Child Safeguarding

Child safeguarding is a topic that received extensive attention under the New Labour governments, and the issue of partnership was a crucial theme within discussions of this topic. All too often alleged failings in inter-agency working are vividly illustrated through sad and disturbing tales of children who have been neglected and/or abused. These narratives are told and re-told in lurid detail by the media to cries of outrage from the general public. This is not a new phenomenon and issues of child neglect and death have been widely reported through the media for at least the last 40 years (Reder et al., 1993). Despite the widespread media attention that this topic receives, child deaths are ‘relatively rare and the majority of children at risk of harm present relatively low levels of abuse and neglect and are protected at home by means of family support’ (Axford and Bullock, 2005: p. 57). However, investigations into high-profile issues of child neglect, abuse and death all too often find that a complex network of inter-agency involvement existed in the lives of these children (Rose and Barnes, 2008): due to problems in information sharing or joint working between professionals more generally, the warning signs are missed and at the expense of the well-being of these children. Investigations into failings in child safeguarding and the accompanying sensationalist media coverage often apportion blame to child welfare professionals and, in the process, vilify these individuals (Pritchard, 1992; Ayre, 2001).