Peer relations at primary school

This report by the Centre for Research on the Wider Benefits of Learning
explored friendship patterns and children’s general relationships with their peers between the ages of 8 and 10 and examined how children’s early development (ages 3 to 4) may predict their later development in terms of social behaviour including likelihood of becoming a bully.

Key Points:
- Three quarters of the sample belonged to one of three positive friendship groups - positive, many friends (48 per cent), positive but fallout with friends (18 per cent), and positive but few friends (10 per cent). Normal 0 false false false

- The remaining quarter of the sample had poor social relationships characterised by few friends and a higher prevalence of bullying and or victimisation than the other groups.

- Victims and bully/victims had poorer social relationships than other children, and were more likely to have limited early language skills and social development. Difficulties (e.g. low self-esteem, depression, antisocial behaviour) had existed from age 3 to 4 through primary school years and were most acute for bully/victims.

- Socio-demographic influences on friendship were complex. Children from the positive, many friends cluster were more likely have privileged backgrounds and victims more disadvantaged backgrounds. However, bully/victims did not significantly differ from the other clusters in terms of income and maternal education, although their parents were less likely to be married.

- Some friendship-patterns had a strong gender bias with positive, few friends and bully/victims more likely to be boys. The other groups were more balanced.

Young people and social networking services

This report by Digizen investigate how social networking services can and are being used to support personalised formal and informal learning by young people in schools and colleges. A good guide for those wanting a grounding in these dynamic subject area.

The report opens by asking “What are social networking services?” This section investigates current definitions of social networking services and provides a comprehensive review of current social networking service types and activities.

In Evaluating social networking services, the report then describes how to use a toolkit – a social networking evaluation chart covering six different social networking services, and an accompanying checklist, which are available to download from the Digizen website:
(www.digizen.org/socialnetworking/ checklist.aspx) – to evaluate services. The chart is not definitive, but provides a comprehensive framework covering significant relevant issues such as site age restrictions, the presence of adverts, collaborative tools, security issues and data management restrictions.

The benefits and opportunities to individual users, as well as outlining some of the opportunities that educators and schools using social networking services might take advantage of are also laid out. This section looks at issues around digital literacy and social engagement, skills and identity development, and opportunities for better understanding e-safety and data management issues.

Then the barriers and risks section looks at current barriers to using social networking services within education, including staff development and support issues, and risk evaluation and management approaches. Risk areas that educators should be aware of are outlined, and approaches to manage these are addressed.

Issues include users’ perceptions of the environment they are posting in, personal data management, and cyberbullying and potentially illegal behaviours.

An ideas and examples section showcases innovative practice, providing links to a range of projects and examples where social networking services have been successfully used to support both teachers and students. Links to current debates around specific services are also included.

Finally, the Glossary describes some terms that readers may be unfamiliar with.

Supporting children in families affected by mental illness

This Barnardo's report "Family Minded" is based on the experiences of a number of Barnardo’s services that work with children whose lives are affected by parental mental ill-health. It is informed by the academic literature in this field. The authors explore the challenges of parental mental illness for both policy and practice, addressing mental health policy and practice in all four nations of the UK.

The report makes the following recommendations:

Improve understanding of how mental illness affects parents
- Recognise that patients are often also parents and offer opportunities to discuss concerns they have about the impact of their illness on the family.
- Provide better information about the support available to families and if needed, help to access such services.
- Offer advice and support with parenting.
- Continue to raise awareness of the stigma that can surround mental illness and how this can prevent some families from asking for help.
- A named lead professional (or key-worker) to act as the main point of contact for the family, sharing information and advocating on their behalf.

Work in partnership with children to sustain the whole family
- Offer age-appropriate information to help children understand and cope with their parent’s mental illness.
- Provide the opportunity for children to be involved in planning support for themselves and for their parents.
- Work with schools and other children’s agencies so that, if necessary, social, emotional and practical support can be given.
- Make child-friendly visiting facilities available when parents are treated as hospital in-patients.

Put services and practitioners in the best position to ‘think family’
- Develop strategic commissioning and service design which ensures that children’s and adults’ services can work together.
- Offer ongoing professional development and training that raises awareness of the needs of parents with mental illness and their children.
- Disseminate best practice about how to ‘think family’ – such as how to communicate with children.
- Professional guidance, processes and protocols must contain clear expectations about the need to take children into account when treating parents.

Volunatary and community services sector role in supporting parents and families

This report by the Tavistock Institute on behalf of the DCSF examined the role the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS) plays in supporting parents, carers and families under the Every Child Matters agenda.

