2.2 Information Sharing

Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018 states that:

“Effective sharing of information between practitioners and local organisations and agencies is essential for early identification of need, assessment and service provision to keep children safe. Serious case reviews (now referred to as child safeguarding practice reviews) have highlighted that missed opportunities to record, understand the significance of and share information in a timely manner can have severe consequences for the safety and welfare of children".

“Practitioners should be proactive in sharing information as early as possible to help identify, assess and respond to risks or concerns about the safety and welfare of children, whether this is when problems are first emerging, or where a child is already known to local authority children’s social care (e.g. they are being supported as a child in need or have a child protection plan). Practitioners should be alert to sharing important information about any adults with whom that child has contact, which may impact the child’s safety or welfare".

"Information sharing is also essential for the identification of patterns of behaviour when a child is at risk of going missing or has gone missing, when multiple children appear associated to the same context or locations of risk, or in relation to children in the secure estate where there may be multiple local authorities involved in a child’s care. It will be for local safeguarding partners to consider how they will build positive relationships with other local areas to ensure that relevant information is shared in a timely and proportionate way".

The Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) do not prevent the sharing of information for the purposes of keeping children safe. Fears about sharing information must not be allowed to stand in the way of the need to promote the welfare and protect the safety of children.

For more information see page 21 - Working Together to Safeguard Children - page 21 - Myth-busting guide to information sharing  

Working Together to Safeguard Children provides that professionals  do not need consent to share personal information. It is one way to comply with the data protection legislation but not the only way. The GDPR provides a number of bases for sharing personal information.

It is not necessary to seek consent to share information for the purposes of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of a child provided that there is a lawful basis to process any personal information required.

The legal bases that may be appropriate for sharing data in these circumstances could be ‘legal obligation’, or ‘public task’ which includes the performance of a task in the public interest or the exercise of official authority.

For section 17 and section 47 cases, the lawful bases for processing will largely be for the performance of a public task and necessary for the provision of social care.

The MASH/FDFF/ SPOA environments are unique because they enable multiple sources of information to be considered and shared in a secure and safe location. Each has its own Information Sharing Agreement setting out arrangements for the lawful sharing of information between signatory organisations involved in the safeguarding of children

It is good practice to work as collaboratively with families as possible. Professionals should be open and honest with the individual from the outset as to why, what, how and with whom, their information will be shared. A record of what has been shared should be kept.

Ensure that the information you share is necessary for the purpose for which you are sharing it, is shared only with those individuals who need to have it, is accurate and up-to-date, is shared in a timely fashion, and is shared securely.

If  you are ever unsure about information sharing seek advice from your supervisor, manager, nominated person within your organisation or area, or from a professional body.

A Caldicott Guardian is a senior person responsible for protecting the confidentiality of patient and service-user information and enabling appropriate information-sharing. The Guardian plays a key role in ensuring that the NHS, Local Authority Social Services Departments and partner organisations satisfy the highest practicable standards for handling patient identifiable information.

The Eight Caldicott Principles

1. Justify the purpose(s) for using confidential information;
2. Don't use personal confidential data unless it is absolutely necessary;
3. Use the minimum necessary personal confidential data;
4. Access to personal confidential data should be on a strict need-to-know basis;
5. Everyone with access to personal confidential data should be aware of their responsibilities;
6. Comply with the law;
7. The duty to share information can be as important as the duty to protect patient confidentiality
8. Inform patients and service users about how their confidential information is used

See more here- Eight_Caldicott_Principles_08.12.20.pdf (publishing.service.gov.uk)

Every local Health Service and Children and Young People's Directorate has its own Caldicott Guardian, to provide advice and guidance on appropriate information sharing.

Working Together 2018 states that:

• all organisations and agencies should have arrangements in place that set out clearly the processes and the principles for sharing information. The arrangement should cover how information will be shared within their own organisation/agency; and with others who may be involved in a child’s life.
• all practitioners should not assume that someone else will pass on information that they think may be critical to keeping a child safe. If a practitioner has concerns about a child’s welfare and considers that they may be a child in need or that the child has suffered or is likely to suffer significant harm, then they should share the information with local authority children’s social care and/or the police. All practitioners should be particularly alert to the importance of sharing information when a child moves from one local authority into another, due to the risk that knowledge pertinent to keeping a child safe could be lost 

Where there is a clear risk of significant harm to a child, or serious harm to adults, the public interest test will almost certainly be satisfied. However, there will be other cases where practitioners will be justified in sharing some confidential information in order to make decisions on sharing further information or taking action. The information shared should be proportionate. Decisions in this area need to be made by, or with the advice of, people with suitable competence in Child Protection work such as named or designated professionals or senior managers.

