How to Improve Children's Services in Kirklees

The problems in children's services in Kirklees seem intractable. A Commissioner has been appointed to oversee the service after Ofsted found systemic failure in its duty of care to children. Recently, a High Court judgment Re: CZ (Human Rights Claim: Costs) [2017] has been scathing about social work practice. My aim is to use this court case to analyse the dysfunctional nature of social work practice and show the need for a new approach to child protection referrals.

The case was concerned with baby CZ who was wrongly made the subject of an Interim Care Order. He was succesfully placed with his paternal grandparents and only returned to the care of his parents 11 weeks later, when the order was discharged. The council has now been ordered to pay a total of £11,250 in damages and also a substantial part of the £120,000 in legal costs.

The core facts in this case can be summarised in the following way. The mother, in her 20s, suffered from learning difficulties and minor mental health problems and the father had in the past been aggressive to others. Both parents had received assistance from adult social care for many years and during the mother's pregnancy health services had been involved with the family in planning for the birth of their first baby. In spite of these challenges there was no pre-birth referral to children's services. In hindsight it can be seen that a pre-birth referral should have been made as this would have given children's services more time to make an assessment.

The baby was born by emergency caesarean section. Four days after the birth children's services received a referral from the hospital raising concerns regarding the long-term parenting capacity of the mother and father. The referral was clearly a child protection referral that needed an immediate response. Three days later a social worker visited the hospital and saw the mother and heard that the baby was well enough to be discharged that day. Several hours later an application was made to court for an Interim Care Order and this was granted. The baby was removed from his parents care at the hospital and placed with his paternal grandparents. Unfortunately, there was then some delay in allocating this case to a named social worker.

Eventually, at a court hearing 11 weeks later an agreement was accepted between all parties and the court that the Local Authority was unable to provide evidence showing that the threshold for legal intervention had been met. The subsequent human rights claim by the parents has revealed that the local authority had not followed the due process of law when making the application and some of the information given to the court was incorrect.

It is difficult to understand why the Local Authority applied for an Interim Care Order. There is no evidence that a section 47 enquiry had been carried out, in accordance with the practice guidance in Working Together 2015. Worse still, there seemed to be little understanding of the circumstances of vulnerable parents with a newborn baby, or the fact that the the paternal grandparents were committed to supporting them. This was a situation in which a competent social worker could have engaged the parents in collaborative work to ensure the safety of the child, without going to court.

Questions must be asked about why social workers found themselves in a situation where they were unable to respond appropriately. This case illustrates the tendency of some children's services to deal with a child protection referral by immediately initiating court proceedings. The essential social work task of carrying out a section 47 investigation is apparently forgotten. This level of social work incompetence is appalling and brings the profession into disrepute. The only possible explanation may be that there is a concurrence of poor social work knowledge and skills, unsatisfactory levels of staffing and a risk-averse culture leading to an unthinking 'child rescue' response to referrals and this approach becoming the 'custom and practice'.

The section 47 interview by a social worker is an excellent procedure and it works very well when social workers are trained and supervised appropriately. In the past it may have caused unnecessary stress to parents because social workers took a narrow 'policing' approach and were not trained to understand the social work methods underpinning this work. In England it seems to have been effectively withdrawn and the section 47 is only used when there is a criminal investigation by the police. However, in Wales the single agency investigation by social workers is still regarded as an important social work tool and good professional practice is embedded in official guidance.

Social workers who carry out a section 47 investigation have a formal role, underpinned by a statutory duty, and need different skills from social workers providing family support. The social worker will invariably be saying things to parents that may be difficult for them to hear. Unless this work is recognised as formal child protection work the social worker may not conduct the interview with family members in a way that addresses reported concerns and leads to greater clarity about what has happened. It is essential that social workers conducting a section 47 interview fully understand the forensic requirements in relation to the gathering of evidence that may later be presented in court.

One solution to the problems in Kirklees is to introduce a clear model of child protection practice that raises standards of assessment and decision-making at the point of referral. Splitting off the social work function of investigative work from other types of social work would provide a new opportunity to clarify the child protection role and enable social workers of the right calibre to develop their skills and find satisfaction in this work. The investigation under section 47 should be recognised as one that requires rigorous safeguards and controls. It might therefore be appropriate to require that only social workers with the status of an 'Accredited Child and Family Social Worker' should be allowed to do this work.

Furthermore, a centralised team dealing only with investigations of child protection concerns would be better understood by other agencies and families. If other professionals feel confident that their referral receives careful consideration and that families receive a high standard of service they are more likely to make timely referrals. This team might also provide the opportunity for social workers in other teams to join it on a rota basis in order to develop their own understanding of the investigative role.

Poor child protection practice has arisen because the profession has moved away from this core function and in the more dysfunctional authorities, such as Kirklees, the work tends to be of a 'hit and miss' nature. Many child protection social workers seem uncertain of their role and consequently may unwittingly participate in unlawful interventions. A good place to start would be to raise standards of practice in section 47 enquiries by creating a clearer separation of statutory duties under section 47 from other types of social work. This may well have implications for the organisational structure. If social workers can be helped to develop their skills in working with complex child protection cases this would be a step in the right direction.

The Commissioner in Kirklees has a very difficult task; a dysfunctional system has its own internal mechanisms for maintaining the status quo. She must address the dysfunction in the organisation and insist that priority is given to improving arrangements for responding to child protection concerns, particularly those that need an immediate response. Poor social work practice in responding to child protection referrals leading to inappropriate legal action can bring a heavy financial cost - as well as bringing the profession into disrepute.

Hilary Searing