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A Learning summary has been published The decision is made by the Safeguarding Board under a statutory serious case management review.
The review investigated the admission of a vulnerable teenager to hospital after taking a large amount of drugs. The young person was in care at the time of the incident.
For review purposes and to protect his identity, this person is referred to as “Child J.”
The Safeguarding Board commissioned an independent off-island expert, Dr Russell Wate QPM, to conduct a review and produce a summary of learnings to guide improvements in children’s services.
The review found that children J had experienced many adverse childhood experiences from an early age. These experiences can be traumatic events in childhood, which often lead to chronic health and social problems in adulthood and have a negative impact on educational outcomes and future employment opportunities.
Child J’s experiences led to escalating risk-taking behaviors, ultimately making him vulnerable to exploitation by criminals.
The independent report sets out a number of learning points and recommendations.
Overall, the measures cover the need for government agencies to work together to develop a strategy to prevent young people from being exploited or harmed outside the home, or becoming involved in criminal activity – an approach known as situational safeguarding. This will ensure that the risk of children and young people being at significant risk of harm outside the home is better understood and enable services to determine the most appropriate actions to reduce that harm.
The report also recommends that all agencies working with young people adopt a vulnerable youth services strategy and an early help strategy. This will ensure young people and their families get help and support as quickly as possible to prevent long-term problems.
The review also acknowledged that this work needs to be underpinned by a professional framework to improve professionals’ knowledge and understanding of the impact of adverse childhood experiences. This will enable practitioners to provide appropriate and informed responses to other young people in the future. The review also discussed the importance of identifying ‘accessible moments’, which are unplanned opportunities that can provide a breakthrough for young people at risk of exploitation.
Lesley Walker, independent chair of the Conservation Council, said:
“When a review of safeguarding practices to protect vulnerable young people comes into play, it is understandably worrying. However, it is important that when practice can be improved, we seize the opportunity and implement change. This review has provided a number of recommendations which, if fully implemented, will reduce risks to other young people in the future. The Isle of Man Government and its agencies have already begun work to address the lessons identified.
“The aim of these reviews is not to assign blame but to establish the facts, identify lessons learned – what worked well and what needs improvement – and support agencies to make changes as a result. Ultimately this is about raising standards and improving practice to properly protect vulnerable people on the Isle of Man.”
Ms. Walker continued:
“A striking feature of this review is that all professionals working with this young person cared about their safety and were fully committed to improving practice through learning.
“Overall, the statutory role of the Safeguarding Board is to support all agencies involved in implementing improvements so that similar situations are avoided in the future. The Safeguarding Board will receive regular assurance reports on the work of agencies involved in implementing the recommendations.”
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