Q&As On Serious Case Reviews

22 January 2014, 00:00 | Updated: 22 January 2014, 05:56

A series of Q&As about serious case reviews.

What is a Serious Case Review?

The Local Safeguarding Children Boards Regulations undertake reviews of serious cases in where:
 
(a)       abuse or neglect of a child is known or suspected; and
(b)       either:
(i)         the child has died: or
(ii)        the child has been seriously harmed and there is cause for concern as to the way in which the authority, their Board partners or other relevant persons have worked together to safeguard the child.
 
In addition, an SCR should always be carried out when a child dies in custody, in police custody, on remand or following sentencing, in a Young Offender Institution, in a secure training centre or a secure children’s home, or where the child was detained under the Mental Health Act 2005. It can also include cases where a child died by suspected suicide.
 
It's important to remember that the review is not a public enquiry, a disciplinary process or grievance hearing. The focus of the review has to be on how agencies worked together on the case to identify ways in which local practice might be improved in future.
 
When does it start?
 
A decision to start an SCR is usually made within 1 month of the death or incident.
 
How long do they take?
 
It depends on many factors such as the scale and how complex the case is as well as other issues such as whether there are ongoing police investigations or criminal proceedings.
 
The target is to complete them within 6 months.
 
Who writes the review? Is it just 1 person?
 
There is usually an Independent Safeguarding Lead appointed to manage the process, chair meetings of the Review Team and facilitate the professional’s learning events.
 
In addition an Overview Report Author is appointed with responsibility to write the final report and work closely with the Independent Safeguarding Lead.

What are the potential outcomes of SCR’s?
 
The SCR will identify a series of lessons that should be learned aimed at improving practice across and within agencies that work in Suffolk. The LSCB will then decide what actions need to be taken to address the learning and decrease the likelihood of the same mistakes being made again in order to prevent other children being killed or harmed in the future.
 
Are they legally binding?
 
Neither the learning nor the actions arising are legally binding. They have the status of professional advice based on the experience of the case and analysis of the facts.
 
Once an SCR is published what happens?
 
The LSCB will have responded to the SCR by agreeing a range of actions that should be taken to address the learning. This is transferred into an Action Plan, the progress against which the Suffolk LSCB Learning and Improvement Group will monitor until they are all in place.