Safeguarding Practice Reviews

When are Safeguarding Practice Reviews Undertaken?

HSCPs must continue to commission SPRs until the point at which the new safeguarding partner arrangements begin to operate in a local area. HSCPs should also continue to use the SPR criteria set out in Working Together 2015.

Only once the safeguarding partner arrangements begin to operate in the local area, they should commission local child safeguarding practice reviews, rather than SCRs, as set out in Working Together 2018.

HSCPs were required to consider undertaking a Safeguarding Practice Review (SPR) whenever a child dies and abuse or neglect are known or suspected to have taken place.

Other circumstances that may lead to a SPR are:

• A child receives a potentially life-threatening injury or serious impairment of their health, as a consequence of abuse or neglect
• A child is subjected to serious sexual abuse
• A parent has been murdered and a homicide review has been initiated
• A child has been killed by a parent with a mental illness
• There are concerns about the way different organisations worked together

Purpose of Safeguarding Practice Reviews

SPRs are written by people who are independent from the HSCP that commissions them, in order to identify where there are lessons that can be learned about the way that organisations worked, both individually and together.

Safeguarding Practice Reviews - A National Perspective

The lessons learned through the SCR process in other areas of the country can be relevant to our practice in Haringey. All SPRs published on HSCP websites across the country are available on the NSPCC website (external link).

Some of the key findings of the 47 cases studied in detail from the last DCSF Review are:

• Domestic violence was present in 66% of cases
• Substance misuse was present in 57% of cases
• Mental ill health was present in 55% of cases
• All three issues were present in 34% of cases