News

It is only through sharing information that agencies or organisations and practitioners build a richer picture of the day-to-day life of the child and family they are working with.

The DSCP have developed an Information Sharing Agreement to provide a framework to share information to safeguard children and young people, specifically when considering information relating to harm outside the home.

Tier 2 Information Sharing Agreement:  Harm Outside of the Home (Durham).

It sets out clear expectations and the importance of timely, informed, respectful and purposeful gathering and sharing of information.

Sharing information could change a child’s life; if you think a child is at risk, you can share information to protect them from harm and to provide the right help at the right time which allows us to safeguard children and provide support at an early stage.

It is not necessary to seek consent to share information for the purposes of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of a child provided that there is a lawful basis to process any personal information required.

Find out more by accessing the DSCP training package which will support you in your role to share information to safeguard children and young people.  The course covers:

• learning from practice in Durham
• information sharing in the context of safeguarding; a strong emphasis on prevention, and;
• sharing within the lawful basis of ‘public task’ rather than consent

Training can be found at Information sharing – How We Share in Durham (durham-scp.org.uk)

For further information contact DSCP Business Unit; DSCPSecure@durham.gov.uk

The Durham Safeguarding Children Partnership Annual Report 2023/2024 is now available on our Annual Reports page.

The Improvement Delivery Group have now completed the first five stages of the learning cycle for Priority Three. The Business Unit have created a briefing for practitioners to explain what we have looked at and to give some helpful links to resources and guidance. It is an A3 document designed to be taken into team meetings, supervisions or to be used by practitioners to help them to reflect on key learning, shares strengths in practice, identifies areas for learning in safeguarding practice, together with details on the steps you can take to find out more and access further training and resources.

DSCP Priority Three – First 1001 Days.pdf

This rapid review was conducted in January 2024 following a serious incident notification being made in response to the death of a young baby.  The review document includes the safeguarding concerns and incident, what’s worked well, learning from practice and what the DSCP is doing.

Key Learning Annabel.pdf

On 15 December 2023, the government published “Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023. Statutory guidance on multi-agency working to help, protect and promote the welfare of children”.

This statutory guidance sets out what organisations and agencies who have functions relating to children must and should do to help, protect and promote the welfare of all children and young people under the age of 18 in England. The 2023 edition replaces Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018.

A summary of changes is now available at Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023 (durham-scp.org.uk)