Child protection – Lord Laming recommendations and Green Paper ‘Every Child Matters’

Report: 12
Date: 12 February 2004
By: Commissioner

Summary

Progress report regarding Child Protection in the MPS, in particular the Lord Laming recommendations update and the changes in the approach to child protection following the publication of the Green paper ‘Every Child matters’, presented to Parliament by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury by Command of Her Majesty September 2003.

A. Recommendations

That the progress made in addressing child protection issues be noted.

B. Supporting information

1. The Planning Performance and Review Committee (PPRC) has requested a Police Authority report covering three areas that are headlined below.

• Follow up on the report produced by the MPS on Child Protection – Implementation of the Laming report presented to the PPRC on the 9 October 2003.
• Provide a summary of the MPS response to the Green Paper Every Child matters.
• Any other information the MPS considers relevant.

An update on Lord Laming’s recommendations, issues relating to Child Protection in the MPS

2. In light of the nature and complexities of the recommendations it has been decided that this report will take the form of a brief update on each recommendation as opposed to a review of the period for 2003.

3. In response to the recommendations, the Child Protection Command (SCD5) have seconded a Detective Chief Inspector to head up the Change Programme Team to co-ordinate and manage the resulting projects and actions that have evolved over the past twelve months.

4. Recommendation 91 – ‘Save in exceptional circumstances, no child is to be taken into police protection until he or she has been seen and an assessment of his or her circumstances has been undertaken’.

5. Police Notice 29/03 implemented, initial evaluation undertaken with positive feedback. A six monthly review is due in April of this year to benchmark the initial results against that review.

6. Recommendation 92 – ‘Chief Constables must ensure that crimes involving a child victim are dealt with promptly and efficiently, and to the same standard as equivalent crimes against adults’.

7. In September 2001, the Child Protection Command issued Professional Standards for Crime Investigation involving inter familial child victims set against critical success factors drawn from the ACPO Murder Manual. These have been subsequently re-enforced in SCD5's Professional Standards Manual within specific Standard Operating Procedures issued. Version 6 of the manual issued in August 2003.

8. In the Metropolitan Police, officers in SCD5 now attend a 4-week Centrex investigator's course, 1 week SCD5 specialist child protection training, 1-week Achieving Best Evidence training and 1 week multi agency training.

9. Recommendation 93 – ‘Whenever a joint investigation by police and social services is required into possible injury or harm to a child, a manager from each agency should always be involved at the referral stage and in any further strategy discussion’.

10. Since the update provided to the MPA in October 2003, the Referral Managers have been party to a working group on the evaluation of the Referral Units, the outcome is to published shortly but in essence the referral system is working efficiently and effectively but does require an increase in administration staff to most of the Referral Units.

11. The financial implications to recruit the staff necessary would be in the region of £400,000. This is based on the increase of twenty police staff at band ‘E’. The need for an increase on the Referral Units was highlighted in the recent Inspection report undertaken by Commander Paddick in September 2003.

12. Recommendation 94 – ‘In cases of serious crime against children, supervisory officers must, from the beginning, take an active role in ensuring that a proper investigation is carried out’.

13. The introduction of the Referral Manager within Child Protection Units has improved the initial supervision with regard to allegations at the point of referral, this aligned to a greater awareness across the command for the need to monitor the performance of their officers and their CPU cases has ensured that performance data is updated on a daily basis and passed to the OCU Crime Management Unit which was formed in January 2003 The role of the Crime Management Unit is to monitor and to maintain the standards required by the MPS with regard to Crime reporting and crime disposal.

14. Recommendation 95 – ‘The Association of Chief Police Officers must produce and implement the standards-based service, as recommended by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary in the 1999 thematic inspection report, Child Protection’.

15. This requires a national response from ACPO. The MPS professional standards based service is accepted nationally as best practice. It is currently being amended into a national document format.

16. Recommendation 96 - ‘Police forces must review their systems for taking children into police protection and ensure they comply with the Children Act 1989 and Home Office guidelines. In particular, they must ensure that an independent officer of at least an Inspector rank acts as designated officer in all cases’.

17. Police Notice 29/03 implemented and initial evaluation undertaken with positive feedback. A six monthly review is due in April of this year to benchmark the initial results against that review.

18. Recommendation 97 – ‘Chief Constables must ensure that the investigation of crime against children is as important as the investigation of any other form of serious crime. Any suggestion that child protection policing is of a lower status than other forms of policing must be eradicated’.

19. The Metropolitan Police Service has brought all child protection investigation within the remit of the Specialist Crime Directorate, which also investigates homicide, kidnapping, armed robbery and other serious crime. The SCD 5 HQ is based at New Scotland yard and currently consists of 407 police officers and 117 police support staff.

20. The Command has been authorised to increase its workforce to 470 police officers by June 2004. An extensive recruitment and retention programme is well underway.

