In January 2022, the Panel published terms of reference for a national child safeguarding practice review into allegations of harm to children living in three privately run residential facilities for children with disabilities and complex health needs. Dame Christine Lenehan DBE, Director of the Council for Disabled Children, is conducting the review on behalf of the Panel.
 
Due to the large scope of the review, with alleged harm to a significant number of children, the Panel agreed to conduct the review in two phases.
 
Phase One has considered safeguarding practice and the quality of care received by the individual children in scope of the review. The report on this phase is being finalised and will be published in the Autumn. It will consider a range of issues relating to the placement of these children, factors that undermined their safety and wellbeing and the quality of external oversight and quality assurance. 
 
Phase Two of the review will look at a wider issues to assess whether issues identified are reflective of child safeguarding practice more generally, to identify relevant national learning and to make recommendations about changes that need to be made to policy and practice.  A series of stakeholder roundtables will be conducted by the Panel as part of Phase Two.
 
If you have any questions, please direct all correspondence to Mailbox.NationalReviewPanel@education.gov.uk

Sally Shearer OBE has been appointed to the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel from 1st July 2022 to 14th November 2025.
 
Sally’s appointment follows a competitive recruitment exercise undertaken by the Department for Education due to the end of Sarah Elliott’s tenure as the nursing representative.
 
Sally is a Registered Children's Nurse with 42 years’ experience in the NHS, most recently as Chief Nurse and Acting Deputy Chief Executive at Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust. Her leadership experience spans acute, community and mental health services across South Yorkshire, the Midlands and East London.  Sally was awarded an OBE for services to nursing in the Queen's Birthday Honours in 2020.
 
Sally has previously served as a Fitness to Practice panellist with the Nursing and Midwifery Council and is currently an Executive Reviewer for the Care Quality Commission.

In June 2022, the Panel hosted five webinars about the national review into the murders of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson. We would like to thank everyone who attended. Over 1,500 people engaged in the sessions with lively Q&A and debate. Watch the recording here and download a summary of the key issues discussed:

As requested, it is also possible to download the slides for each session on the following links:

·      Solihull / Arthur

·      Bradford / Star

·      Safeguarding partners

·      Business managers

·      Frontline professionals

The Panel was very shocked and troubled by what happened to Child Q and the humiliation and deep distress she will have suffered when she was strip searched on her own in her school by the police. No child should be treated in this way. This was reflected in the shock expressed by so many people across the country.
 
The Local Child Safeguarding Practice Review (LCSPR) published by City & Hackney Safeguarding Children Partnership provides important learning for the sector and should be carefully considered to ensure that the very poor child safeguarding practice exhibited by the school and police is not repeated.
 
We agree with the review findings that Child Q’s race was a factor in how the school and the police responded. The LCSPR shines a vital light on a range of safeguarding issues, including the impact of racism and ‘adultification’ on the practice of professionals. Our Panel Member, Jahnine Davis, explores ‘adultification’ in a paper about this form of bias within child protection and safeguarding. We would encourage safeguarding partners to read this (link here).
 
Our contact with City & Hackney Safeguarding Children Partnership has established how lessons learned from this LCSPR are being applied through further work on safeguarding in schools in the borough.  We believe that this has wider relevance, across London but also nationally, and have therefore written to senior officials in the Department for Education to draw their attention to the Partnership’s work highlighting the impact of schools’ cultures, of racism, and how behaviour and discipline policies are enacted in practice.
 
The LCSPR also recommended that the Panel should work with the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) with a view to developing national guidance on police engagement with the LCSPR process which includes timely sharing of information. We have accepted this recommendation and are in discussion with them about these issues.
 
The Panel has also reflected a great deal on our response to the rapid review submitted in January 2021, prior to the completion of the LCSPR.  We recognise that this has been a cause for concern and wanted to explain that at the time there was a lengthy discussion about the very distressing circumstances outlined in the review as well as whether the incident met the criteria as set out in Working Together 2018.
 
We recognise that our feedback in response to the rapid review neither reflected the seriousness of the issues under consideration, the discussion at the Panel meeting or that Hackney could choose to undertake an LCSPR because what happened raised issues of importance to the local area. We are sorry that this was not the case. We want to continue to improve our dialogue with safeguarding partners, including how we give feedback and have taken a number of steps recently to improve the quality of this. We welcome your continuing feedback on these issues.
 
Finally, a key priority for the Panel is making real our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion in terms of how we undertake our work and in making sure that the needs of all children are understood and addressed. This is a priority area for us and our forthcoming Annual Report for 2021 will include further information about these critical issues.

The Panel is updating its guidance for local safeguarding partners. This is an important part of the Panel’s support for safeguarding partnerships and in how we use evidence and data to drive system improvement and learning through high quality reviews.
 
The Panel is asking for business managers, independent chairs and safeguarding partners to come forward and work with us to review the guidance. Although this is not a formal consultation, we are aiming to ensure we have input from across the regions and to ensure there is equal input from across the statutory partners. 
 
Please submit your interest to Mailbox.NationalReviewPanel@education.gov.uk by Friday 29^th July and we will send through further details.

The following LCSPRs were published between 1^st March and 30^th June 2022.

• London: Lambeth, LCSPR Angela; Croydon, LCSPR Ben; City & Hackney, Child Q; Ealing, Young person H and others; Bexley, Young Person 5;
• South-East: Portsmouth, LCSPR Freya; LCSPR Skylar;  Berkshire West, Bobby; Berkshire West, Aiden; Essex, Child V;
• South-West: Hampshire, Amelia; Plymouth, Young Person A; Plymouth, Baby Isla;
• East: Norfolk, Child AJ; Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, Stephen,
• North-West: Trafford, Teddy Wilbur and Peter; Trafford, Michael; Bolton, Child F;
• North-East: Hartlepool & Stockton-on-Tees, Child Q; Hartlepool & Stockton-on-Tees, Alex; Sunderland, Helen & Jane;
• West Midlands: Warwickshire, Prada and Jordan; Warwickshire, Charlie; Warwickshire, James;
• East Midlands: Northamptonshire, Child AU; Nottinghamshire, Addendum to LCSPR SN20
• Yorkshire & the Humber: Kirklees, Child A; Kirklees, Child K; Leeds, Jake; Barnsley, Child W; Barnsley, Child X;

Thematic reviews:

• Somerset: Thematic LCSPR injuries to babies during the pandemic lockdown
• Wiltshire: Long-term sexual abuse of children in care
• Pan-Dorset: Multi-Agency thematic summary on extra familial harm in memory of Child M

• The Department for Education’s Strengthening Families, Protecting Children (SFPC) programme held a national online event on 14-15 June to share learning from the implementation of the three practice models involved in the programme: Hertfordshire Family Safeguarding, Leeds Family Valued and North Yorkshire No Wrong Door. Over 600 representatives from local authorities, central government, health and voluntary and community sector agencies attended over the two days and heard from the three innovator local authorities as well as those adopting the models. Materials from the event and recordings from all sessions are now available via this link: National Online Learning Event 2022 | Strengthening Families, Protecting Children (SFPC) (scie.org.uk)