“Information sharing in a safeguarding context means the appropriate and secure exchange of personal information, between practitioners and other individuals with a responsibility for children, in order to keep them safe from harm.” (Information Sharing, Advice for practitioners providing safeguarding services for children, young people, parents and carers)
Setting the scene:
The updated Information Sharing Advice for Safeguarding Practitioners guidance was published by the Government in May 2024.
When you’re managing a concern, making decisions about when, how and why to share information, can present real challenges. To help you make some of that decision making a little bit easier this Tool Box unpicks some of the detail included in the guidance, and provides you with opportunities to explore and practice your information sharing skills.
What is its relevance to me?
One of the most striking features of this updated guidance is how clearly it makes the direct link between information sharing and keeping children safe. There are several references to the updated Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023, with a focus on giving practitioners the confidence to know they are sharing appropriately, when sharing is needed.
Rather than Information Sharing Advice for Safeguarding Practitioners being another guidance document sitting on an 'office shelf', the aim of this Tool Box is to help you use the guidance when you’re making decisions every day.
But it isn’t just about making decisions in the moment. The objective of this Tool Box is also to help leaders and managers to use the guidance when they’re developing the safety net that supports you to do your job, as well as you can. To refer to it when they’re developing policies, processes and practice guidelines, to make sure that safe information sharing is a golden thread running through all our work.
Specifically, how does the guidance aim to assist practitioners to keep children and young people safer?
At its core is the belief that having safe access to all the right information enables practitioners to:
- identify, assess and respond effectively to safeguarding concerns
- join up the pieces of a jigsaw, knowing that the final piece might make all the difference to a child’s safety and wellbeing
- support families to have the right conversation, with the right person, at the right time, by accessing services that will help, as soon as they’re needed
- work together more effectively with colleagues, across all partner agencies
- understand what we all mean when we talk about sharing information safely. Speaking the same language as our partners (across adult and children’s services) will make all the difference to the quality and adequacy of the information we share
What more can I learn, and how will that help me to share information safely?
30 Minute learning activity
Throughout this resource, we’re going to explore some of the key principles and advice included in the guidance, which you can add to your safeguarding Tool Box. As a starting point, why not take some time to visit a useful resource which the document signposts you to?
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) provides guidance and support for practitioners making difficult decisions about information sharing. Very particularly, it provides a A 10 Step Guide to Sharing Information to Safeguard Children, this includes some case examples and working through a best practice approach to decision making.