Naomi Knott - Professional Development Services - 2015
SAFEGUARDING CHILDREN
TRAINING FOR ELECTED
MEMBERS
Purpose of Training
 Provide an overview of the role of elected members
in relation to Safeguarding
 Understand the terms Safeguarding and Child
Protection
 Brief overview of key considerations in Child
Safeguarding
 The Plymouth Picture
 Where to go next for more information
Elected Members
ROLES, RESPONSIBILITIES &
GOOD PRACTICE
Role / Responsibilities of Elected
Members in Safeguarding
Councillors have a responsibility to:
 report concerns about a child to the appropriate body
 avoid situations that may be misinterpreted and lead to
allegations of inappropriate behaviour.
 inform the relevant officers if they have a concern and
need advice on reporting abuse, or if they are
concerned about a colleague potentially perpetrating
abuse
 Immediate danger - If a child or vulnerable adult is in
immediate danger then contact the police
Good Practice for Councillors
 Not all councillors will have direct contact with
children as part of their roles.
 However some will as part of their ward councillor
role or for civic duties
 It is important that councillors operate within a safe
working environment for children and vulnerable
adults.
 If councillors adhere to the principles of safe working,
this benefits the work and reputation of the council
by developing an open and positive climate.
Performing Councillor Duties
 Councillors should ensure that they do not have
contact with vulnerable children on their own in their
role as a councillor.
 Some councillors may have this level of contact in their
employment or in a voluntary capacity, and will have
been required to have a disclosure and barring service
check to undertake this.
 It is important that members avoid unsupervised
contact with a vulnerable person to prevent the risk of
an allegation of inappropriate behaviour
Whistle-blowing (institutional
abuse)
 Serious concerns about poor practice in the
organisation or the council’s approach to safeguarding
should be addressed by referring using the Council’s
Whistleblowing Policy.
 Councillors may represent the council on outside
bodies. If a councillor has a safeguarding concern that
relates to the behaviour of officers or trustees within
these organisations, these concerns should be reported
to the organisation.
 They should also make the relevant senior officer for
each outside body aware of their concerns.
The Lead Member for Children’s
Services (LMCS)
 Section 19 Children Act 2004 requires local authority
to designate Lead Member for Children’s Services.
 The LMCS has political responsibility for the leadership,
strategy and effectiveness of local authority children’s
services.
 The LMCS is also democratically accountable to local
communities and has a key role in defining the local
vision and setting political priorities for children’s
services within the broader political context of the
Council.
Definitions
WHAT IS SAFEGUARDING
AND CHILD PROTECTION
Child Protection
 Child protection is the process of protecting
individual children identified as either suffering, or
likely to suffer, significant harm as a result of abuse or
neglect.
 Child abuse involves acts of commission and omission,
which results in harm to the child. The four types of
abuse are physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional
abuse and neglect.
Difference between Safeguarding
and Child Protection
 Safeguarding, and promoting the welfare of children, is
a broader term than child protection.
 It encompasses protecting children from
maltreatment, preventing impairment of children's
health or development, and ensures children grow up
in safe circumstances.
 Child protection is part of this definition and refers to
activities undertaken to prevent children suffering, or
likely to suffer, significant harm.
What is Abuse
 ‘The violation of an individual’s human and civil rights
by any other person or persons’ (Department of
Health, 2000)
 Abuse commonly occurs within a relationship of trust
or responsibility and represents an abuse of power or
a breach of trust.
 It includes bullying and domestic violence.
 Abuse may be perpetrated in a family or institutional
or community setting, by those known to the
individual victim or, more rarely, by a stranger.
What does ‘Promoting Welfare’
Mean?
 Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is
defined as:
 protecting children from maltreatment
 preventing impairment of children’s health or
development
 ensuring that children are growing up in
circumstances consistent with the provision of safe
and effective care
 taking action to enable all children to have the best
life chances.
How should professionals work
together?
 Statutory Guidance - Working Together to Safeguard
Children 2015 published by the Department for
Education
 local authority chief executives & children’s social work
 local safeguarding children board chairs
 teachers and education staff
 health service professionals and adult services
 police officers
 voluntary and community sector workers in contact with
children and families
What is Physical Abuse?
