Child Thriving Strategy - Response to Neglect
Neglect is the most common form of abuse and NSPCC research suggests around 1 in 10 children in the UK have been neglected. Supporting professionals to have the knowledge, skills, and confidence in identifying and responding to concerns of neglect is fundamental in addressing this. We want to help children thrive and excel by protecting them from neglect and by supporting families at the earliest time with the best help.
Our Berkshire West wide response to Neglect is captured in the BWSCP Child Thriving Strategy. Please use the following link to access and download a PDF version of the Child Thriving Strategy - Response to Neglect.
Neglect Tools
Neglect Tools for practitioners to help identify neglect across Berkshire West can be found below
Brighter Futures for Children (Reading) - Click here to download the assessment tool | Click here to download the review template | Click here to download the toolkit guidance
West Berkshire & Wokingham - Click here to download the tool | Click here to download the toolkit guidance
Definition of Neglect
Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023 defines neglect as: The persistent failure to meet a child’s basic physical and/or psychological needs, likely to result in the serious impairment of a child’s health or development. Neglect may occur during pregnancy because of maternal substance abuse. Once a child is born, neglect may involve a parent or carer failing to:
- Provide adequate food, clothing, and shelter (including exclusion from home or abandonment).
- Protect a child from emotional and physical harm or danger.
- Ensure adequate supervision (including the use of inadequate care givers).
- Ensure access to appropriate medical care or treatment.
- It may include neglect of, or unresponsiveness to, a child’s basic emotional needs.
Neglect can be a difficult concept for both practitioners and families and differs in its presentation from other forms of abuse. There is rarely a unique incident or critical event; more commonly there is a repetition of neglecting behaviour which causes incremental damage to the child(ren). This can undermine the child’s resilience, leading to avoidable health and developmental problems, distress and unhappiness for the child, harm and poorer life chances. Understanding its repercussions and the potential for both prevention and intervention is vital.
Neglect is directly linked to the parent or carer’s capacity to recognise and respond to the child’s needs whatever their age. Adults in a child or young person’s life may not recognise the signs of neglect and the child may be too young, too scared or feel ashamed to tell anyone what is happening to them.
Our Local Partnership Statement and Expectations
Berkshire West Safeguarding Children Partnership is fully committed to safeguarding the welfare of children by taking all reasonable steps to protect them from neglect. We expect that everyone in organisations and agencies working with children and families, including those who work with parents / carers, will work restoratively using trauma informed principles, collaboratively, effectively, and understands the role they should play and the role of other practitioners when responding to neglect.
Practitioners need to recognise and work with families to respond to neglect; identifying how neglect presents and what ‘good enough’ looks like. As a partnership, we need to ensure that all practitioners have a consistent understanding of childhood neglect and know what is expected of them should concerns arise.
We expect leaders and managers to:
- Promote the importance of listening to children, hear them and ensure their voice impacts on service planning.
- Have sound management oversight of practice around neglect, through effective governance and quality assurance arrangements.
- Provide skilled supervision to practitioners, providing them with an opportunity to reflect on cases, challenge and be challenged.
- Support and enable appropriate practitioners to attend training on neglect and support them to apply the tools they need in practice.
- Support practitioners to challenge each other skilfully, accept challenge from staff and other agencies and deal with it in the best interests of the child.
We expect practitioners to:
- Listen to children, hear them, and ensure their voice impacts on plans made about them.
- Listen to each other, hear what is being said and ensure everyone’s perspective helps in understanding the child’s needs.
- Use a whole family approach, being mindful of the needs of adults in the child’s household and how their needs might impact on the child.
- Respond sensitively and swiftly to concerns while understanding the cumulative nature of neglect.
- Take account of the full history and not just the recent episode; complete chronologies regularly to enable reflection on cases, pick up non-compliance, drift and delay and take remedial action.
- Seek management support and challenge and use supervision to reflect on cases and create new options.
- Use all available evidence to inform action planning and be mindful of the particular complexities involved when a child has complex health needs and/or disabilities.
- Challenge each other skilfully, with the child at the centre.
Response
If you feel you have identified a risk, you should refer to the BWSCP Threshold Guidance to gauge the level of help required and take appropriate action. The relevant Threshold Guidance can be found here:
Reading West Berkshire Wokingham
Use the risk and protective factors at each level of help to understand how urgent the need is. Consider the child’s viewpoint through the My World Triangle to consider what the concerns mean for the child. To assess neglect effectively it is important to understand the early indicators and impact of neglect. It is also important to have a good understanding of child development and what would be reasonable to expect for that child. To learn more about using the assessment framework triangle click here.
Chronologies: To support your understanding of what life is like for the child, and to gather evidence if you feel a referral to Children’s Services is required, a chronology is imperative for a true picture of family history and should place the child at the centre. A chronology seeks to provide a clear account of all significant events in a child’s life to date, plus any interventions and support previously provided to the family and how successful they were. This brief and summarised account of events provides the opportunity to identify and respond to patterns of concern as well as emerging need and risks and can be used to inform decisions on the most appropriate support and safeguarding services required to promote a child’s welfare.
