2020-21 Annual Report, Independent Scrutiny Visit report and refreshed 2022-23 BSCP Business Plan

Annual report 2020/2021: BSCP is pleased to publish its Annual Report covering the period September 2020 – September 2021. Spanning a period heavily impacted by the Covid19 pandemic, this has been a time like no other for children and young people and the services in place to protect them. Their lived experiences have included schools closing, disruption to their extra-curricular support and enrichment, family dynamics altering and additional pressure upon their lives at home, for some their emotional and mental health worsening exacerbated by managing the consequences of loss and bereavement. For the most vulnerable children in society the loss of a line of sight to trusted adults and professionals within education, social care and health settings has heightened concerns upon their safety. The recent Ofsted Annual Report for 2020/21 notes that, ‘nearly all children have been affected by Covid19 to some degree’.

Across the BSCP we have responded to this challenge and will continue to do so. Our Annual Report outlines key developments and impact in critical areas such as; 

• ensuring additional support for the mental wellbeing of young people through our BICS provision,
• actively supporting schools to ensure that places of learning are continually developing their safeguarding measures in response to new and emerging threats
• pushing forward Police responses to Domestic Abuse by ensuring that nearly all schools in Barnet are signed up to the Operation Encompass programme – ensuring robust support for children affected by violence within the household.
• pushing forward the ICON programme across Health partners – designed to prevent Sudden Unexpected Death in Infants . Over 130 health professionals have engaged with awareness raising activity.
• Delivering a multi-agency training programme attended by over 700 practitioners from across the Partnership.

As we go forward, we will continue to work collectively to tackle safeguarding challenges posed by Covid-19 upon the lives of children. We must remain vigilant and determined to tackle abuse, neglect or exploitation wherever it affects the lives of children.

Our new business plan for 2022-2023: 

Further to approval by the BSCP Leadership Forum, we are pleased to outline the 2022/23 BSCP Business Plan. Following on from our Annual Reporting process and Independent Scrutiny Visit, we will continue to take forward 6 core priorities for the BSCP. There are:

1.       Strengthening leadership and partnership

2.       Tailoring our work to local themes

3.       Driving continuous safeguarding practice improvement

4.       Responding to serious child safeguarding cases effectively

5.       Creating a strong feedback loop with children, families and practitioners

6.       Measuring and evidencing the impact of our work

In addition, this year’s Business Plan will seek to place a focus upon 4 shared safeguarding themes for statutory partners in Health, Police and the Local Authority, with further support by education colleagues and the voluntary, community and faith sector. They are;

• Domestic Abuse
• Neglect
• Suicide and self-harm and,
• Learning from serious youth violence.

We hope that by placing a lens upon these safeguarding challenges we can ensure that our collective focus is upon improving the multi-agency safeguarding system for children and families through a firm commitment to continual learning and improvement. Our new Business Plan can be found here

 Our thanks to all Partners for your ongoing commitment to the Partnership and to children and young people.