• Roles, Responsibilities and Decision Making Hierarchy.

• Gateway Panel.

• Calderdale MBC Placement Finding Process.

This new chapter provides guidance on the storage of personal data (including photographs) on mobile devices. 'Personal data' is any information about an identifiable living individual.

This chapter has been updated to reflect Keeping Children Safe in Education 2019. Section 11, Safeguarding Children Looked After at School has been amended to include reference to Upskirting (which is now a criminal offence) and serious violence.

This chapter, which sets out the process for managing to referrals to the Emergency Duty Team has been reviewed locally and updated as required. It clarifies the process for transferring information to and from the Emergency Duty Team and Children and Young People Services and explains the procedure for ensuring the safety of EDT workers on visits. 

This procedure has been updated to reflect changes from 'Practice Direction 27a - Family Proceedings: Court Bundles (Universal Practice to be Applied in the High Court and Family Court) in relation to the required maximum length of certain court documents, (unless otherwise specifically directed by the court). In addition, a new subsection of Section 4.1, Local Authority Documentation- 'Final Care Plan' provides further detail on the importance of recording information on the Care Plan which will help the child, parent or the child's carer understand why decisions have been or are being made.

This chapter has been updated in line with the Children and Social Work Act 2017 and associated statutory guidance.

These changes relate to the status of 'Previously Looked After Children'. A Previously Looked After Child is one who is no longer looked after in England and Wales because they are the subject of an Adoption, Special Guardianship or Child Arrangements Order which includes arrangements relating to with whom the child is to live, or when the child is to live with any person, or has been adopted from 'state care' outside England and Wales.

This guidance has been updated to reflect the changes introduced by the Children and Social Work Act 2017.

These changes relate to the status of 'Previously Looked After Children' i.e. a Previously Looked After Child is one who is no longer looked after in England and Wales because they are the subject of an Adoption, Special Guardianship or Child Arrangements Order which includes arrangements relating to with whom the child is to live, or when the child is to live with any person, or has been adopted from 'state care' outside England and Wales. The chapter includes a new Section 16, Mental Health and a new Section 11, Safeguarding Children Looked After School.

• Requests for Information from West Yorkshire Police: Advice and Guidance to Field work Practitioners.

Additional information has been added in to Section 2.3, Section 20 Accommodation, in line with recent case-law which considered the use of Section 20 Accommodation by local authorities These cases were clear that:

• A local authority failing to permit a parent to remove a child in circumstances within section 20(8) acts unlawfully; and
• The relevant information that a parent would need to be able to understand, retain and weigh up in order to have competency to consent to the accommodation of a child is as follows:
  • That the child will be staying with someone chosen by the local authority, probably a foster carer;
  • That the parent can change their mind about the arrangements, and request the child back from accommodation at any time;
  • That the parent will be able to see the child.

This new procedure describes the processes to be followed when a child's placement ends in an unplanned way. The term disruption is used to describe a placement ending in a way that was not part of the Looked after Child's Care Plan, either in the ending itself or in the timing of the termination. The disruption review process looks at the sequence of events and to learn from the experiences in order that:

• The child's future needs can be met;
• The carers can be appropriately supported to recover and learn from the experience;
• Practice can be improved across relevant social work teams.

Links have been added to the following local documents:

PACE –Post Charge/Placement Information Form for Placement Overnight - This form is for use when a young person has been charged and detained to appear before court the following day, this form should be completed and a copy placed on the electronic system (CASS). A copy should also be given to the PACE placement and emailed to YOT; and

• External Fostering and Residential Placements;
• External Residential Placements;
• Decision Making Hierarchy.

• Behaviour Management.

A link to the Calderdale Sufficiency Plan has been added.

The following note has been added into Section 3, Key Principles:

Section 3, Convening and Chairing of Secure Accommodation Reviews has been amended as follows:

The Secure Accommodation Panel should be chaired by a person independent of the care planning for the child, including line managers and the Independent Reviewing Officer. Given the need to focus on the Section 25, Children Act 1989 criteria issues, the chair should also be independent of any resource allocation, etc. but should have sufficient experience and knowledge to carry out the task.

This new chapter contains links to the West Yorkshire Consortium Procedure for Safeguarding Children and Young People Against Radicalisation or Violent Extremism.

• Employees As Adopters.

Links have been added to the following documents:

• Updated MAST Handbook; and
• New MAST Information Sharing Agreement.

