Safeguarding Matters Autumn 2016, Issue 11 Free Safeguarding Training! The Rochdale Borough Safeguarding Boards offer a programme of free multi agency safeguarding training for people working with children, young people, adults at risk of abuse or neglect and their families. The 2016-2017 training programme is now available together with guidance to help you pick which course is most appropriate for you. The training is provided by practitioners who can provide up-to-date, practical guidance and direction. The training ranges from full day courses to 2 or 3 hour seminars, and 1 hour lunch and learn sessions. Courses are free but there is a charge for non-attendance. In addition there are various e-leaning courses available from other sources, details of which can be found on the Board s website. 7 minute briefings are also available, which are a quick and easy way to learn about a subject in a limited time. 7 minute briefings are on the Board s website, and more will be added over the coming months. Details of available training and how to book a place can be found on the www.safeguarding4rochdale.com website. In this issue: News from the Board 2 Who s who? 4 Left behind 5 Keeping up-to-date 6 Care Certificate 7 Healthwatch 8 FGM resources 8 Prevent Catalogue 8 World Mental Health Day Guide for Social Care Service Providers Awareness of Forced Marriage 9 10 10 Extremist material 10 Jargon buster 11 Contact details 12
News from the Board an update from the last Board meeting The Rochdale Borough Safeguarding Adults Board (RBSAB) meets every three months and each newsletter carries a summary of what was discussed. The last Board meeting was in September 2016. The Board discussed its workload going forwards and planned its meeting schedule for next year. The Board currently meets four times a year, and decided that in 2017 and onwards the meetings would be scheduled for every two months. The Honour Based Abuse strategy was approved. The strategy has four main strands - prevention, protection, prosecution and partnership. An action plan is now in development. A report on Making Safeguarding Personal (MSP) was considered by the Board. MSP ensures that the views of the individual at the centre of a safeguarding enquiry, and their desired outcomes, are central to the process. Although originally seen as a development in social work practice with adults it is now recognised as an approach which needs to be embedded in multi-agency practice. The report makes a series of recommendations about how the principles of MSP can be developed across the multi-agency partnership. These will be progressed by one of the Board s sub-groups. The Learning Disability Premature Mortality Review Programme was presented, to update the Board on the health position in relation to the review of premature deaths amongst people with learning disability and mental health issues. The Programme is commissioned by the Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP) on behalf of NHS England. Its aim is to guide improvements in the health and social care delivery for people with learning disabilities and help reduce premature mortality and health inequalities for people with learning disabilities. All deaths of people with a learning disability between 4 and 74 will be reviewed. Deaths in the 4-17 age range will be reviewed as per the current process of the Child Death Overview Panel. The purpose of the reviews are to help health and social care practitioners and policy makes to identify potentially avoidable contributory factors, identify variation and best practice and develop action plans as needed where lessons need to be learnt. This initiative only covers the unexpected deaths of those with learning disability at the current time. 2
News from the Board an update from the last Board meeting The Board reviewed the findings from the recent Care Quality Commission inspection of Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust. The CQC the health and social care regulator - can give one of four ratings to Trusts and services: Outstanding, Good, Requires Improvement, or Inadequate. A team of CQC inspectors found the Trust provided services that were Good for Caring, but were deemed overall Inadequate for being Safe and Well-Led, and Requires Improvement to be Effective and Responsive. The CQC inspected all four hospitals and all community services run by the Trust: Rochdale Infirmary was rated as Good. Fairfield General Hospital in Bury was rated as Requires Improvement North Manchester General Hospital was rated as Inadequate The Royal Oldham Hospital was rated Inadequate All community services run by the Trust were rated as Good across all CQC domains Outstanding rating given for the Caring domain in the community End of Life Service Outpatients, x-ray and other diagnostic services rated Good across all hospital sites The RBSAB Multi-Agency Policy and Procedures are currently being updated in light of the revised Care Act Guidance that was issued recently. The updates are almost complete and the final chapters will be sent to Board members for their approval in the next couple of weeks. Once approved, the Policy and Procedures will be uploaded onto the RBSAB website and members will be asked to inform the staff in their agencies that the updates are available. The Safeguarding Adult Review screening subgroup reported on its activities. The group meets on a as required basis to screen cases to assess if they meet the requirement to make recommendation to the Chair to commission a Safeguarding Adult Review or a local learning lessons review. The group also quality assures single agency reviews/reports on behalf of the RBSAB. A referral for a Safeguarding Adult Review has been received and the screening group has recommended a review should proceed. The Chair of the Board has approved this recommendation. The Board also heard about a Review conducted by Pennine Care NHS Trust recently. A summary of all the Board meetings can be found at www.rbsab.org.uk along with lots of other safeguarding information! 3
