This week, a serious case review found that up to 370 girls may have been abused by gangs of men in Oxfordshire in the past 16 years, and said that police and social services made "many errors" in their handling of a recent high-profile case. The news followed similar revelations from the town of Rotherham last year, and both cases arose after the exposure of historical sexual abuse of children and adults by Jimmy Saville and other powerful figures.
Clearly, Britain has a problem with how it tackles such cases, and politicians across the spectrum have proposed new policy and legislation on the issue. One common call—backed by the Labour party but accompanied by similar proposals from the Conservatives (who will extend the offence of "willful neglect" to cover many professionals working with children), is for the reporting of child abuse to become mandatory, making it an offence for relevant professionals to ignore evidence of such abuse.
I'm a strong advocate for the mandatory reporting of child abuse. There's been a real change over the past five or six years—because of celebrity abuse cases it's been brought home to the public that this sort of activity is not acceptable, and it shouldn't be brushed under the carpet. Mandatory reporting is a step further along that continuum.
This is about culture change. You get unhealthy cultures within organisations, sometimes even denial of what's going on. Mandatory reporting allows people within those cultures to say “I only have suspicions. I might be wrong, I might be right, but I now have a legal obligation to report them.” It enables them to feel comfortable.
Of course you have to determine which professionals and officials will have the obligation to report. That might include teachers, healthcare professionals and others. Now, would you include politicians on that list? That's an interesting question...
We are the first people to say that we absolutely cannot tolerate poor practice that puts children at risk of significant harm. But criminalising social workers is not the answer. For a start, the very nature of today’s child protection system is close-knit, multi-agency working which relies on different contributions from a range of professionals—there will rarely ever be one individual on the frontline who can be taken to task for overall failure. Plus, there are already significant repercussions for those who fail to meet practice standards, such as being struck off the social work register.
Secondly, criminalisation places investment and focus at the wrong end of the process. This is about ensuring our children are protected—therefore, more should be invested in sufficient training and resource for social workers in order to support children and families, properly understand different forms of abuse and develop appropriate responses. At the moment, services are under a huge strain because of cuts to funding.
Clearly, Britain has a problem with how it tackles such cases, and politicians across the spectrum have proposed new policy and legislation on the issue. One common call—backed by the Labour party but accompanied by similar proposals from the Conservatives (who will extend the offence of "willful neglect" to cover many professionals working with children), is for the reporting of child abuse to become mandatory, making it an offence for relevant professionals to ignore evidence of such abuse.
Culture change
Simon Danczuk, Labour MP for Rochdale and campaigner on sexual abuseI'm a strong advocate for the mandatory reporting of child abuse. There's been a real change over the past five or six years—because of celebrity abuse cases it's been brought home to the public that this sort of activity is not acceptable, and it shouldn't be brushed under the carpet. Mandatory reporting is a step further along that continuum.
This is about culture change. You get unhealthy cultures within organisations, sometimes even denial of what's going on. Mandatory reporting allows people within those cultures to say “I only have suspicions. I might be wrong, I might be right, but I now have a legal obligation to report them.” It enables them to feel comfortable.
Of course you have to determine which professionals and officials will have the obligation to report. That might include teachers, healthcare professionals and others. Now, would you include politicians on that list? That's an interesting question...
Invest in training
Jo Cleary, Chair of The College of Social WorkWe are the first people to say that we absolutely cannot tolerate poor practice that puts children at risk of significant harm. But criminalising social workers is not the answer. For a start, the very nature of today’s child protection system is close-knit, multi-agency working which relies on different contributions from a range of professionals—there will rarely ever be one individual on the frontline who can be taken to task for overall failure. Plus, there are already significant repercussions for those who fail to meet practice standards, such as being struck off the social work register.
Secondly, criminalisation places investment and focus at the wrong end of the process. This is about ensuring our children are protected—therefore, more should be invested in sufficient training and resource for social workers in order to support children and families, properly understand different forms of abuse and develop appropriate responses. At the moment, services are under a huge strain because of cuts to funding.