This following note has been added into Section 3, Consent for Absence from School:

The following minor amendments have been made to this procedure:

• Where a prospective adopter enquires about inter-country adoption, information should also be given about the policy on fees and an estimation of the costs the prospective adopter will have to pay to the agency and the Department for Education;
• In relation to references, applicants will be asked to provide the names of three personal referees, who are adults (not more than one of whom should be related to them), have known the applicant for at least two years and who are happy to provide personal references on the prospective adopter. A written report must be prepared of the interviews held with each of the referees.

The following information has been added in relation to the Child's Permanence Report:

• Child's Permanence Report must be written by the worker who knows the child best and is also a qualified social worker;
• The Report should include a summary, written by the agency's medical adviser, of the state of the child's health, health history and any need for health care which might arise in the future, and a Chronology of the decisions and actions taken by the agency with respect to the child; and
• Those parts of the Report that contain factual information about the birth family should be shared with the relevant family members to enable them to confirm their accuracy and agree to it being passed on to a child in due course. Any such agreement should be clearly recorded on the child's case record. Each of the child's parents should be shown those parts of the Report which set out their views and wishes, and given the opportunity, if they so wish, to express these in their own words.

This chapter has been completely rewritten and replaces the previous guidance. It should be re read in its entirety.

It contains the procedures to be followed in all categories of adoption where the adoption agency and the adoption panel do not play a part in the placement of the child for adoption. These are:

• Partner adoptions (formally known as step parent adoption);
• Anyone who has had care of the child (for any three year period in the past five years);
• Local authority foster parent(s) proceeding without the support of children's social care.

The following information concerning remuneration for former foster carers has been added into Section 9.8, Remuneration for former foster parents:

This new chapter reflects the statutory guidance 'Ceasing to look after a child' in 'Care Planning, Placement and Case Review Regulations (2015)' as amended by the 'Care Planning and Fostering (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2015' and Working Together to Safeguard Children.

A link has been added to the Social Work Evidence Template (SWET) which has been produced by ADCS and Cafcass. It can be used by local authorities to submit an application for a care or supervision order.

The template supports professionals in submitting summarised, clear and analytical material to the court, setting out the reasons why the local authority is making an application for a specific order in relation to a child. A balanced, analytical and evidence based application will avoid unnecessary delay for the child and enable the court to quickly identify the issues in dispute, and potentially limit the cross examination of evidence. See above for further details.

This chapter has been updated in line with Looked-after Children: Contact with Siblings - Update to Children Act 1989 Guidance and Regulations - Volume 2: Care Planning, Placement and Case Review.

Additional information has been added in relation to sibling placement as follows:

Section 1.8, Ending of Placement has been updated to take account of recent case-law in which the High Court stated that not less than fourteen days notice of a removal of the child should be given to the parents, save in an emergency.

This chapter has been reviewed locally and updated through as required. Section 1.4, Placement Stability Meetings is new and requires that, in circumstances where the placement stability is considered to be at risk of disrupting, a meeting should be urgently convened within 5 working days. The purpose of this meeting will be to explore all possible, safe options to maintain the placement including:

• Additional support to the child;
• Additional support to the parent/carer.

This chapter has been updated following the publication of Looked-after Children: Contact with Siblings - Update to Children Act 1989 Guidance and Regulations - Volume 2: Care Planning, Placement and Case Review.

Additional Information has been added into Section 1, Approving and Planning Contact as follows:

• There is a presumption of continued contact between the child and their family while the child is Looked After, unless it is not reasonably practicable or consistent with the child's welfare;
• Contact arrangements should be focused on, and shaped around, the child's needs. Each child's wishes and needs for contact should be individually considered and regularly assessed;
• Where contact arrangements are contrary to the child's wishes, the child must be given a full explanation by the Social Worker and this must be recorded on the child's electronic record.

With effect from 31 October 2014, further legislation extended this to persons having a Prescribed Relationship with an adopted person. This will include all relatives of adopted adults, from children and grandchildren to civil partners and adoptive relatives. Intermediary agencies may accept applications from a person with a Prescribed Relationship to an adopted person for assistance in contacting a relative of an adopted person and vice versa. This allows, for example, descendants to obtain information about family medical history in relation to inherited diseases.

This new chapter deals with the placement of a child with carers who are dually approved, i.e. approved both as prospective adopters and as local authority foster carers.

This new document provides:

• A set of principles for social workers when working on child protection cases where the child has links to a foreign country;
• A summary of the main international legislation;
• Information about where social workers should go for help when seeking to obtain information or contacts abroad about a child and/or their family; and
• Sign-posts to other relevant guidance.