Who s who? In each issue we introduce a member of the Board, to help people understand who is on the Board and the types of backgrounds and jobs they have. This issue features Cath Owston from Rochdale Boroughwide Housing. Hello my name is Cath Owston I am Director of Customer Services at Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH). I have worked in housing and customer services for 30 years and started my working life as a homelessness advisor in the London Borough of Hillingdon, employed on a three month temporary contract! I quickly realised that supporting and helping those who were living in poor or unsatisfactory housing or threatened with homelessness was what I wanted to do. RBH is the UK s first tenant and employee co-owned mutual housing society, with over 13,500 homes throughout the local area. Our vision is that by working together we provide better places for our members, tenants and employees to live and work. The Customer Services Directorate plays a key part in this - delivering services ranging from enquiries and assistance with rehousing through to repairs, re-letting empty homes, helping tenants with rent and income enquiries, supporting people to live independently, providing face to face and telephone customer services advice, helping people into home ownership. We also provide a homelessness and housing options service on behalf of Rochdale BC, helping to prevent homelessness and offer advice and support to anyone who needs help with their housing circumstances. I am RBH s Safeguarding lead and am currently a member of the RBSAB, while other colleagues are members of the Children s Board and sub-groups. Safeguarding is important to RBH. We believe that safeguarding is everyone s responsibility. Many RBH colleagues come into direct and regular contact with customers, carers, families and neighbours. This means that we are particularly well-placed to raise concerns, alert agencies and act to protect individuals from harm. This year we have concentrated on providing training and support to all our front-line colleagues to ensure that they have a good awareness of safeguarding and the confidence to know when and how to raise a concern. Our Nominated Officers also ensure that all our teams are kept informed of policy developments and good practice. We are an active partner in multi-agency forums and work closely with partners to ensure that RBH is working effectively to deal with issues as varied as domestic abuse, anti-social behaviour and modern slavery. I look forward to working with partners on the Board to further improve the links we have. 4
The National Counter Terrorism Policing have launched a new film 'Left Behind', which features four police Prevent Contact Officers talking about the impact on families when a loved one travels to Syria or another conflict zone. They describe the distress and heartache families go through and appeal to viewers to seek help if they are concerned about someone they know and love. http://www.preventtragedies.co.uk/left-behind/ Don t Forget.. To keep up-to-date with safeguarding developments, initiatives and reports you can subscribe to the RBSAB website. Each time a page is updated, we ll send you a message! 5
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Care Certificate The Care Certificate is a set of standards that social care and health workers stick to in their daily working life. It is a set of minimum standards that should be covered as part of induction training of new care workers. The Care Certificate was developed jointly by Skills for Care, Health Education England and Skills for Health. It: applies across social care and health links to National Occupational Standards covers what is needed to be caring - giving workers a good basis from which they can develop their knowledge and skills. Who is it for? Designed with non-regulated workers in mind, the Care Certificate gives everyone the confidence that workers have the same induction - learning the same skills, knowledge and behaviours to provide compassionate, safe and high quality care and support. The Care Certificate is the start of the career journey and is only one element of the training and education that will make them ready to practice within their specific sector. Although the Care Certificate is designed for new staff, it also offers opportunities for existing staff to refresh or improve their knowledge. For more information about the care Certificate, including workbooks, presentations and supporting material, please visit the Skills for Care website. 7
