What is working together to safeguard children?
This is a government guidance document for inter-agency working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. The latest version of this publication was July 2018, commonly known as 'working together to safeguard children 2018' .
The Children Act 2004, as amended by the Children and Social Work Act 2017, placed new duties on key agencies in a local area. Specifically the police, clinical commissioning groups and the local authority are under a duty to make arrangements to work together, and with other partners locally, to safeguard and promote the welfare of all children in their area. The document issues guidance on how this is to be done.
The aim of 'working together to safeguard children 2018' is to:
protect children from maltreatment
prevent impairment of children's health or development
ensure that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
to take action to enable all children to have the best outcomes
Safeguarding children UK law
The following acts and regulations apply to protecting children and young people:
Local Authority Social Services Act 1970, section 7
Children Act 2004 sections 10,11 and 16
Children and Social Work Act 2017 section 16
section 175(4) of the Education Act 2002
The Schedule to the Education (Independent School Standards) Regulations 2014, made under sections 94(1) and (2) of the Education and Skills Act 2008.
paragraph 3 of the Schedule to the Non-Maintained Special Schools (England) Regulations 2015, made under section 342 of the Education Act 1996, which requires arrangements for safeguarding
Children act 1989
Local authority safeguarding children
The Children Act 2004 required each local authority to establish a Safeguarding Children Board. These are known as LSCB's - Local Safeguarding Childrens Boards.
The statutory function of an LSCB are:
To assess the effectiveness of the help being provided to children and families, including early help
Assess whether LSCB partners are fulfilling their statutory obligations
Quality assure practice, including through joint audits of case files involving practitioners and identifying lessons to be learned
Monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of training, including multi-agency training, to safeguard and promote the welfare of children
The Children and Social Work Act 2017 (the Act) replaces Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs) with new local safeguarding arrangements, led by three safeguarding partners (local authorities, chief officers of police, and clinical commissioning groups). This is gradually being phased in and is to be complete by September 2019. These will be known as Safeguarding Children Partnerships, SCP's, often with the Local Authority prefix, for example Doncaster is known as DSCP.
Local safeguarding children's board contact details, this was where you used to report any concerns over a child's welfare. Now you would report your concerns to the local safeguarding partnership. The relevant local authority will be able to supply contact details for their own SCP.
How do we safeguard children?
Every body has a role to play in safeguarding children, but especially those that work with children. Child abuse can sometimes be hard to spot and child protection procedures do not always work in the home when the child is perhaps most at risk.
If you work with children or are involved with voluntary children organisations then the first step is to do a basic safeguarding awareness course. This will make you aware of any legal issues that affect you, where to get help, where to report any concerns you have and what to expect after reporting them.
Our Level 1 online course is suitable for anyone working with children or vulnerable adults including volunteers, nursery and school workers, activity club workers and those working in a nursing or care capacity. It leads to a RoSPA certificate and 2 CPD credits.
