People's Plan

1.3.9

Children and Young People's Plans (CYPP) have become optional. However, local partners are encouraged to continue to develop a single, strategic, overarching plan for all services affecting children in the local area. This is because drawing up CYPPs has involved providing an accurate and comprehensive assessment of current needs and outcomes for local children; identifying where these outcomes could be improved, and planning how and when the improvements would be achieved.

1.3.10

Accordingly local partners are encouraged to continue to develop a single, strategic, overarching plan for all services affecting children in the local area. This is described in these Procedures as 'a strategy for children's services, such as a children and young people's plan'.

United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child

1.4.1

These procedures reflect the principles contained within the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was ratified by the UK Government in 1991 and underpins the Every Child Matters: Change for Children agenda.

1.4.2

The UNCRC accords children three types of rights:

• Survival and development rights: these are rights to the resources, skills and contributions necessary for the survival and full development of the child. They include rights to adequate food, shelter, clean water, formal education, primary health care, leisure and recreation, cultural activities and information about their rights. These rights require not only the existence of the means to fulfil the rights but also access to them. Specific articles address the needs of child refugees, children with disabilities and children of minority or indigenous groups.
• Protection rights: These rights include protection from all forms of child abuse, neglect, exploitation and cruelty, including the right to special protection in times of war and protection from abuse in the criminal justice system.
• Participation rights: Children are entitled to the freedom to express opinions and to have a say in matters affecting their social, economic, religious, cultural and political life. Participation rights include the right to express opinions and be heard, the right to information and freedom of association.

1.4.3

Key articles include:

• Article 6 - States Parties recognize that every child has the inherent right to life and States Parties shall ensure to the maximum extent possible the survival and development of the child;
• Article 12 - States Parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child;
• Article 19 - States Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child; and
• Article 39 - States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to promote physical and psychological recovery and social reintegration of a child victim of: any form of neglect, exploitation, or abuse; torture or any other form of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; or armed conflicts. Such recovery and reintegration shall take place in an environment which fosters the health, self-respect and dignity of the child.

1.4.4

All agencies should promote awareness, within the community and among professionals, of children's rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child through public education campaigns and training and supervision for staff all levels within the organisation. The methods used to communicate with the public should be sensitive to the cultures and languages of local community.

Individual professional responsibility

1.4.5

Agency structures and systems and the actions of professionals working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children should reflect an approach which is:

• Child centred (see 1.4.6 below);
• Rooted in child development;
• Holistic;
• Informed by evidence;
• Appropriate to achieve actual outcomes for children;
• Multi-disciplinary and multi-agency as appropriate;
• A continuing process, not an event;
• Regularly reviewed;
• Ensuring equality of opportunity;
• Involving children and their families; and
• Building on strengths as well as identifying difficulties.

A child-centred approach

1.4.6

All frontline professionals working with children have a responsibility to get to know each child as an individual and, as a matter of routine, consider how their situation feels to them. Ofsted's evaluation of 50 Serious Case Reviews conducted between 1 April 2007 and 31 March 2008 highlighted 'the failure of all professionals to see the situation from the child's perspective and experience; to see and speak to the children; to listen to what they said, to observe how they were and to take serious account of their views in supporting their needs as probably the single most consistent failure in safeguarding work with children.'

1.4.7

Since 2005, local authorities have been under a duty under the Children Act 1989 (as amended by section 53 of the Children Act 2004) to ascertain the child's wishes and feelings and give due regard to their age and understanding when determining what (if any) services to provide under section 17 of the Children Act 1989, and before making decisions about action to be taken to protect individual children under section 47 of the Children Act 1989. These duties complemented existing requirements relating to the wishes and feelings of children who are, or may be, looked after (section 22(4) Children Act 1989), those being provided accommodation (section 20(6) Children Act 1989) and children taken into police protection (section 46(3)(d)).

1.4.8

In discharging their duties under these sections, the local authority must give due consideration to the child's 'wishes and feelings' so far as is reasonably practicable and consistent with the child's welfare and giving due regard to the child's age and understanding. There will be occasions when it is not possible to ascertain the child's wishes and feelings. In these circumstances, professionals should record in writing why it was not reasonably practicable or consistent with the child's welfare to elicit his or her wishes and feelings.

