Parents, carers, family and friends

This section is to provide information about Safeguarding to parents, carers, family and friends to promote the welfare of children and young people.

Child protection is not just about protecting children from abuse or neglect. It is also about helping children to grow up into confident, healthy and happy adults. The Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board (WSCB) aim to work together to provide services, care and support to children and their families in the borough, creating a healthy and positive environment, which will contribute to the safeguarding and promote the welfare of all children and young people in the borough, so that they can be safe, thrive and achieve.

You can find out how to contact us, or perhaps talk to someone else, in our 'Reporting concern or abuse' section. We have also written about what we can and will do to help if you want us to.

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Safer Parenting Handbook

This handbook has been produced by the WSCB, in consultation with parents and carers living in the borough. It contains a range of useful advice and information for parents and carers.

We hope that this handbook will give you some information and ideas to help you find ways through what can seem like a maze of issues and advice. We hope you find this helpful and worth keeping for future reference.

Safer Parenting Handbook

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Ending of Child Protection Register

This is to confirm that as of 1st April 2008 Wandsworth no longer has a Child Protection Register.

The Lord Laming Inquiry in 2003 into the death of Victoria Climbié recommended that "local authorities replace the Child Protection Register with a more effective system. Child protection conferences should remain, but the focus must no longer be on whether to register or not. Instead the focus should be on establishing an agreed plan to safeguard and promote the welfare of the particular child".

Working Together, 2006 (the guidance to inter-agency working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children) confirmed the implementation of this recommendation to take effect within each authority no later than the 1st April 2008.

We will continue to hold child protection conferences where there are concerns that a child is suffering or is at risk of suffering significant harm. If the child protection conference decides that a child is at risk of significant harm, the child will now be the "subject of a child protection plan". Wandsworth will continue to keep a record of all children who are subject of child protection plans.

The aim of this change is to focus workers and families on the child protection plan and the actions that need to be taken to keep children safe and to make a difference in their lives. The child protection plan is a working tool that should enable the family and professionals to focus on the outcomes for each individual child, to understand what is expected of them and what they can expect of others.

An effective child protection plan should:

• Identify any further assessments that are needed.
• Identify the root causes of the harm to the child, based on evidence and assessments to date.
• Set out specific and achievable child-focused outcomes (both long and short-term).
• Set out what both the family and workers involved need to do to stop the child suffering significant harm.
• Set out who will be checking the child is safe and well on a day to day basis.
• Include a contingency plan, i.e. what should be done if the child protection plan is not working.
• Describe how and when the child protection plan will be reviewed.

The first core group meeting will continue to be held within 10 days of the initial child protection conference. It is the responsibility of the core group (including family members) to draw up and add more detail to the outline child protection plan constructed at the conference.

It is the role of the key worker to co-ordinate the child protection plan, including keeping the child/young person up to date with the plan and finding out the child/young person's views.

The Wandsworth Safeguarding Children Board are using this opportunity to review practice around child protection conferences, and particularly the balance between the time spent within conferences sharing relevant information, conducting risk assessments and formulating meaningful outline child protection plans.

If you have any questions about this change, please contact Paul Secker (tel: 020 8871 6998, e-mail psecker@wandsworth.gov.uk) or one of the Child Protection Co-ordinators 020 8871 7303/6321/7163).

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