 Hitting, shaking, pushing, kicking, throwing, poisoning,
burning or scalding, drowning, suffocating, punching,
biting, deliberate burns, stabbing, strangulation,
unnecessary or inappropriate restraint and other
forms of assault.
 Medical mistreatment such as withholding or
inappropriately altering or administering medication or
other treatments, and fabricating the symptoms of, or
deliberately inducing, illness.
2001
Adam/Ikpo Mwosa
The headless, limbless
body of a boy aged
between five and six was
found floating in the river
Thames
Nigerian child trafficked to
Germany and later Britain
by traditional witch
doctors who sacrificed him
in the name of magic.
Psychological or emotional
abuse:
 Deprivation of social contact or deliberate isolation,
overprotection and limitation of exploration and
learning, being made to feel worthless or inadequate,.
 Humiliation, blaming, verbal abuse, lack of privacy or
choice, use of coercion, using threats or fears to override a person’s wishes
 Treating an adult as if they were a child.
 It may involve serious bullying.
Neglect
 Neglect features in 60% of all Serious Case Reviews.
 Lack of care, deprivation of necessary personal care,
failure to protect from harm, failure to provide
adequate food, clothing and shelter (including exclusion
from home or abandonment), failure to provide access
to appropriate medical care or treatment, removal of
aids to daily living.
 Neglect of or unresponsiveness to a child’s basic
emotional needs.
2008
Khyra Ishaq
‘Khyra dropped down as she walked
after a spirit got into her body, it was
evil and it was trying to control her
body because Khyra had accepted it
as a friend’ Kyra’s Sibling
Khyra and five other children in the
couple's care were starved, beaten
Better assessment and tortured in house bursting with
and information
food. Kyhra withdrawn from school
sharing might have for ‘home education’. The family
helped prevent
believed in spirit possession.
Hamzah Khan died 2011
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ukengland-24388175
Hamzah Khan's
mummified remains were
found in squalor at their
Bradford home in
September 2011 after he
died due to severe
malnutrition
Unknown and Invisible:
did not participate in
routine universal
services, persistent DV
& Neglect
Sexual Abuse
 Involves forcing or enticing a vulnerable individual to
take part in sexual activities including prostitution
whether or not they are aware of what is happening.
 This may include non contact activities such as
watching or producing online images, and watching
sexual activities.
Child Sexual Exploitation CSE
 Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) is illegal activity by
people who have power over young people and use it
to sexually abuse them.
 This can involve a broad range of exploitative activity,
from seemingly 'consensual' relationships and informal
exchanges of sex for attention, accommodation, gifts
or cigarettes, through to very serious organised crime.
 Hidden from view and going unnoticed, vulnerable
young girls and boys are groomed and then abused,
leaving them traumatised and scarred for life
Lara McDonnell’s Story
Lara was one on the six girls the Operation Bullfinch Serious Case Review
focuses on.
Operation Bullfinch, Oxford, culminated in seven men being convicted of
around 60 offences against six children.
Lara subsequently wrote her own account of what happened to her.
Her understanding of her experiences led her to make the following
observations:
Lara’s Voice
‘The level of manipulation and coercion was shocking. Me
and the other girls were brainwashed so effectively and
thoroughly that none of us possessed free will.’
‘We were owned, we were hollow husks- our will
belonged to the men’.
‘Singled out and isolated , we did not engage with anyone.
The links we built with our abusers were based on a web
of threats, addiction and compulsion’.
Lara’s Voice
 “It was like Stockholm syndrome- the psychological
phenomenon whereby victims of kidnapping start to
display positive attachment to their captors.
 None of us was capable of making decisions for
ourselves and we were made to believe that what we
were doing we were doing willingly. The men are
paedophiles who are experts in grooming vulnerable
girls……..”
Lara’s Voice
“It was only after I broke away from the gang that I began to
realise the deep psychological control they had exerted over
me. I had believed what happened to me was my own fault; I
didn’t see myself as a victim. Often I felt a duty to protect
them.
