Making a referral to the Early Help and Safeguarding Hub (EHASH)

Describe your concerns

Be clear where possible and explain in detail -

• what you have seen and heard
• who you are worried about
• what they have done to make you have a worry
• how long you have been worried
• how often you have had these worries
• how severe these worries have been
• the known impact on the child or children to date

Examples

“We are concerned that the children are being neglected.” compared with “The children have told us that there has not been any food in the house for the past 3 days because their mum and dad have spent all the money on drugs. The children have said that they have been so hungry they have been looking in bins for food.”

The second phrase is a more detailed statement which will better inform our assessment.

When we visit the home, the parents might have just been shopping, and the children might have just eaten. The parents might have told the children not to tell the social worker that sometimes there is no food in the house. If so, we will not be able to capture this in the same way that you, the referrer, can, and this information will be important to evidence harm in a Court Report.

A contextual safeguarding example is -

“We are worried Emma is at risk of CSE.”, would be better described as “Emma is often picked up from school by a group of older young people in a car, mum reports she does not know these new friends of Emma’s, Emma has become very secretive about where she goes and who she is with. Emma showed her support worker a brand-new iPhone that she was really pleased about and said she had a job after school.”

If you are describing events or behaviour that you did not see firsthand, make sure you explain who observed this.

If you did not see or hear the harmful behaviour firsthand tell us who did.

Where possible use their words verbatim to explain this and provide their full name and contact details so we can get further information if necessary.

The impact to the child

Make sure you distinguish between what you think is the impact on the child and what you have seen. If you say something like “James was really upset” explain what this looked like. Was he crying, screaming, quieter than usual? What did James say or do to make you think he was upset? When describing what James told you, use his exact words in speech marks. We want to capture the voice of the child wherever possible.

Include observations and exact words where possible.

In line with the prompts on the harm matrix -

• is this the first time the reason for your referral has happened?
• if not, when was the first time this happened?
• what was the worst incident?
• when was the last time you were aware?

 If you have checked your records and there is no sign that this has happened before, mention this in your referral.

Complicating factors

Complicating Factors should be clearly identified under a separate heading within the ‘What Are We Worried About’ section of the referral. This is where you record anything that is making it more difficult to address the worries, for example -

• physical or mental health of someone in the household
• financial problems.
• someone having communication difficulties because of a hearing impairment or not speaking English as a first language, making it difficult to explain what is happening
• problematic relationships with extended family, friends, and community
• health issues
• financial problems

What is working well

Include strengths and safety factors. What is going well in the day-to-day care of the child, who does this and what are they doing? 

This will help us to understand the actions that have been taken to keep the child safe when harm has been present and the good things that are already happening in the child’s life.

This is all useful information that we can build on with the family to create a good plan to keep the child safe.

Include information in your referral about the strengths and safety in the child’s life. Strengths are the good things people are doing to try and sort out the worries and the people who are helping. Safety is the people who are keeping the child safe when the bad things are happening For example -

• “Sometimes Mum’s sister Kate is with her when she drops James off at school. This happens about once a week and when she is there he always arrives on time, and his clothes look clean and smart. James often speaks about his Auntie Kate, and he always smiles when he talks about her. "
• “The Imam has been supporting the family with everything that has been going on during this difficult time.” 
• “Every Thursday James goes to his friend Ben’s house after school and has his tea there, he has mentioned this a few times on a Thursday and really looks forward to playing with Ben. Ben’s Mum Rebecca picks them both up from school.”
• "Emma seems to have built a good relationship with the pastoral support worker; she seeks her out in school regularly and will talk to her about some of her worries about school and friends. Emma has kept one of her best friends throughout these recent changes."
• “When Mum started to get angry, Dad took the children round to their Gran’s house so that they weren’t frightened or hurt.”
• “Dad has been going to see the doctor to get some help with his depression. He has been getting Ben to school on time more often since he has started taking medication.”
• “Emma has phoned her best friend’s mum in the past to pick her up when she was out with these new friends but wanted to come home earlier than they did.”

If anyone is mentioned in the ‘What is working well’ section, list them in the ‘family network and other important people’s' part of your referral, even if you do not know their full name.

We will explore this further if the referral progresses to early help or social care. It is important that we identify people who can help keep the child safe and support the family, both as part of a safety plan to address the worries and to continue doing this when children’s services are no longer involved. It does not always have to be a family member it can be a friend or neighbour too.

What needs to happen next

List next steps and necessary changes for example -

• tell us what you would need to see for you to feel that the child is safe
• what are the next steps that your agency is taking to try and support the family going forward?
• what is it that you need to see for you not to have a worry?
• what does the child and their family think needs to happen next or what needs to change?

Scaling questions

We will ask you scaling questions to help us understand how safe the child is in relation to your worry.

The questions will usually be tailored to the child you are discussing but it will look something like this -

•  'On a scale of 0 to 10 where 10 is the child is safe in relation to your worry and where 0 is you are so worried you don’t think it’s safe for the child to remain in their current situation, where would you rate the situation?

We will also ask you what you would need to see happening to rate the situation one step higher. This helps us to understand how worried you are, and we will take this into account within our decision making.

We will consider all the information and evidence that you have shared, and this decision will also be checked and authorised by their manager.