1. Serious Case Review: Agency Briefing
Charlie and Charlotte
Informing practitioners of issues identified by the review and sharing learning for practice.

2. Case Summary: Concerns:
Charlie and Charlotte were 10 and 7 when they were they were placed on the child protection register, removed from the care of their family and placed into foster care.  
Concerns:
Parents had children previously removed from another authority as a result of concerns regarding neglect.
There was extensive multi-agency involvement for a significant period of time following the children being born.
There was lack of any evidence of sustained change in the parent’s ability to meet the children’s needs resulting in:
Severe dental decay and failure to ensure appropriate treatment for both children.
Permanent visual impairment for both children as a result of parental failure to seek treatment.
Variable home conditions from very poor to just good enough over periods of time.
Failure to meet a broader range of the children’s health needs over a significant period of time.
Extreme behavioural challenges presented in school by Charlotte.
Very poor routines for the children meaning that Charlotte regularly fell asleep in school.
One child was overweight and the other often refused to eat.
Children frequently arrived at school hungry.
Poor supervision of the children.

3. Findings:
The lessons learned from this review focus in particular on the ‘start again’ approach taken when mother became pregnant with Charlie which led to an over optimistic and unrealistic assessment of parents’ capacity to care for their children.
The learning from this review should be used to influence practice and policy where families have previously had children removed from their care.
Additional learning comes from how professionals recognise, assess and respond to risk when sexual/abuse allegations are made by children and young people but do not proceed to criminal proceedings; specifically the difference between evidential thresholds and actual/probable risk.
Further learning comes from how practitioners recognise, understand, assess and respond to cases of chronic neglect.
For detailed information of the learning in this case please refer to the full version of this document on the LSCB Website.

4. Useful references links available on the LSCB Website
Durham LSCB Child Protection Procedures
Cycle of Change: Contains Prochaska and DiClemente’s comprehensive model of change to enable practitioners to determine where parents might be in terms of their motivation to change.
Neglect Practice Guidance: This guidance should be read by all practitioners undertaking assessments where there are concerns about neglectful parenting.
Child Development Checklist: This checklist provides a comprehensive guide to developmental milestones at all stages of a child’s development.
Risk and Protective Factors: This handout supports practitioners in analysing information and forming professional judgements about risk and protective factors.
Engaging with Parents: This document provides some useful guidance on engaging with parents and suggested topics/questions.
Home Environment Checklist and HEAT Analysis and Action Plan: This checklist should be used by all staff and enables an assessment of the suitability of the home in relation to basic amenities, health and safety issues, supervision etc.
Engaging Families Toolkit: The toolkit provides practitioners with guidance to assist the effective engagement of families in the offer of support across all
levels of intervention.