Families seeking support for a disabled child can end up going through child protection routes. When a local authority issues a child protection plan, professionals working with the family have to assign one of five categories e.g. physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, neglect or multiple.
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We think these categories assign parent blame and therefore want a new category "unmet needs".
When parents of children with disabilities (CWD) seek help, they can end up on a safeguarding pathway. The minimum criteria for a CWD Social Worker (SW) is high e.g. must have autism and a learning difficulty, which can result in families being assigned SW's with safeguarding as their primary training, rather than disabilities. These families can get trapped in a safeguarding loop which we feel breaks down trust and currently, if placed on Child Protection, this can have lifelong DBS consequences including loss of work. We want change.