Chronologies are particularly important when working with neglect where there may be fewer critical incidents, but where children live in families where they are exposed to chronic and long-term harm. Chronologies can help identify these patterns of harm, and where previous support/intervention has either been successful or not. Chronologies are also particularly useful in cases of medical neglect and essential in relation to concerns around perplexing presentations/ fabricated or induced illness.
Chronologies help to make links between the past and the present, helping to understand the importance of historic information upon what is happening in a child’s life now. A good chronology can draw attention to seemingly unrelated events or information and assist the process of assessment and care planning. Chronologies do not replace routine case recording but offer a concise summary view of events and interventions in a child’s life in date order and over time. These should include changes in the family composition (new adults in the home), address and educational establishments. Any periods of school exclusion or non-attendance, any injuries, periods of hospitalisation, changes to health including weight loss/gain. Any domestic abuse or parental substance misuse, any missing episodes or attempts to self-harm as well as any discussions with other practitioners where information is shared.
When carried out consistently across agencies, good chronologies can improve the sharing, and understanding of the impact of information about a child’s life. Chronologies are also helpful in supporting reflective supervision and future decision-making for a child. For more information and guidance on chronologies, click here.
When working with a family, remember to:
- Focus on the child: Parents who are struggling to meet their children’s needs are likely to have many needs of their own.
- Treat each child as an individual: In some cases, not all children in a family will be treated the same. Negative feelings may be projected onto one child but not others in the family and it is important for an assessment to capture this and address each child’s needs separately.
- Be open with parents: It can be hard to raise concerns of neglect with parents because it means addressing issues which are personal and difficult to hear, for example, smells, dirt, or hazards in the home. It is important to ensure parents understand concerns and these are explained clearly, honestly and with sensitivity.
- Observe: Observations can inform assessments of parent/child interaction and the relationships between parents and child, and child and other siblings. It can also help you to assess the child’s development, their behaviour and social interactions, and the environment in which they are living. This can take place in their home as well as other settings such as school or nursery.
- Recognise the impact of trauma: The term Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES) is often used to describe a range of stressful or traumatic experiences that children can be exposed to growing up. Neglect is one such experience and children and young people who have been neglected may exhibit trauma and stress-related behaviour and can struggle to manage their emotions. It is important that this is recognised as well as the impact of any trauma the parents may have experienced in their lives.
- Avoid becoming desensitised to neglect: Practitioners who work regularly with families where there is neglect can become desensitised and may minimise or ‘normalise’ situations which in other contexts would be viewed as unacceptable. It is important to be aware of this, to reflect, and to remain alert to neglect. It can be helpful to discuss the family with your supervisor and with professionals from other agencies to share concerns and gain another perspective.
- Consider the whole family: It is important to consider the family holistically because neither the children nor the adults exist in isolation. A whole family approach means working with the family to achieve shared goals as well as responding to individual needs within the family. This will usually require a coordinated multi-agency response from those working with children and adults.
- Look out for ‘Invisible Men’: Recent research shows that fathers and other men involved in children’s lives are often ignored by professionals who can focus on the care provided by the mother. This can mean that a protective factor, for example a father who does not live in the home but is capable of caring for the children can be overlooked. It can also mean that men who may pose a risk to children are not assessed.
Make good use of supervision:
All agencies should ensure that neglect cases are regularly reviewed in supervision. Working with families where there is neglect can be overwhelming for practitioners and it is important to acknowledge this. Supervision should also ensure that the focus remains on the child, help the practitioner be more objective and give direction to avoid delay.
Barriers and challenges:
Resistance is used to describe a range of parental behaviours which can prevent professionals from being able to assess neglect and intervene. This can be very challenging for practitioners to work with and can leave children at risk of harm. The majority of child safeguarding practice case reviews report a lack of cooperation from families or superficial engagement (disguised compliance). Parents and carers can resist professional intervention for many reasons, and it is helpful to try and understand this. For example, they may not understand the concerns, they may feel they are not to blame for the issues raised, or they may be fearful or mistrustful of authorities due to past experience. It is important to consider our own practice and whether we can do something differently to promote better engagement.
To watch a short video about working with resistant families click here or click here to watch a longer webinar.
To read more about disguised compliance click here
To read more about common issues when assessing neglect and overcoming these click here
Escalation: Professionals in all agencies including schools have a duty to act proactively and assertively to ensure that a child’s welfare is the paramount consideration. The Local Safeguarding Partners recognise that good practice will sometimes include constructive challenge between workers. Escalation is a positive response to an unresolved issue, and a part of day-to-day practice. To support practitioners we have produced solution focused guidance to underpin the procedure, a presentation to explain the process, and tools. Click here for more information.
Resources and links
General Information:
Neglect in particular groups:
Further Reading on Affluent Neglect:
Working with Resistance:
Berkshire West Safeguarding Children links: