Social Work Child Protection

Questions: Describe the following points.. Task 1: Recommendation and important features of the reports of Lord Laming and Professor Munro Task 2: Use of Lord Laming and Professor Munro reports on the social work practice Task 3: Current policy on fostering and adoption Answers: Task 1: Recommendation and important features of the reports of Lord Laming and Professor Munro After the murder of a child Victoria Climbi as a result of child abuse led to the report of Lord Laming on the issue of protection of the child. There were one hundred and eight recommendations in order to re fix the protection of the child (Garrett, 2006). Among these recommendations the most essentials have been given below. Firstly, he suggested that children and families board needs to be conducted by the senior ministers in the government in order to coordinate the policies and plans which tend to have a bearing on the safety and security of the children and families. He further recommended that a national agency needs to be formed that would be guided by the commissioner in charge so as to make sure that the local services are meeting the national standards for the protection of the child and the implementation of the reforms (Cowan, 2003). Lord Laming suggested that committees for the children and families should be made by council and in such councils there should be members from different fields such as education, police, housing, social work and NHS. Additionally, local management boards need to be developed that would be chaired by chief executives of the council along with the members of the various fields such as social work, education, services for probation, health and housing etc. These boards would also appoint a local director from the children and family services that helps to monitor the effectual working on the purposes of child welfare and protection. Also he suggested that a childrens database be also created in order to keep a track of the contacts that every child has with the members of staff that ranges from health care to police and to the local authorities ('Laming report is to be welcomed', 2009). Critical examination of the report by Lord Laming would state that most of the recommendations made by Lord Laming was appropriate. The only hitch is the proper implementation of the reports and to the extent they could be carried out by the authorities. Professor Eileen Munro is the Professor of Social policy, London School of Economic and is also an eminent academician in the area of child safeguard and protection. She was given the responsibility to prepare the national review on children protection. In this review it has been evident that the focus of the system of child protection should be on the requirements of the particular children and the young generation and not on the processes and targets imposed by the centre (Whittaker, 2011). The vital message that was given in the report by Munro is that the level of prescription by the government should be reduced and this also includes the elimination of other legal timescales. Further the forma procedures for child protection should be removed and more focus should be laid in to the local discretions and the judgment of the professionals. Nevertheless, the Munro also suggests that a new responsibility be placed on the partner agency and the local authorities. This is mainly done in order to safeguard the provisions relating to the early help services for the young people, the families and the children and also to produce a strategy planning on the purposes (Munro, 2000). Some of the most vital parts of the reports are firstly, that the government should not target the local authorities and hence the local service should be free. They should also exercise freedom from the IT systems and regulations so that they are able to design services and plans (Parton, 2011). Secondly, the authorities should conduct the inspections in an unannounced manner and the inspection should be carried out for all services including education, health etc. Thirdly the government should start working with the health professionals for instance the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health in order to make sure that the NHS reforms do not have any negative effect on the effectual protection of the partnership arrangements. And finally the local authorities should employ a senior manager who would be very active in conducting the frontline work and also give the reports of the observations of the professionals in the management. Task 2: Use of Lord Laming and Professor Munro reports on the social work practice After Lord Laming had published the report on the child protection, the government had taken steps for the implementation of the recommendations of the report. The government tried to improve the training for the social workers for children by making a transformation fund for social work. Since a number of the recommendations were directed towards the social task force the government also made initiatives for the same. Supervision guidelines would be established for the social workers and further strategies would be made so as to address the recruitment processes and difficulties relating to retentions (Laming, 2003). The recommendation regarding the establishing of National Safeguard Delivery Unit was accepted by the government and in this regard explicit priorities and safeguarding of targets were developed. Further the hike in fees would be reviewed by the commission and amendments were made in the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill so that new policies on the protection of the children are included. Also the amendments with regard to code of practice for the employers were to be done soon. On the other hand the recommendations made by Professor Munro regarding the protection and safeguard of children even though was considered as a huge success for the social workers, it has been observed that the implementation of the rules have not been in the manner it should have been. There has not been much change in the social work circuit and there has been no mention of the recommendations later (Ainsworth and Hansen, 2011). Even though Munro insisted that the social workers are free from the direct work it has been observed that social workers are doing more work. However there are a few places were the multi-agency safeguarding hub as recommended by Munro had been created and there has been work on the other vital suggestions by Munro. Further with regard to the training it must be noted that the recommendations regarding the Munro were not heard and the training facilities for the social workers still continue to be worse in most of the places. Hence it can be construed even though the recommendations by Lord Laming and Professor Munro was highly appreciated by all sectors when it came to the implementation of these polices the work on the part of the government has been extremely slow. In order to improve the scenario with regard to the protection of children and child abuse it is essential that these recommendations be implemented soon. Task 3: Current policy on fostering and adoption The United Kingdom laws on foster care and adoption were reviewed in the year 2000 and since then the Adoption and Children Act 2002 have been taking care of this issue. Adoption can be carried out with the help of adoption services and agencies that has been approved by the secretary of state (Lord, 2011). This indicates that private adoption has been prohibited by the government. Generally the court passes adoption orders in accordance to the laws under the Children Act 1989. Some of the other legislations that are essential in this regard are the European Convention on Human Rights 1950 and the Convention on the Rights of Child 1989 (O'Halloran, 2006). Also it must be noted that in most cases these adoption cases are lengthy and extremely complex which are conducted in closed courts. References Ainsworth, F. and Hansen, P. (2011). The Munro Review of Child Protection: Final Report A Child-Centred System: A Review and Commentary.Children Australia, 36(03), pp.164-168. Cowan, J. (2003). Risk management, records and the Laming Report.Clinical Governance: An Intl J, 8(3), pp.271-277. Garrett, P. (2006). Protecting Children in a Globalized World: 'Race' and 'Place' in the Laming Report on the Death of Victoria Climbie.Journal of Social Work, 6(3), pp.315-336. Laming report is to be welcomed. (2009).Early Years Educator, 11(1), pp.12-12. Laming, L. (2003). Victoria Climbi does the deliberate harm of children matter?.Criminal Justice Matters, 53(1), pp.46-47. Lord, J. (2011).Adopting a child. BAAF. Munro, E. (2000). Response to a required mind-set for child protection practice: comments on Munro (1999).Child Abuse Neglect, 24(4), p.447. O'Halloran, K. (2006).The politics of adoption. Dordrecht: Springer. Parton, N. (2011). The Munro Review of Child Protection: An Appraisal.Children Society, 26(2), pp.150-162. Whittaker, A. (2011). Social defences and organisational culture in a local authority child protection setting: challenges for the Munro Review?.Journal of Social Work Practice, 25(4), pp.481-495.