On 10 June 2010, the Secretary of State for Education commissioned Professor Eileen Munro of the London School of Economics to conduct a wide-ranging independent review to improve child protection. On 10 May 2011, Professor Munro published her final report entitled A child-centred system.
Professor Munro has carried out a wide-ranging and in-depth review. Her report makes fifteen recommendations and signals a shift from previous reforms that, while well-intentioned, resulted in a tick-box culture and a loss of focus on the needs of the child. Taken together, the recommendations cover the following key areas:
- radical reduction in the amount of central prescription to help professionals move from a compliance culture to a learning culture, where they have more freedom to assess need and provide the right help. Statutory guidance should be revised and the inspection process modified to give a clearer focus on children’s needs. Inspection should be unannounced;
- a change of approach to Serious Case Reviews (SCRs), with learning from the approach taken in sectors such as aviation and healthcare. There should be a stronger focus on understanding the underlying issues that made professionals behave the way they did and what prevented them from being able to properly help and protect children. The current system is too focused on what happened, not why;
- reform of social work training and placements with employers and Higher Education Institutions and doing more to prepare social work students for the challenges of child protection work. The work of the Social Work task Force and the Social Work Reform Board should be built upon to improve frontline expertise;
- each local authority should designate a Principal Child and Family Social Worker to report the views and experiences of the front line to all levels of management. At national level, a Chief Social Worker should be established to advise the Government on social work practice;
- local authorities and their statutory partners should be given a new duty to secure sufficient provision of early help services for children, young people and families, leading to better identification of the help that is needed and resulting in an offer of early help;
- affirmation of the importance of clear lines of accountability as set out in the Children Act 2004 and the protection of the roles of Director of Children’s Services and Lead Members from additional functions, unless there are exceptional circumstances; and
- strengthened monitoring of the effectiveness of help and protection by Local Safeguarding Children Boards, including multi- agency training for safeguarding and child protection.
DfE Ministers have welcomed Professor Munro’s thorough analysis of the issues. They want to consider carefully, with professionals, how best to respond to her proposals to bring about the long-term reform needed.
Ministers are establishing an implementation working group drawing together key individuals from the social work profession, local government, health, police, education and the voluntary sector. The Government will work closely with this group, whose membership will be announced shortly, to develop a full response to Professor Munro’s recommendations before the summer recess.