Comment on Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel’s third...

Charlotte Ramsden, ADCS President, said:

“This latest national learning review from the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel considers some very distressing cases. It is clear the pandemic has intensified some of the ‘hidden harms’ we’ve heard about, bringing the health, safety and wellbeing of children to the fore. Babies and very young children cannot tell us how they feel or what is happening to them and disrupted access to the formal and informal networks families rely on, from health visitors to grandparents, further heightens the risk of harm as the rise in serious incident notifications shows.

“This review highlights some longer term challenges in both policy and practice that require urgent action. This includes the involvement of, and focus on men, both before the birth of a baby and the weeks and months following. Our collective focus is almost exclusively on mother and child and this is crucial, but we must make space for fathers and other male figures in both assessments and offers of parenting support. The Panel calls for new government investment in multi-agency responses, which the Association wholly supports. The role of health services are particularly important but there is more we can all do as local leaders, strategic partnerships and frontline professionals, to understand and respond to the needs of men and share our respective insights in order to keep children safe.”

ENDS

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