Government plans to set up national child database must overcome serious problems
- Posted:
- 16:15 10 Nov 2003
- Topics:
- IT Legislation & Regulation | Databases | Regulatory Compliance | IT Strategic Planning | Business Continuity | Computer Hardware | IT Applications
The government's proposal to protect
at-risk children by developing local information sharing systems
will need as much money as the NHS IT programme.
Government plans to set up a national database of all children and
develop integrated IT systems to help prevent a repetition of the
events that led to the murder of Victoria Climbie are at risk. They
face challenges ranging from underfunding and problems with data
quality to data protection issues.
Eight-year-old Climbie was killed by her carers. Care agencies knew
she was at risk but the inquiry into her death found that poor
systems and lack of information sharing meant no agency took
responsibility for her.
Following the inquiry into Climbie's death, the government asked
councils to develop systems that would enable data on at-risk
children to be shared across a range of organisations, including
the NHS and police.
The government's green paper, Every Child Matters, which was
released in September, made clear what was expected of the public
sector. A spokeswoman for the Department for Education and Skills
said, "The government's response to the Victoria Climbie inquiry,
set out in the Every Child Matters green paper, proposes the
development of local information sharing systems based on national
data standards." The government would examine the IT challenges
involved in this, she said.
Sharing information across disparate computer systems is not easy,
particularly in the public sector. Last year the government
allocated £1bn to overhaul IT within the criminal justice
network, and £2.3bn is being devoted to building a new health
service technology infrastructure.
David Johnstone, director of social services at Devon County
Council, warned that the government would have to boost its funding
levels if its strategy for sharing information on vulnerable
children was to work.
"The NHS has a £2.3bn investment programme for IT - if we are
going to talk about the creation of these massive new information
systems for the protection of vulnerable children you would need a
figure in that region," he said.
Bernard Diamant, director of corporate services at the London
Borough of Brent, echoed Johnstone's concerns. "The scale of this
job, if it is to be achieved successfully on a national basis, will
require resources far above those currently identified."
The government has not made a firm commitment about future funding
levels. The DfES said the processes outlined in September's green
paper were not just about spending money. "It is also about how we
can do better with existing resources," a spokeswoman said.
DfES officials have confirmed that the long-term financial
implications of the green paper would be considered as part of the
government's 2004 spending review.
Certainly, the cash allocated so far nowhere near matches the scale
of the task set out in the green paper. Each local authority is to
receive £100,000 to help share information between agencies.
Whitehall has also identified 10 trailblazer areas, which will each
receive £1m in 2003/2004 and another £1m in 2004/2005 to
develop the Identification Referral Tracking (IRT) project, which
is a key part of the government's efforts to build child protection
systems.
The IRT scheme, which involves 15 local authorities, aims to create
a national framework within which locally managed systems can share
information effectively.
As well as looking at the content and compatibility of IT systems
and processes for efficient information sharing, the project aims
to provide guidance and best practice models for local
authorities.
In addition to the technology and funding challenges, the IRT
scheme will also need to overcome significant legislative hurdles
if it is to be a success, said Johnstone.
"IRT is difficult to implement because of regulations and statutes
such as the Data Protection Act, but also because of the
practicalities of defining what is legitimate information to
include," he said.
The report, Electronic Safety Nets: Technology Systems to Safeguard
Children, published by data provider Headstar last month, presented
the results of a survey of 80 local authority directors of social
services and revealed the scale of the challenge.
It found that most councils were unlikely to meet the December 2004
deadline to have in place an IT system capable of recording and
monitoring children's contact with welfare and law enforcement
organisations.
More than 85% of social services directors lack the necessary
management information to check which agencies are working with a
child before a home visit takes place. Nearly 8% of councils said
it would take more than five years to put the necessary systems in
place.
The report also highlighted a number of barriers perceived by local
authority social services directors in implementing child
protection systems. These included interoperability with the
government's proposed national children's database (48.7%), sharing
information with the health service (38.5%), uncertainty over data
protection and freedom of information legislation (30.8%) and lack
of funding (30.8%).
The government recognises there are technical and legal issues
still to be resolved. "We have given a commitment in the green
paper to legislate at the earliest opportunity to remove legal
barriers to information sharing, and are currently consulting on
whether a too rigid interpretation of privacy laws gets in the way
of a child getting the help and support they need," the DfES
said.
If the legal barriers come down, data quality issues could still
remain. When Hammersmith and Fulham Council in west London compared
55,000 records in its social services department with the local NHS
database it found 48% did not match, including 3% where there was
disagreement on whether a person was alive or dead.
Few areas of the public sector need effective information sharing
systems as badly as child protection teams. Getting those systems
in place looks like being extremely difficult.
The government's 10 IRT trailblazer areas
- Bolton
- Camden
- East Sussex in partnership with West Sussex
- Gateshead in partnership with Newcastle upon Tyne
- Kensington & Chelsea
- Knowsley
- Leicester in partnership with Leicestershire and Rutland
- Lewisham
- Sheffield
- Shropshire in partnership with Telford & Wrekin.
