HSCP Safeguarding Arrangements

Hounslow Safeguarding Children Partnership

Children’s welfare is of the highest importance, and children who need help and protection deserve high quality and effective support as soon as a need is identified. Professionals working with children and their families in Hounslow take their responsibility to do so, and to keep children safe, very seriously.

Hounslow Safeguarding Children Board (HSCB) has driven this by providing expertise and leadership across the local area which has been enabled by solid partnership working; scrutiny of practice, sharing knowledge, developing our workforce, and considering whole system issues.

Chapter 3 paragraph 6 of Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018 states that “all three partners have equal and joint responsibility for local safeguarding arrangements”. In Hounslow, these agencies, including education have formed the Hounslow Safeguarding Partnership Executive. The executive members are Hounslow Council Chief Executive, Borough Commander for the West Area BCU and Chief Accountable Officer of NW London Collaboration of CCG’s, and their nominated advisors. The executive partnerships key objective is to set the priorities and the strategic business plan.

The new arrangements which each area is required to have in place, have provided our partnership with an opportunity to reflect and refresh how we do this within the new legislative framework to ensure we continue to achieve for all of our children so that they are able to reach their full potential.

The plan sets out how organisations and people in Hounslow will work together within the new arrangements, creating a realistic and sustainable model, which builds on the successes already achieved by our partners, re-evaluates and changes what isn’t working and developing a system that can respond flexibly to the issues that are important both in our local area and nationally and allows Hounslow safeguarding partners keep their focus on critical safeguarding matters to improve outcomes.

Hounslow Safeguarding Children Partnership will maintain a Stakeholder Board, overseen by an Independent Advisor of all organisation’s individuals, known as ‘’relevant agencies’’ as stipulated in The Child Safeguarding Practice Review and Relevant Agency (England) Regulations 2018 in Hounslow that will either be part of our safeguarding arrangements or receive information, including those who will be required to undertake an audit under Section 11 of The Children Act 2014. This will promote consistency of the application of statutory guidance and good practice, and we are committed to continue efforts to get full engagement of all independent, private providers and communities.

The Partnership Visions, Values and Principles

Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018 states that the purpose of local arrangements is to support and enable local organisations and agencies to work together in a system where:

children are safeguarded, and their welfare promoted
partner organisations and agencies collaborate, share and co-own the vision for how to achieve improved outcomes for vulnerable children
organisations and agencies challenge appropriately and hold one another to account effectively
there is early identification and analysis of new safeguarding issues and emerging threats
learning is promoted and embedded in a way that local services for children and families can become more reflective and implement changes to practice
information is shared effectively to facilitate more accurate and timely decision making for children and families.

The partnership has developed a one vision, two values and six principles which it will operate to.

Our Vision
All partners are committed to working together so that every child in Hounslow is safe, well and able to reach their full potential.

Our Values

A child centred approach: for services to be effective they should be based on a clear understanding of the needs and views of children.

Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility: for services to be effective each member of Hounslow’s community, its practitioners and organisations should play their part.

Our Principles (The six principles adopted from Adult Safeguarding Boards)

Empowerment: People being supported and encouraged to make their own decisions and with informed consent.

Prevention: It is better to act before harm occurs.

Proportionality: The least intrusive response appropriate to the risk presented.

Protection: Support and representation for those in greatest need.

Partnership: Local solutions through services, organisations and communities working together.

Accountability: Accountability and transparency in safeguarding practice.

How we will achieve these

The Hounslow Safeguarding Children Partnership aims to promote high standards of safeguarding work and to embed a culture of continuous improvement, whilst each partner retains its own existing line of accountability for safeguarding. We are committed to learning from work that has been successful in safeguarding children and risks they face, as well as reviewing and reflecting on poor practice to facilitate improvements.