1.4.9

Effective ongoing action to keep the child in focus includes:

• Developing a direct relationship with the child;
• Obtaining information from the child about his or her situation and needs;
• Eliciting the child's wishes and feelings - about their situation now as well as plans and hopes for the future;
• Providing children with honest and accurate information about the current situation, as seen by professionals, and future possible actions and interventions;
• Involving the child in key decision-making;
• Providing appropriate information to the child about his or her right to protection and assistance;
• Inviting children to make recommendations about the services and assistance they need and/or are available to them;
• Ensuring children have access to independent advice and support (for example, through advocates or children's rights officers) to be able to express their views and influence decision-making; and
• The importance of eliciting and responding to the views and experiences of children is a defining feature of staff recruitment, professional supervision, performance management and the organisation's broader aims and development.

1.4.10

To do this depends on communicating effectively with children and young people, including those who find it difficult to do so because of their age, an impairment, or their particular psychological or social situation. This may involve using interpreters and drawing upon the expertise of early years workers or those working with disabled children.

1.5.1

This document sets out procedures which all London agencies, groups and individuals must follow in identifying, raising and responding to welfare concerns when coming into contact with or receiving information about children. This may be through:

• Direct service provision to children (e.g. providing education, healthcare, leisure or social care services for children);
• Working with adults who are parents;
• Providing any other services to adults.

1.5.2

The London agencies include:

• All health services, including the London Ambulance Service;
• All other local authority services (including adults' social care, housing, education, libraries, leisure and youth services and others);
• Armed forces;
• Children's (and adults') independent sector;
• Children's (and adults') services in the third sector;
• Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (CAFCASS);
• Children's Fund and Connexions;
• Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI);
• Courts;
• Crown Prosecution Service;
• Diplomatic services;
• Immigration and Nationality Service and Refugee Council;
• LA children's social care;
• London Fire Brigade;
• Metropolitan Police Service;
• National Offender Management Service;
• Probation service;
• Schools and further education services;
• SureStart and other early years children's services';
• Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted);
• Youth Offending Teams.
  

1.5.3

These procedures are supported by a number of supplementary procedures, which should be read as extensions of this document:

• Safeguarding Sexually Active Children;
• Safeguarding Children Abused through Sexual Exploitation
• Safeguarding Trafficked and Exploited Children;
• Safeguarding Children Missing from Care and Home;
• Safeguarding Children Missing from School;
• Safeguarding Children Abused through Domestic Violence;
• Safeguarding Children Abused through Female Genital Mutilation;
• Safeguarding Children affected by Gang Activity / Serious Youth Violence.

1.5.4

Other, locally developed, single and multi-agency procedures and protocols must be consistent with these London Child Protection Procedures and endorsed by the relevant Local Safeguarding Children Board/s.

1.5.5

Professionals in all organisations can access these London Safeguarding Children Procedures in electronic form from the London Safeguarding Children Board's website, at: www.londonscb.gov.uk.

1.6.1

Terminology is complex and changing as services are reshaped. Key terms used in this document are:

Definitions

1.7.1

Government issued national guidance, such as Working Together to Safeguard Children 2006, interprets UK law and legislation for agencies and services, such as local authorities, the police, health or other services, in a particular area of service delivery.

1.7.2

Local authorities, the police, health or other services develop policies which describe the agency or service's strategy in a particular area of service delivery or organisation; policies may be aspirational.

1.7.3

Procedures describe what staff must do in particular circumstances and to an extent how they must do it; procedures define thve limits of professional discretion. Failure to follow procedure may be a disciplinary offence. When something goes wrong, if staff have followed procedure they will usually be deemed to have acted appropriately.

1.7.4

Protocols set out agreements between different agencies or parts of the same agency, about particular issues; protocols describe what each agency can expect of the other/s. Protocols have the same status as procedures, that is, failure to follow protocol may be a disciplinary offence.

1.7.5

Guidance gives staff practical and / or theoretical advice on the best way of approaching an issue or carrying out an activity.