They made me feel that I was the problem and I deserved to be
treated the way I was, which I now know was ridiculous.
I only really came to terms with the fact I wasn’t to blame
when I heard the details given at the trial- it was like a veil was
lifted from my eyes.”
Long term effects of abuse
include
 emotional difficulties such as anger, anxiety, low self-worth
 mental health problems such as depression, eating
disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), self harm,
 problems with drugs or alcohol
 disturbing thoughts, emotions and memories that cause
distress or confusion
 poor physical health
 struggling with parenting or relationships
 learning difficulties, lower educational attainment, difficulties
in communicating
 behavioural problems and criminal behaviour
Information Sharing and Serious
Case Reviews
 Sharing information helps keep children and young
people safe.
 Serious Case Reviews highlight the need for effective
and timely information sharing so that risks and
strengths can be accurately assessed.
 Serious Case Reviews help us learn lessons from
serious events to develop practice and systems to
better protect children
Daniel Pelka - died in March 2012
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-coventrywarwickshire-24106823
Starved and beaten
for months before he
died in March 2012,
at his Coventry home
Delays in recording
information, delays in sharing
information, challenges in
managing the volume of
information, parallel challenges
in schools and health visiting.
Poor quality social care
assessments lacking detail
and inadequate chronologies
It can happen anywhere…
 Keanu was born in Torbay, Devon, and the SCR found
Torbay's Children's Services should have been aware of the
risks even before his birth.
 It states: "There was enough information available to raise
concerns that the unborn child was likely to be at risk of
suffering significant harm.”
 The toddler was found with 37 injuries including a fractured
skull and torn abdomen, in Ward End, Birmingham. His mother
was subsequently convicted and imprisoned.
 The SCR concluded: "If a child protection plan had been in
place, there would have been more robust arrangements to
safeguard and promote Keanu's interests.“ [2011]
Learning from Keanu
 "Professional over optimism"
 A lack of "professional curiosity" in questioning information
 A lack of confidence among professionals in challenging parents
and other professionals
 Poor communication between and within agencies.
 A lack of analysis of information
 Shortcomings in recording systems
 In a comment that echoes those made after the death of
starved four-year-old Daniel Pelka the report says that Keanu
had become "invisible".
Not Every Death is Preventable
 Andrew Webb, from the Association of Directors of Children's
Services, said: "There is something about the human condition
which leads to parents killing their children."
 “50 to 70 children died at the hands of their parents or carers
every year.” (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-coventry-warwickshire-23528650)
 Even when multi-agency practice is exemplary, not every child
death or injury is preventable
 Learning from Serious Case Reviews enables us to reflect on
policies, procedures and practices and to continually improve
Remember that the Process of
Child protection ‘Protects’
 There were 68,840 looked after children at 31 March 2014 – an
increase of 1% compared to 31 March 2013. 50% were boys and
50% girls
 Most (72%) came to social service's attention due to abuse or
neglect and 51,340 (75%) were in a foster placement
 There were 5,050 looked after children adopted during the year
ending 31 March 2014, an increase of 26% from 2013. The
average age was 3 years and 5 months.
 72% were placed for adoption due to abuse or neglect, 15% due
to family dysfunction, 5% because the birth family was in 'acute
stress'
Where can I get further
Training?
 Plymouth Safeguarding Childrens Board (PSCB)
run multiple courses.
 The training reflects lessons from Serious Case
reviews and the outcomes of national enquiries to
present contemporary thinking and best practice.
 All training is multi -agency.
 How do I access the training?
 For further information email
safeguardingtraining@plymouth.gov.uk
 or telephone 01752 307535
Further Reading
 Statutory Guidance Working Together to
Safeguard Children 2015
 Local authorities have overarching responsibility for
safeguarding and promoting the welfare of all children and
young people in their area. They have a number of statutory
functions under the 1989 and 2004 Children Acts which make
this clear, and this guidance sets these out in detail.
 https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attach
ment_data/file/419595/Working_Together_to_Safeguard_Chil
dren.pdf