The report states that “failings in how agencies worked together meant concerns raised by wider family members about physical abuse were not properly investigated by police and social workers”. It also states that “what happened to Arthur and Star were not isolated incidents and their deaths reflect wider problems in child safeguarding practice.”
The panel is therefore calling for Government to strengthen the child protection system at both local and national levels to ensure there is a more effective joined-up response to child protection concerns.
The panel acknowledges that “protecting children from abuse is intrinsically complex and challenging work”. They had three major areas of concern:
- Weakness in information sharing
- Lack of robust assessment in relation to assessing complexity, engaging reluctant parents, understanding the daily lives of children and domestic abuse
- The need for leaders to enable better child protection practice
- The Panel is making recommendations to Government as follows:
- A new expert-led, multi-agency model for child protection investigation, planning, intervention, and review.
- Establishing National Multi-Agency Practice Standards for Child Protection
- Strengthening the local Safeguarding Partners to ensure proper co-ordination and involvement of all agencies.
Changes to multi-agency inspection to better understand local performance and drive improvement.
A new role for the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel in driving practice improvement in Safeguarding Partners.
- A sharper performance focus and better co-ordination of child protection policy in central Government.
- Using the potential of data to help professionals protect children.
- Specific practice improvements in relation to domestic abuse.
In response to the publication, Dr Alison Steele, Officer for Child Protection at RCPCH said:
We were appalled to learn about the deaths of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson last year, both murdered by their parent’s partners. Nothing can ever compensate for their tragic deaths and our hearts go out to their loved ones. Unfortunately, these children are not the first to be killed by those who should have cared for them, and sadly nor will they be the last.
We welcome the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel report into the deaths of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson.
The RCPCH aims to improve the health and well-being of all children and this includes protecting them from maltreatment when this is required.
As such it is good to see the recommendation from the review team to strengthen multi-agency working and information sharing. We welcome the proposed standards that we hope will ensure consistency of approach across the country.
The Panel has called for a sharper, national focus on child protection through a new Child Protection Board reflecting the range of government departments involved and calls for every local area to have an expert Multi-Agency Child Protection Unit. The proposed strengthening of local multi-agency working, more robust information sharing, and improved understanding of both children’s lives and family members’ concerns is welcomed.
Let us ensure we truly learn from Arthur and Star’s tragic deaths and together we will build a better child protection system.
The Government must now respond and we urge it to support the recommendations made by the Panel with actions. Both commitment and resource will be required to implement the recommendations. Only by doing this can we achieve a safe and happy childhood for all.