Contact:
  • Children and Families Services 
  • Address:

    Bath & North East Somerset Social & Housing Services, P. O. Box 3343,Bath.BA1 2ZH

  • E-mail:
    children_family@bathnes.gov.uk 
  • Telephone:
    (01225) 397985 
  • Fax:
    (01225) 396115 
  • Minicom:
    (01225) 477815  
  • Page Updated:
    14/09/2007
  • Author:
    Ted Head 
A to Z Index

Local Safeguarding Children Board

Annual Report and Business Plan 2007 - 2008

Aims,Core Principles and Objectives

Aims

The Local Safeguarding Children Board will focus on children and young people who are suffering or likely to suffer significant harm and on safeguarding and promoting the welfare of these children.  In doing so, the Board will promote activities that protect children and young people from actual significant harm and the continuing risk of harm, that minimise the impact of harm, and that promote factors that enhance protection.

The Local Safeguarding Children Board will work to raise awareness within the wider community, and communities of interest, taking into account differing backgrounds and needs, and among statutory, voluntary and independent agencies, about how everybody can contribute to safeguarding children and promoting their welfare.

Underpinning the LSCB’s work is the belief that every child matters, families count and communities make the difference.

Values

Key values which underpin our work:

  • Children are citizens entitled to the protection and care of the State, and whose rights, needs and welfare are paramount whatever their circumstances.
  • Children have the right to be protected from abuse, neglect and exploitation.
  • Children’s views should be taken seriously, and where they do not conflict with their welfare should be acted upon as far as it is possible.
  • Parents have “parental responsibility” for their children and, except where it is contra-indicated, their children’s welfare should be promoted through their parents care.  Parents’ views should always be sought, and where they are meeting their responsibilities they should make all major decisions affecting their children’s lives.
  • The need to recognise and value the racial and cultural diversity of Bath and North East Somerset’s communities combined with a commitment to anti-discriminatory practice in respect of gender, race, ethnicity, disability, and sexual orientation.
  • Supporting families to stay together except where the welfare of their children contra-indicates it.

Core Principles

1.         Safeguarding children services in Bath and North East Somerset are based on the use of professional judgement within the framework of agreed guidance and procedures.

2.         Safeguarding children practice in Bath and North East Somerset is multi-disciplinary at all stages of the process.

3.         Safeguarding children services in Bath and North East Somerset are focused on safeguarding and promoting the welfare of the child by meeting the needs of the child and his/her family.

4.         Safeguarding children services in Bath and North East Somerset recognise that intervention is most effective when parents and young people are fully engaged.

5.         Safeguarding children services in Bath and North East Somerset maintain as its primary focus the welfare of the child in all its work involving others.

Core Objectives of the LSCB

1.         To co-ordinate what is done by each person or body represented on the Board for the purpose of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children living in, attending school in, or visiting Bath and North East Somerset.

2.         To ensure the effectiveness of what is done by each such person or body for that purpose.

3.         To work to reconcile the different organisational responsibilities and ensure lines of accountability for inter-agency work.

4.         To ensure agencies demonstrate effectiveness in their safeguarding work and that they are held accountable to the LSCB for efficiently co-operating with other services.

Overall Objectives

1.         To develop and agree local policies and procedures for inter-agency work to safeguarding children within the framework provided by Working Together to Safeguard Children.

2.         To audit and evaluate how well local services work together to safeguard children.

3.         To put into practice objectives and performance indicators for safeguarding children, within the framework and objectives set out in the Children & Young People’s Plan, and ensure that the Plan takes into account priorities promoted by the LSCB Business Plan.

4.         To encourage and help develop effective working relationships between different services and professional groups, parents, carers and young people based on trust and mutual understanding.

5.         To ensure there is a level of agreement and understanding across agencies about operational definitions and thresholds for intervention. 

6.         To improve local ways of working in the light of the knowledge gained through national and local experience and research, and to make sure that any lessons learned are shared, understood and acted upon.

7.         To help improve the quality of safeguarding children work and inter-agency working through specifying needs for inter-agency training and development, and ensuring that the training is delivered and evaluated.  Further, that this training informs better practice and improved outcomes for children and young people.

8.         To raise awareness within the wider community of the need to safeguard children and promote their welfare, and to explain how the wider community can contribute to these objectives.

9.         To make sure that any lessons learned from case reviews are understood and acted upon: to communicate clearly to individual services and professional groups their shared responsibility for safeguarding children, and to explain how each can contribute.