Sexual Harm Consultation Group

Sexual Harm is being considered as part of the Action Plan under the remit of Children who display Harmful Sexual Behaviour (HSB) and Children who are victims or at risk of Intra-Familial Child Sexual Abuse (IFCSA) in line with the agreed threshold.

Harmful sexual behaviour (HSB) can be defined as “Sexual behaviours expressed by children and young people under the age of 18 years old that are developmentally inappropriate, may be harmful towards self or others and/ or be abusive towards another child, young person or adult.” (Hackett, Holmes and Branigan, 2016).

The term ‘harmful sexual behaviour’ is used to describe a continuum of sexual behaviours, from inappropriate to problematic to abusive. There is a range of common and healthy behaviours at different developmental stages.

There is no single agreed definition of Intra-Familial Child Sexual Abuse. The UK Government’s definition of child sexual abuse is “forcing or enticing a child or young person to take part in sexual activities, not necessarily a high level of violence, whether or not the child is aware of what is happening. The activities may involve physical contact, including assault by penetration (for example, rape or oral sex) or non-penetrative acts such as masturbation, kissing, rubbing or touching outside of clothing. They may also include non-contact activities, such as involving the children in looking at, or in the production of, sexual images, watching sexual activities, encouraging children to behave in sexually inappropriate ways or grooming a child in preparation for abuse (including via the internet). Sexual abuse is not solely perpetrated by adult males. Women can also commit acts of sexual abuse, as can other children’ (Department for Education, 2015).

When considering Intra-Familial CSA it is recognised that in addition to parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles and siblings, an abuser may be someone close to the child that they consider to be family such as a step-parent or close family friend.

Working Together 2010 (now archived) states in relation to children and young people who display harmful sexual behaviour:

• There should be a coordinated approach between youth justice, children’s services, police and health (including child and young people's mental health services);
• DSCP’s should ensure there is a clear operational procedure in place within which assessment, decision making, and case management should take place.

NICE guidelines (HSB among child and young people: 2016) state that local authorities should develop local safeguarding policies and agree a harmful sexual behaviour framework between agencies, meet regularly to plan, implement and evaluate care pathways for children and young people. It also recommends that the care plan is the responsibility of the whole multi-agency team and not individual practitioners.

Research shows that the number of children subject to child protection plans under the category of sexual abuse is at it’s lowest in over 20 years despite Police reporting an increase in the number of CSA crimes recorded. (Kelly and Karsna, 2017). There are worries that this is a reflection of changing priorities in Local Authority’s, a focus on Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) or Domestic Abuse. It may also reflect the professional challenges involved with Intra-Familial CSA. Overcoming these challenges required confident and able professionals and a supportive child protection system rather than a bureaucratic and target centred one. (Munro, 2011).

Recent innovations seeking to achieve such change have highlighted the importance of social workers combining empathy and collaboration with purpose and authority, good reflective supervision, and the use of multi-disciplinary teams. (McNeish et al, 2017).

Following DSCP Child Safeguarding Practice Review (2020) in cases where Sexual Harm was a theme is was found that improvements were required by Durham Children’s Social Care. An action plan has been agreed around Sexual Harm which incorporates a new procedure and the development of a sexual harm consultation group. This is one of the four key priorities for 2021 from the DSCP.

The Harmful Sexual Behaviour Tool has been developed by the Durham Safeguarding Children Partnership to assist professionals with the identification and assessment of children and young people who display harmful sexual behaviour. This can be found under Further Information.

Purpose

The role of the Sexual Harm Consultation Group is to provide strategic direction and leadership to ensure that children and young people where intrafamilial child sexual abuse or harmful sexual behaviour is present. This is to ensure the child/young person receives the appropriate interventions, support, reduced risk and better outcomes. To make secure decisions around future steps, assessment and intervention for young people who display HSB or have been a victim of IFCSA. It is imperative to ensure a multi-agency approach is used. In contextualising the concerns by drawing information from Police, Social Care, One Point Early Help, Youth Justice Service, Full Circle Therapeutic Services, Health and Education together, a richer understanding of the young persons’ needs can be established. Therefore, the purpose of the Sexual Harm Consultation Group will be to do the following:

• To meet on a monthly basis and provide oversight and scrutiny of care planning to those cases where children or young people are identified as Medium/High or High risk of HSB or IFCSA;
• To ensure that all children arrested or referred to Children’s Social Care, County Durham Youth Justice Service or Durham Constabulary via the HSB pathway are considered for referral to the Sexual Harm Consultation Group;
• To identify as early as possible, where intervention would be beneficial in preventing a pattern of further offending or HSB and to advise on the appropriate interventions and/or referrals;
• To discuss the findings and recommendations of any specialist HSB reports including AIM3 assessments in Medium/High or High risk cases, to ensure that recommendations including safety planning are agreed and implemented;
• Monitor high risk police cases through to outcome;
• To ensure that where children or young people are identified as Medium/High or High risk of HSB or IFCSA the appropriate interventions are in place including signposting and operational advice;
• To report to the DSCP and offer assurance around on practice developments.

