On this page: About the Board | What does safeguarding mean? | WSCB Annual Report 2008/09 & Action Plan 2009/10 | Flowchart of WSCB Structure | Dates of WSCB meetings | Previous Annual Reports
About the BoardThe Children Act 2004 required each Local Authority to establish a Local Safeguarding Children Board. The Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board (WSCB) is the key statutory mechanism for agreeing how the relevant organisations in Wandsworth co-ordinate services and co-operate to safeguard and promote the welfare of children and for ensuring the effectiveness of what they do. The WSCB is a multi-disciplinary forum, bringing together senior representatives of the main agencies responsible for working together to prevent and protect children from suffering significant harm, and to improve the well-being of all children. What does safeguarding mean?Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is defined in Working Together as:
The WSCB will ensure that the statutory duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children is carried out in such a way as to improve the well-being of children in relation to the five outcomes set by the government for all children (being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution and achieving economic well-being). Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children includes protecting children from harm. Ensuring that work to protect children is properly co-ordinated and effective remains a key goal for our board, and the WSCB should not focus on their wider role of preventative work to avoid harm being suffered, if this core responsibility is not being met. WSCB Annual Report 2008/09 & Action Plan 2009/10Every now and again the impact of a single incident leads to a major review of arrangements for keeping children safe. The death of Victoria Climbié was the driver for the "Every Child Matters" agenda and the more recent death of Baby Peter in Haringey lead to Lord Laming's review and the recent government response. The review confirmed that robust legislative, structural and policy foundations are in place and that the ECM reforms set the right direction. Lord Laming was equally clear that more needed to be done to ensure best practice is universally applied and that more support needed to be provided for the front line workforce. Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board is still relatively new. This annual report gives a flavour of the enormity of the agenda and the balance that must be struck between focusing on those most at risk and requiring protection and the broader safeguarding responsibilities which must also be addressed. It is difficult for the report to do justice to the twin requirements of establishing strong multi-agency working underpinned by practical procedures and policies and the professional challenge which must exist across agencies to secure the safety of children and young people. Nonetheless this is what the WSCB has achieved. Good professional dialogue and practice is being supported by excellent multi-agency working. This is a good foundation from which to progress but much still needs to be done and 2009/10 is likely to be a busy one. Paul Robinson
Flowchart of WSCB StructureDates for WSCB MeetingsMain WSCB
Executive Board
Sub-groups MeetingsPlease click here to view the dates of the various WSCB Sub-group Meetings. Annual Review Reports2007/08 Please click here to access the WSCB's Annual Report 2007/08. Appendis 1 - Flowchart of WSCB Structure Appendix 2a & 2b - Membership Executive & Main WSCB 2006/07 The Chair of the Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board, who is also the Chief Executive and Director of Administration of the Council, completed his annual review report on the progress on safeguarding children and young people in Wandsworth and the work of the Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board. |
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