The relevant issues for social workers are usually around sharing information where consent has been withheld. There is a public interest defence if sharing information is for the purposes of safeguarding a child or vulnerable person.

Section 115 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 establishes:

The power to disclose information is central to the Act's partnership approach. The Police have an important general power under common law to disclose information for the prevention, detection and reduction of crime. However, some other public bodies that collect information may not previously have had power to disclose it to the Police and others. This section puts beyond doubt the power of any organisation to disclose information to Police authorities, local authorities, Probation Service, Health Authorities, or to persons acting on their behalf, so long as such disclosure is necessary or expedient for the purposes of crime prevention. These bodies also have the power to use this information.

Article 8 in the European Convention on Human Rights states that:

Everyone has the right to respect for his/her private and family life, home and correspondence;

There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of rights and freedoms of others.

For guidance for local authorities on improving case management systems for children's social care services see Children's social care: improving case management systems - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

The Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme(DVDS), also known as “Clare’s Law” enables the police to disclose information to a victim or potential victim of domestic abuse about their partner’s or ex-partner’s previous abusive or violent offending. This scheme adds a further dimension to the information sharing about children where there are concerns that domestic violence and abuse is impacting on the care and welfare of the children in the family. See more Domestic Violence Discolsure Scheme factsheet

Members of the public can make an application for a disclosure, known as the ‘right to ask’. Anybody can make an enquiry, but information will only be given to someone at risk or a person in a position to safeguard the victim. The scheme is for anyone in an intimate relationship regardless of gender.

Partner agencies can also request disclosure is made of an offender’s past history where it is believed someone is at risk of harm. This is known as ‘right to know’.

If a potentially violent individual is identified as having convictions for violent offences, or information is held about their behaviour which reasonably leads the police and other agencies to believe they pose a risk of harm to their partner, a disclosure will be made. 

A disclosure can be made lawfully by the police under the scheme if the disclosure is based on the police’s common law powers to disclose information where it is necessary to prevent crime, and if the disclosure also complies with established case law, as well as data protection and human rights legislation. It must be reasonable and proportionate for the police to make the disclosure, based on a credible risk of violence or harm.

The Child Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme (CSOD) is designed to provide members of the public with a formal mechanism to ask for disclosure about people they are concerned about, who have unsupervised access to children and may therefore pose a risk. See more here Child Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme  This scheme builds on existing, well established third-party disclosures that operate under the Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA).

To apply see here - Sarah's Law (Child Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme) 

Police will reveal details confidentially to the person most able to protect the child (usually parents, carers or guardians) if they think it is in the child’s interests.

The scheme has been operating in all 43 police areas in England and Wales since 2010. The scheme is managed by the Police and information can only be accessed through direct application to them.

If a disclosure is made, the information must be kept confidential and only used to keep the child in question safe. Legal action may be taken if confidentiality is breached. A disclosure is delivered in person (as opposed to in writing) with the following warning:

• 'That the information must only be used for the purpose for which it has been shared i.e. in order to safeguard children;
• The person to whom the disclosure is made will be asked to sign an undertaking that they agree that the information is confidential and they will not disclose this information further;
• A warning should be given that legal proceedings could result if this confidentiality is breached. This should be explained to the person and they must sign the undertaking’ (Home Office, 2011, p16).

If the person is unwilling to sign the undertaking, the police must consider whether the disclosure should still take place.

The issue of age assessment in social work with asylum seeking young people remains controversial and has been something that Children’s social care have struggled with since the millennium. The ADCS Asylum Task Force has worked with the Home Office to provide two new jointly agreed documents, as detailed below. These documents are offered as practice guidance, by way of assistance to local authorities and their partners. The use of the proforma and consent form is voluntary. The content does not, nor does it seek to, be binding on local authorities. It is simply a recommended approach.

See also:

• Age Assessment Joint Working Guidance
• Age Aseessment Guidance  
• Age Assessment Information sharing proforma
• Home Office -Published for Home Office staff on 31 December 2020