Issue - meetings

That the report be accepted as information in relation to Child Protection and Safeguarding for the period 1 October 2012 to 31 December 2013.

The Director of Community Services introduced the report providing statistical information in relation to Child Protection and Safeguarding, which was a priority area for the Council.  He said that the new structure may provide an opportunity to consider safeguarding reports for both children and adults together and went on to thank the Head of Children’s Services and her team for their response to the increase in child protection referrals, together with support from the Cabinet resulting in the provision of additional resources to maintain the quality of the service.

The Head of Children’s Services highlighted the activity within the report along with positive corporate responses to reaffirm the Council’s commitment on child safety.  In highlighting earlier comments that children were behind each statistic in the report, she pointed out that removing a child from their parents was not a decision taken lightly but was unavoidable in some cases.

Councillor Ian Dunbar referred to the increase in child protection registrations during the latter part of 2013 from 58 to 158 but acknowledged the need to sanction this for the children’s protection.  He recognised the work carried out by the service and asked what measures were being put in place to meet the increasing demand.  The Service Manager, Children’s Fieldwork Services, reported that the figure had since reduced to 126, with 18 on the temporary register.  Over the last quarter, there had been 138 child protection investigations of which 19 had proceeded to case conferences.  He explained that a multi-agency risk assessment conference (MARAC) approach was taken and believed that the improvements in the service provided assurance of a robust process.

On children’s safeguarding, the implementation of the Public Law Outline had presented challenges in terms of a much tighter deadline for completion of Court hearings, however progress was being made.

RESOLVED:

That the report be accepted as information in relation to Child Protection and Safeguarding for the period 1 October 2012 to 31 December 2013.