Safeguarding Children: A Comparison of England's Data with that of Australia, Norway and the United States

Munro, Emily R.; Manful, Esmeranda

doi:10.1037/e516542013-015

Cited by 33 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…We know from aggregate data that the rate of initial social service contacts progressing to initial and core assessments in England steadily increased during 2004-6 and beyond (Munro and Manful, 2012), probably as a result of increased professional recognition of safeguarding concerns, along with professional anxiety exacerbated by blame culture. But we also know from the same data that significant proportions of children and young people referred to social services nonetheless received either no, or limited, further action beyond initial contact, and other evidence shows that interventions are more targeted towards younger than older children (Sharland, 2006).…”

Section: Social Services In Englandmentioning

confidence: 99%

Predictors of Social Service Contact among Teenagers in England

Henderson¹,

Scourfield

Cheung

et al. 2015

Br J Soc Work

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Very few UK studies make use of longitudinal general population data to explore social service contact for children and young people. Those that do only look at specific interventions such as care placements. This paper seeks to address this gap by asking to what extent do structural, neighbourhood, familial and individual characteristics predict social service contact? We provide an empirical answer by analysing the Longitudinal Survey of Young People in England, which includes data on social service contact in connection with young people's behaviour. Our findings indicate that social class, gender, ethnicity, stepfamily status and special education needs are all significant predictors of social service contact. Difficult parent-child relationships, frequent arguments and parents' lack of engagement with school meetings also matter, as does young people's own risktaking behaviour. We conclude with a discussion of the limitation of the data for social work research and the implications of the findings.

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Section: Social Services In Englandmentioning

confidence: 99%

Predictors of Social Service Contact among Teenagers in England

Henderson¹,

Scourfield

Cheung

et al. 2015

Br J Soc Work

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“…This increasing trend, in which over 60% of investigations do not find that children are suffering or likely to suffer significant harm, is increasing the stress on and causing harm to a growing number of families and simultaneously reducing the likelihood that these children receive help. This trend of an increasing involvement of children in the child protection system is seen in a number of countries (Bilson et al, 2015;Munro and Manful, 2012) where the broadening of criteria from maltreatment to responding to children's well-being leads to more investigations (e.g. Trocmé et al, 2014;Bilson et al, 2016) and children entering state care (Gilbert et al, 2011;Bilson et al, 2016).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Referrals and Child Protection in England: One in Five Children Referred to Children’s Services and One in Nineteen Investigated before the Age of Five

Bilson

Martin

2016

Br J Soc Work

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Based on a Freedom of Information request with data from 75% of all English children's services departments covering over ½ million children, this paper shows that 22.5% of children born in the 2009-10 financial year were referred to children's social care before their fifth birthday. Three-quarters of them were at some point assessed; almost two-thirds found to be in need; and a quarter formally investigated. These findings show the full extent of children's involvement in children's social care before the age of five. One in every 9 children born in 2009-10 was suspected by social workers of being abused and this high level of involvement is only justifiable if it is demonstrably reducing harm and promoting well-being of children -an outcome which is contested. Early Help's introduction was associated with high proportions of children being referred and assessed and rapidly increasing numbers of investigations thus questioning its ability to prevent entry to the child protection system. The paper calls for a change from the current emphasis on individualised and investigative approaches to child protection in order to provide an effective and humane response to children, the majority of whom live in families affected by high levels of deprivation and poverty. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 IntroductionDespite statistics on safeguarding being collected in England for many years, numerous inquiries, and decades of research there has never been information published at a national level to show how many children are involved in the system over their lifetime. This paper reports on a freedom of information (FoI) request that gathered data from 75% of all local authorities (LAs) in England covering over half a million children, 80% of all those born in the 2009-10 financial year. It provides, for the first time, information on how many children were referred to children's services before reaching the age of five. It also shows how many were formally assessed; suspected of abuse; subject to a child protection investigation; on a child protection plan; and entered care. More than one in five of all children were referred and many progressed deeper into the formal child protection system. Given the shame and fear that accusations of abuse can cause (Gibson 2013) this high level of involvement is only justifiable if it is demonstrably reducing harm and promoting well-being of children -a goal which is certainly contested (Edwards et al., 2015; Featherstone, White and Morris, 2014a; Frost and Parton, 2009; Gilbert et al., 2012).The FoI request shows that this information on numbers of children involved in the safeguarding system over 5 years is easily produced. The fact that such important information has, until now, been unavailable is an indication of how research agendas and policy making in many cases have been f...

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“…Over the past decade the proportion of cases attributed to neglect has remained relatively stable, at around 40-45% of registrations across the UK, while sexual abuse and physical abuse have 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 This also mirrors changing trends internationally with the majority of children in Australia and the US now being classified under neglect or emotional abuse (Munro & Manful, 2012). Munro & Manful (2012) attribute this to increasing recognition of the detrimental impact of these forms of abuse although they recognise these designations have the greatest definitional ambiguity at an international level.…”

Section: Insert Figs 9 and 10mentioning

confidence: 66%

“…Numerous international studies point to very large variations in child abuse reporting rates as well differences in patterns and rates of child welfare interventions between and within a range of countries (see for example Gilbert et al 2012;Gilbert, 1997;Bunting and Wallace, 2007;Munro & Manful, 2012;Tilbury and Thoburn, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in Child Protection Across the UK: A Comparative Analysis

Bunting

McCartan

McGhee

et al. 2017

The British Journal of Social Work

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Although numerous international studies point to large variations in child welfare interventions, comparative analysis has tended to focus either solely on England or the UK as a whole, discounting differences across the four UK countries. This paper compares trends in national statistics relating to the operation of child protection systems across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland between 2004/5 and 2013/14. Despite a number of legislative, operational and definitional differences between nations, a number of trends are apparent. All systems show an increasing orientation towards child protection as evidenced by rising rates of child protection investigation and children subject to child protection planning. Increasingly, this relates to emotional abuse and involves younger children aged 0-4 years. However, the way cases are processed can differ with only one in ten referrals resulting in a child protection investigation in Northern Ireland compared to one in five in England.Potential reasons for these differences are discussed and questions raised as to why, more than quarter century after the introduction of the Children Act 1989, we still have no clear picture of the circumstances of families who come into contact with social services or the services provided to support them. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 While providing a valuable framework for interpreting variations between countries, UK-based comparative research, to date, has tended to focus either solely on England or the UK as a whole, discounting differences across the four UK countries of England, Northern Ireland (NI), Scotland and Wales.Although qualitative comparison (Stafford et al., 2012) points to considerable commonality amongst constituent UK countries with regard to child protection legislation, structures and procedures, a cursory glance at recent national statistics shows considerable variation between nations; at the end of 2013/14 Scotland had the lowest rate of children subject to child protection plans (28 per 10,000) and Wales the highest (50 per 10,000), while England had the lowest rate of children looked after by the state (60 per 10,000) and Scotland the highest (156 per 10,000).

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Safeguarding Children: A Comparison of England's Data with that of Australia, Norway and the United States

Cited by 33 publications

References 37 publications

Predictors of Social Service Contact among Teenagers in England

Predictors of Social Service Contact among Teenagers in England

Referrals and Child Protection in England: One in Five Children Referred to Children’s Services and One in Nineteen Investigated before the Age of Five

Trends in Child Protection Across the UK: A Comparative Analysis

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