21. Recommendation 98 – ‘The guideline set out at paragraph 5.8 of Working Together must be strictly adhered to: whenever social services receive a referral which may constitute a criminal offence against a child, they must inform the police at the earliest opportunity’.

22. An audit trail has been included in the revised manual whereby the Crime Management Unit (CMU) will now be able to monitor all referrals being supervised at source and within a given time scale by the Referral Units on the CPU’s. This performance indicator will then provide the Senior Management Team (SMT) with information on how each unit is monitoring the above.

23. Recommendation 99 – ‘The Working Together arrangements must be amended to ensure the police carry out completely, and exclusively, any criminal investigation elements in a case of suspected injury or harm to a child, including the evidential interview with a child victim. This will remove any confusion about which agency takes the ‘lead or is responsible for certain actions’.

24. Whilst this is a department of Health/Home Office action, the Metropolitan Police Service Professional Standards Manual has already implemented the spirit of this recommendation. This is in line with police primacy.

25. Recommendation 100 – ‘Training for child protection officers must equip them with the confidence to question the views of professionals in other agencies, including doctors, no matter how eminent these professionals appear to be’.

26. Whilst Lord Laming highlighted the issue of training, the MPS believe, this is a development area for SCD5 and as such have dedicated training sessions built in to the initial CPU course. Training designed to assist with ‘Confidence to Challenge’ has also featured on the regional update seminars for 2003 for all staff.

27. Recommendation 101 – ‘The Home Office, through Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, must take a more active role in maintain high standards of child protection investigation by means of its regular Basic Commands Unit and force inspections. In addition, a follow-up to the Child Protection thematic inspection of 1999 should be conducted’.

28. This is a recommendation for Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and they have now conducted a review of the Command. A full copy of the report can be made available should it be required. The MPS will be subject to a HMI Inspection later this year.

29. Recommendation 102 – ‘The Home Office, through Centrex and the Association of Chief Police Officers, must devise and implement a national training curriculum for child protection officers as recommended in 1999 by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary in its thematic inspection report, Child Protection’.

30. Whilst this is a Home Office / ACPO matter the Metropolitan Police Service has contributed to a national training module to be issued to Centrex standards. The SCD 5 Child Protection Course training course notes have been passed to the Centrex writing team for their information.

31. Recommendation 103 – ‘Chief Constables must ensure that officers working on child protection units are sufficiently well trained in criminal investigation, and that there is always a substantial core of fully trained detective officers on each team to deal with the most’.

32. SCD 5 currently has 407 Police Officers; the total number of Substantive Detectives in the CP command is 185. The OCU has 108 Branch Detectives. The OCU has 124 Trainee Detectives (at T/DI, T/DS & T/DC level).

33. The SCD 5 Training and Development Unit monitors the number of officers and detectives per team and their development through the Detective Programme.

34. Recommendation 104 – ‘The Police Information Technology Organisation (PITO) should evaluate the child protection IT systems currently available, and make recommendations to chief constables, who must ensure their police force has in use an effective child-protection database and IT management systems’.

35. In December 2003 the PITO team responsible for the project attended several CPU sites across London with a view to evaluate the current IT systems that are been utilised across the Command.

36. Their review and assessment of the current system will form the basis of the overall recommendation to the ACPO steering committee on Child protection IT systems. The report is due for publication shortly. The lead on the project is Superintendent Graham Dickenson.

37. Recommendation 105 – ‘Chief Constables must ensure that child protection units are fully integrated into the structure of their forces and not disadvantaged in terms of accommodation, equipment or resources’.

38. This recommendation is similar to recommendation 97, in that the Metropolitan Police Service has brought all child protection investigation within the remit of the Specialist Crime Directorate, which also investigates homicide, kidnapping, armed robbery and other serious crime. The numbers of detectives within the Child Protection Command have risen and the command currently has 407 Police Officers and 117 Police Support staff.

39. Linked to the above is the creation of a dedicated accommodation strategy, increase in equipment and resources and the inclusion into the MPS Policing Plan.

40. Recommendation 106 – ‘The Home Office must ensure that child protection policing is included in the list of ministerial priorities for the police’.

41. This is a Home Office action.

42. Recommendation 107 – ‘Chief Constables and police authorities must give child protection investigations a high priority in their police plans, thereby ensuring consistently high standards of service by well-managed and well-motivated teams’.

43. The MPS have given child protection high priority in the policing plan. It is the first force to do so and it is included in the 2003/04 plan. The current 2004 / 5 policing plan is in draft form at this stage.

44. Recommendation 108 – ‘The Home Office, through Centrex, must add specific training relating to child protection policing to the syllabus for the strategic command course. This will ensure that all future chief officers in the police service have adequate knowledge and understanding of the roles of child protection units’.