The Sexual Harm Consultation Group will be made up with representatives from a wide range of multi-agencies and could also, on occasion, benefit from attendance of other specialist services by invitation. The consultation group will include the following:

• Families First team Manager;
• Strategic Manager South;
• Harmful Sexual Behaviour Lead/Youth Justice;
• Youth Justice Representative;
• Independent Reviewing Officer;
• Education;
• Health;
• Educational Psychologist;
• Full Circle Team practitioner;
• Police;
• One Point Early Help;
• The Meadows.

Click here to view the Sexual Harm Consultation Group Process.

Panel Representation

The Sexual Harm Consultation Group will be made up with representatives from a wide range of multi-agencies and could also, on occasion, benefit from attendance of other specialist services by invitation.

The core consultation group members will comprise of:

• Strategic Manager – Families First - Strategic Oversight;
• County Durham Youth Justice Team Manager/Harmful Sexual Behaviour Lead;
• Team Manager, Families First - Children’s Social Care;
• Independent Reviewing Officer - Children’s Social Care;
• Education Equalities Team Leader – Education Durham;
• Counselling Team Leader / Educational Psychologist;
• Full Circle Team Manager - Therapeutic Services;
• Durham Constabulary;
• Senior Safeguarding Lead – Harrogate & District NHS FT - Health;
• Operations Manager - One Point Service -Early Help;
• Child’s Social Worker/Key Worker and relevant Team Manager.

Conduct of Meetings

The child or young person’s Social Worker or Key Worker will make referrals by completing the sexual harm risk matrix relevant to the issue and provide a case synopsis in line with the Sexual Harm Procedure. These will be reviewed and screened by the consultation group chair to have a pre-panel screening process, at this stage it will be agreed to discuss the case at panel or signpost.

Children’s Social Care will collate referrals and circulate the agenda approximately one week prior to the sexual harm consultation group meeting. The agenda will list the child or young person to be discussed, their date of birth and current involvement. Panel members are expected to prepare their agency information in advance to allow for timely discussions.

Each consultation group member will represent their own service area and will be responsible for sharing relevant contextual information relating to the young person being discussed.

Consultant group members are encouraged to challenge ideas and information shared by colleagues as there is no one collective ‘information management system’ which covers all agencies represented therefore clarification and clear and accurate information gathering is imperative.

For cases where onward referral is deemed to be an important action, members will collaboratively make decisions and the most relevant member will take lead with this action.

The recommendations of the consultation group should be incorporated into the child’s plan and recorded in a timely manner within each agency’s case management system.

The sexual harm consultation group will have administrative support provided by the Local Authority who will record the discussions and any actions for consultation group members including timescales for actions to be completed.

In some situations, a child or young person may discussed at subsequent meetings and be recorded as an ‘ongoing’ case due to the nature of the concern. It will be a shared decision by the Consultation Group that a child or young person can be removed from the agenda which will be supported by an up to date risk matrix to evidence that the child or young person is no longer at risk

Minutes from the sexual harm consultation group will be circulated to members within 10 working days following the meeting. A case note under sexual harm consultation group will be added to the child’s records with key outcomes.

The sexual harm consultation group will be held via MS Teams (until further notice) once a month and will last for up to half a day with up to 15 minutes allocated to each case.

The consultation group will collate findings on a bi-annual basis and present to the DSCP Executive Business Group for assurance purposes as part of the Sexual Harm Action Plan.

Any disagreements should be raised with the consultation group chair in the first instance. If an agreement cannot be reached. this should be raised with the relevant agency’s senior manager and any escalation should be referred via the DSCP professional challenge policy.

Escalation Policy

If the consultation group are concerned for the immediate safety and wellbeing of any child discussed at the sexual harm consultation group this should be raised with the group chair, and it will be the responsibility of the chair to escalate the concern to the appropriate senior manager. If a concern relates to a partner agency, the chair will ensure that this is raised with the senior manager of that service.

Amendment, Modification or Variation

These Terms of Reference will be subject to continual review and any amendments, variations or modifications needs to be subject to consultation and agreement reached by the Sexual Harm consultation group members.

Harmful Sexual Behaviour Tool

Harmful Sexual Behaviour Risk Matrix

Intrafamilial Child Sexual Abuse Risk Matrix