Number of Bedford children under child protection plans drops

A child protection plan is made when a child is judged to be at risk of significant harm. This is a level of harm that affects the health, welfare and development of a child.

This plan will say what the specific risks are to the child and the actions that will be needed to keep the child safe.

The Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny (Monday, September 2) heard that in August last year, 240 children in Bedford were subject to a child protection plan.

Jonathan Churchill, interim chief officer for children’s services, said this number was higher than what would be expected for a population the size of Bedford borough. And added it is now at 132, which is “broadly in line” with the predicted number.

He said: “The numbers have come down because of the reduction in existing child protection plans, and it is a reduction in the mainly older child protection plans. And that’s the right way round, we don’t want children on child protection plans for an inordinate amount of time – that suggests something is not quite going right.

“If you look at child protection plans that are six months to a year old, in January we had 70 and now we’ve got 20, which is a big reduction.”

Mr Churchill added that the increase in newer plans suggested that the council is still identifying where there is risk.

“Where there are children that need to be made subject to a child protection plan and we are responding as we should,” he said. “We’ve seen a reduction in the numbers of children that have had a repeat child protection plan as well.

“Which I think reassures us that we’re not making decisions that are overly optimistic and children are coming back on x amount of months later,” he added.

Councillor Hilde Hendrickx (Lib Dems, Riverfield) asked: “What happens when the families come off the child protection plan, are they just left alone completely? What is the level of support that is still available to them?”

Mr Churchill said: “The majority of children that ended their child protection plan did step down to a child in need plan. So instead of visiting fortnightly we visited in three weekly, we still have reviews on a regular basis, the professionals will still be involved.

“The difference with child in need is that a family can say ‘we don’t want this support under a child in need plan anymore’. We can’t force a child in need plan on the family.”

He added: “That’s a major distinction, but it’s because the risk is no longer there. Our work is an art, not a science and it is subjective. In terms of gut feeling it feels about right where we’re at, it doesn’t feel like we’ve a worrying low figure and we’ve got risk out there that we’re not managing.”