45. This is a specific recommendation for the Strategic Command Course and a matter for Home Office and Centrex, however, DCS Ian Delbarre sits on the National Training working group and has submitted several documents that are currently utilised by the MPS for consideration for the Strategic Command Course.

Summary of the MPS response to the Green Paper Every Child matters

46. The publication of the Green Paper entitled ‘Every child matters’ took place on 8 September 2003. The MPS have reviewed the document and have formulated both a position and a formal response following extensive consultation in July of 2003.

47. The formal response took the form of a written submission and can be seen in full at Appendix 1. In summary the MPS generally supports the paper but the response highlights that there is no mention of London as an area where ‘special arrangements will have to be made’.

48. The MPS is also concerned that child protection, the catalyst for the Green Paper, is too heavily subsumed within children’s services and is accorded insufficient emphasis. The prioritisation of child protection services needs to be reinforced.

49. The MPS strongly recommend that Safeguarding Children Boards (SCBs) should be statutory, requiring agencies to participate. National performance indicators should be agreed that are meaningful to all constituent agencies, thus providing strategic leadership, direction and governance and finally these should be consistent with Home Office and local police service objectives and finally these should be consistent with Home Office and local police service objectives.

C. Equality and diversity implications

Child trafficking / child migration

1. As mentioned in the September 2003 submission to the Authority regarding the need to monitor and act upon information received on child trafficking / child migration, the three month pilot ‘Operation Paladin’ has now been completed.

2. The initial feedback has proved very positive and it has been demonstrated that having officers at the major immigration / arrival infrastructures, can have a real impact on the situation. This is a new area of business for the Child Protection Command and will need an influx of resources to maintain and improve the services that have been established over the previous three months.

3. It has been shown that the Heathrow work is overwhelming for one officer and it was necessary to post a Detective Sergeant and one additional Detective Constable to the Hillingdon CPU to support the exiting Constable in this growing business area at Heathrow and additionally supervise the problem at the Waterloo international terminal.

4. Clearly there is an ongoing need for child protection specialist advice and support in this area and with this in mind the exact returns (child interventions) are at present being evaluated and reviewed in order that a business case can be presented to continue this work in the future. It is anticipated that this review will be completed in time for submission to the MPA at their next meeting.

The Child Protection IAG

5. The IAG is next due to meet on the 27 January 2004. High on their agenda will be the SCD 5 Diversity Strategy for safeguarding children and the recruitment of two partnership development officers.

6. The partnership development officers will be seconded from the big five charities on an eleven month pilot project to communicate with minority communities to establish their needs and embark on an education programme on safeguarding children in the United kingdom and the establishment of third party reporting procedures.

The effect of sickness and maternity

7. Given the inherent traumatic nature of the type of investigations, sickness levels through stress are higher in the Child Protection Group than would be expected in an OCU elsewhere.

8. The Welfare support counselling scheme is now well underway and initial feedback from staff and management is that the scheme is most welcome and supportive of the officers.

9. The command currently has 59 officers either sick or on maternity leave. With relatively small teams the impact of not having 59 staff is enormous. All but four of these staff are in Child Protection Units. These continual abstractions represent 14% of SCD5 staff.

10. The Child Protection Group has a high proportion of female officers that varies from between 45 and 50%. Many are mothers thus child care issues impact on this command significantly more so than any other command nationally. The nearest SC command with this volume is 20%.

11. The Child Protection Group values its entire workforce and is committed to the Gender agenda by being flexible to cater for childcare issues. The MPA and MPS needs to recognise the unique situation this command is faced with regarding abstractions. A detailed proposition has been put forward that the BWT for this command should have an additional factor when calculating police numbers that takes into account the difficulties faced through the abstractions outlined.

D. Financial implications

1. With regards to the financial implications mentioned within this report, a full costed bid will be made to Management board for the additional resources in due course.

2. In brief the financial implications involve, additional resources to manage the high proportion of female officers in the Command, this would assist in off-setting the abstraction levels with regard to Maternity leave and part-time / flexible working etc.

3. Additional finances to continue with the Welfare support counselling scheme.

4. Additional officers to continue to deal with Child Migration under ‘Operation Paladin ‘ (safeguarding children), within the costed bid, the command will be asking for one Analysis and one Researcher/Admin officer.

5. Additional ‘Police Staff’ to support the referrals units, a bid will be put forward for a twenty additional staff that have been identified, as a result of the MPS Inspection.

6. Additional ‘Police Staff’ to support the two Major Investigation Teams (MIT), in the form of two Office Managers (one for each).

7. Business manager – new post to be created, to oversee the Finance and Resources, Human Resources managers.

E. Background papers

None.

F. Contact details

Report author: Detective Chief Superintendent Peter Spindler, Child Protection Group SCD 5, MPS.

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

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