Free FGM resources available The Home Office is offering free resources including posters, leaflets, wallet cards, a DVD, an online resource pack and factsheets on the mandatory reporting duty. The order form is available on the www.safeguarding4rochdale.com website. Prevent training Catalogue Prevent is the duty in the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 on specified authorities to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. It is a statutory requirement for many people to receive training and is highly desirable for many other people to understand the risks of radicalisation, the signs and the appropriate response. The training catalogue can be accessed here. 8
Guide to Adult Safeguarding for Social Care Service Providers This helpful guide is available to download free of charge from Skills For Care. World Mental Health Day 8th October 2016 World Mental Health Day (WMHD) is celebrated every year on 10th October by many countries around the world. This annual event raise public awareness about mental health issues. The theme this year is Dignity in Mental Health: Psychological and Mental Health First Aid for All. Rochdale and District Mind are currently organising the Borough s World Mental Health Day celebrations which will take place on Saturday 8th October 2016 on The Butts, Rochdale Town Centre, 10.00am till 3.00pm. The main event which will include a series of Time to Talk events around the Borough during September to help raise public awareness of mental health problems, and allow people to have conversations with each other about mental health in order to break down the stigma surrounding it. Dates for these events are: Friday, 16thSeptember Middleton Market, 9.am 3.pm Tuesday, 20th September Littleborough Town Centre, 7.am 12.30pm Tuesday 27th September Rochdale Exchange, 10.00am 2.00pm Friday, 30th September Heywood Market, 9.00am till 3.00pm Every conversation counts, so please join these Time to Talk events. Rochdale and District Mind will provide you with tips, tools, conversation starters, and even your own Time to Talk tea bags or coffee sachet for you to have your own conversations over a drink. Remember, the little things you do can make a big difference. Like that chat over a cuppa! 9
Adult safeguarding leaflets and posters are available free of charge. Just contact rbsb@rochdale.gov.uk Awareness of Forced Marriage This course has been developed with the Forced Marriage Unit of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Home Office. It aims to raise awareness, challenge perceptions and inform you of the correct actions to take should you suspect someone is at risk. After completing this training you will be able to: Recognise the warning signs of forced marriage Take the right actions to help protect the potential victim Co-operate effectively with other agencies Further details are available here. 10
Jargon Buster Sometimes it can be difficult for people to understand the information they are given because they are not familiar with the terms being used or how the health and social care systems work. In this regular feature, we ll be explaining some of the terms you might come across. What is Domestic Servitude? Domestic servitude involves children, men and women being forced to work in private households performing tasks such as childcare and housekeeping for little or no pay and in abusive conditions. Victims of domestic servitude can be entirely dependent on their traffickers and often speak limited to no English. Victims are often completely isolated from the outside world, which is exacerbated by restriction of their movement. Where freedom is allowed, it is heavily curbed by extreme psychological control. Many victims have no private space - often sleeping on mattresses on the floor in an open part of the house. Unlike many other forms of trafficking, domestic servitude, particularly that of adult migrants does NOT usually involve organised criminal networks. There is evidence indicating that perpetrators may contradict the usual criminal profile, holding positions of influence and wealth e.g. doctors, lawyers, bankers, diplomats. Many victims of domestic servitude are children who are brought to the UK with promises of education and then grossly deceived once here. However there are also many adult victims of domestic servitude, many of whom are migrant domestic workers. These are men and women who enter the UK legally, willingly accompanying their employer to the UK but once here find that they are subject to extreme levels of abuse, control and exploitation. Statistics In 2014 there were 234 adults referred to the National Referral Mechanism (NRM) as victims of Domestic Servitude, 200 of which were women. 71 children were identified by the NRM as being victims of Domestic Servitude in 2014. What are the signs? Foreign national adult/child lives with family (possibly as domestic worker/ nanny). Rarely allowed out of house, unless accompanied. Subjected to psychological/physical/ sexual abuse. No private space/poor sleeping arrangements. Poor diet/leftovers. If a child, poor attendance at school/no time to play. Person not interacting much with the family. 11
How to report a safeguarding concern 12