Agenda item

To receive for information the Adult and Child Annual Safeguarding reports. 

The Board received the annual reports of Children’s and Adults Safeguarding Boards. 

1.               Presentation of the Safeguarding Reports

1.1     Marian Harrington (Independent Chair of the Adult Safeguarding Board) and Geraldine Gavin (Independent Chair of the Children’s Safeguarding Board) attended the meeting to present the reports to the Board. 

Marian Harrington presented the Adult Safeguarding Annual Report and highlighted the following: 

·       There had been an increase in the number of abuses reported to the board: last year nearly 1000 alerts were received.  These are increasing year by year. 

·       New statutory guidance is about to be released, coming out of the Care Act 2014, which will make the Adult Safeguarding Board statutory.  Changes will be made, but the details would not be clear until the guidance was received.

·       The Board works closely with the police and other agencies. 

·       Enfield has a significant number of nursing homes, more than any other London borough, apart from Croydon, which means we have larger numbers of vulnerable people.

·       Early warning indicators are being developed, specifically for Enfield, in conjunction with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and Enfield Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).

·       The Board has been talking to victims and alleged victims to get some feedback on what can be done to improve services, making sure people are at the centre of what is being done.

·       The number of requests for Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards for people lacking mental capacity is much greater than was previously understood. 

·       Workloads are increasing in all areas and it is more and more important to ensure that people are seen appropriately. 

1.2     Geraldine Gavin presented the Children’s Safeguarding Report highlighting the following: 

·       Children’s safeguarding issues are receiving lots of attention, subject to daily comment in the national press. 

·       This has been a tricky year trying to balance the effect of the national headlines as well as the reputational risk of safeguarding issues.

·       Female Genital Mutilation has received a great deal of publicity thanks partly to the campaign in the London Evening Standard which has bought the issue to the fore. 

·       The major child sexual exploitation case in Rotherham had also raised many concerns and the lessons and outcomes are being considered. 

·       In Enfield we have 30-35 young people who have been identified as potentially at risk.  They were being monitored.

·       Multi-disciplinary work was taking place and work to improve communications across the partnership.

·       Communication, learning from serious case reviews and from other health colleagues was key.

·       A major concern was the lack of access to counselling for young people with mental health issues.

·       It had been a very busy year and would continue to be so next year with the issues being so much in the political arena. 

2.               Questions/comments arising from the presentation and the reports

2.1     The point at which the increase in the number of cases becomes more than reassuring, as an indicator that that more people are alert to the risks, is difficult to ascertain but can be judged based on existing thresholds.  Ofsted is key to ensure consistency. Enfield is likely to be inspected soon and outcomes from the inspection will inform the board about any measures that need to be taken. 

2.2     The Board were aware of the need to find alternative sources of funding to address the continuing pressures across the system. 

2.3     Things were improving but more needed to be done in the adult safeguarding area.  Financial abuse was a problem and work with banks was taking place so that they were able to identify situations where people may be being exploited. 

2.4     Crossovers between the two services included issues of domestic violence and adult abuse.  More and more children were living with elderly parents, creating more opportunities for abuse. 

2.5     Serious incidents were referred to multidisciplinary services. 

2.6     The work programmes of the two boards were similar, giving opportunities for cross fertilisation, looking at possibilities of joint commissioning.  A proposal to set up joint board to deal with issues in some areas was being investigated to find out what could best be joined up. 

2.7     The current transition between the adult and children’s areas was felt to be insufficiently robust.  The Chair of the Adult Safeguarding Board was the lead for transition. 

2.8     The enormous increase in the amount of activity highlights the importance of early activity, intervention and prevention.  It was important to maintain effective integrated early intervention.  The SPOE (Single Point of Entry) dealt with referrals and now only around 10% went onto children’s social work.

2.9     The vast majority of abuse takes place in people’s own homes. Mechanisms need to be in place to enable people to spot abuse to ensure constant vigilance.  People need to be able to raise issues if they feel uncomfortable.  An increase in referrals is fine if we are able to respond and get people to provide support. 

2.10    National trends are on the increase but Enfield is already ahead, as it began to work on the issues over 4 years ago. 

2.11    The quality of the services provided in nursing/care homes is also important.  The sector struggles to attract and retain high quality staff. 

2.12    The work that we do in Enfield is a model of best practice in London, but we need to maintain our vigilance. 

2.13    The Adult Safeguarding Board is looking to review their membership, once the new government guidance is in place and they are looking to invite Healthwatch to provide a representative on the board.

2.14    Enfield also provides a team of quality checkers and a dignity panel to oversee these issues. 

AGREED to note the progress being made in protecting vulnerable adults and children in the borough, as set out in the annual reports from the Safeguarding Children Board and the Safeguarding Adults Board.