Key points:
- The number of support services for parents and families (provided by all sectors) usually matched the population size of a local authority. The proportion provided by the VCS was subject to considerable variation, ranging from less than a third in some areas to nearly two-thirds in others, and did not typically bear a close relationship to population size.
- Half of all the services in the mapping were in the broad category of ‘social interventions’ (for example, generic and targeted parenting support, family relationships, early years services and support for families in which there had been sexual or domestic abuse or the death of a child). Health-related services accounted for a further 29%, education 17% and housing 1.5%. The largest proportions of service types, provided by all sectors, were targeted parenting support (social) and services for families in which there was a disabled or ill child (health).
- Rural areas tended to have very few services with a large number of users.
- In terms of approach (preventative or crisis driven), access (open or targeted) and the nature of support offered (therapeutic, educational, social or practical), there was a marked tendency for VCS services to be multi-faceted. For example, while the focus of a service might be on a targeted intervention for families in crisis who benefited from therapeutic support, this did not exclude the provision of other approaches or types of access and support.
- The vast majority of VCS managers struggled to maintain the service with their current funding, which varied from £10,000 a year or less in 25% of cases to £500,000 a year or more in 6% of cases.
- The majority of service managers sought to expand future provision, by diversifying their work or by increasing their number of users and/or staff. However, a major obstacle to continued, consistent or increased provision was a lack of funding, and especially secure and long-term funding.
- The mapping exercise pointed to relatively little provision directed at fathers, either specifically or as part of wider family provision. Other groups for whom there was a low level of service provision were Gypsy and traveller families and Black and minority ethnic (BME) groups, though areas which had been selected for their ethnic diversity did provide some specific provision for the latter group.
- The majority of voluntary sector service providers in the interview sample found the ECM framework useful in their work, by encouraging them to think more about outcomes for children, by making work with parents and children more focused and structured, by providing a common language and shared agenda when working with other services, or by providing a uniform structure for use in funding bids.
- Their practical implementation of the framework tended to be focused on ‘being healthy’, ‘staying safe’ and ‘enjoying and achieving’. Very few VCS services in the sample addressed ‘achieving economic well-being’.

Violence against children

The Children's Rights Alliance for England have produced this report to complement the UN study on violence against children.

They use official statistics to paint a vivid picture of the scale of the issue -

"Imagine a large English city – bigger than York, smaller than Birmingham. One hundred thousand children live in this city.

In an average year one child aged under 15 in this city will be murdered, probably by his or her parent. In the same year 240 children will be on the child protection register as a result of having been mistreated. Forty-six of these will have been physically assaulted and 24 sexually abused. The rest will have been neglected or abused in other ways.

In the city’s homes, large numbers of young children will routinely endure physical pain at the hands of their own parents. In one year in this city of 100,000 young people, at least 38,000 children under the age of 13 will be hit, whacked, beaten, slapped or smacked. Three-quarters of the babies born that year in this city will be hit before their first birthday. Around 3,500 children will experience corporal punishment deemed to be “severe”, and should doubtless join those 51 children whose physical abuse merits investigation by the authorities.

As many as 11,000 of the city’s children will, at some point in their childhood, be sexually assaulted by touching or penetration. Most will know their abuser and most will not tell anyone about it. Only a small proportion will see the abuse brought to an end."

The report goes on to share research into violence against children; child death and violence in homes, on the streets and in schools before making recommendations.

Why children phone childline

This briefing gives basic statistics into why children and young people use the counselling service.

Key points:
- In 2006/07, 20,586 children and young people spoke to ChildLine about family relationship problems, representing 12 per cent of all calls. As well as the 20,586 callers, 22,704 children and young people rang to talk about another issue but also mentioned family relationship problems.
- In total, 43,290 children and young people spoke to ChildLine in 2006/07 about family relationship problems (either specifically or among other subjects), making it by far the most commonly discussed issue overall.
- In 2006/07, 4,215 children and young people in the sample spoke to ChildLine
about conflict between themselves and their parents. Some of these callers described very serious conflict. 18% talked about being physically abused and 12% said that they had been emotionally abused.
- Parents/carers abusing alcohol was an issue mentioned often by those who called ChildLine to talk about conflict between themselves and their parents.
- 395 children and young people in the sample spoke to ChildLine because they were worried about conflict between their parents. In some cases, they talked about violence between their parents that they had witnessed and found very distressing.
- ChildLine also received calls from young people (under the age of 18) who were struggling to cope with being a parent, with one in five of them being under the age of 15. Some were struggling so much they were concerned that they might smack or hit their child.

Draft legislation: Children's Trusts; Sure Start; Pupil Groups; Apprenticeships; Wellbeing; School Buildings; Admissions

In the last three months (June-September) there have been ten draft legislation pieces open for consultation from the DCSF alone. These are listed below, in order of initial publication.

Admissions - a technical area, so best reading the document if interested.
Pupil wellbeing - educational establishments are required to promote pupil wellbeing, this is draft guidance as to how they could achieve.
Schools causing concern - proposed changes on how to deal with schools which cause concern.
Strengthening Children's Trusts - proposals aimed at making the Children's Trust the main strategic body for children's services.
Zero carbon schools - calls for evidence so the government can realise their 2016 target.
Apprenticeships - steps to legislate for the provision of apprenticeships, including making the LSC ensure apprenticeships exist.
Draft guidance on safeguarding children from sexual exploitation.
Draft guidance for children not receiving a suitable education.
Under performing groups - changes to which groups of children are monitored reducing the overall number but including pupils on free school meals for the first time.
Sure Start Children's Centres - legislation to make this provision a legal requirement.

Customer Perception of DCSF, young people's view

This survey by the BMG, for the DCSF, follows a similar survey directed towards parents. It asks young people (10-19) for their views, as aligned to the DCSF Departmental Strategic Objectives.


Key points:
- Young people report that their parents are generally involved in their school or college life (82% disagreed that their parents prefer not to get involved), they feel supported by their parents in their work (95%) and they generally always tell their parents how they are getting on in their education (85%). The majority of young people also reported that their parents usually know what kind of homework they have (as 72% disagreed that their parents do not know what kind of work they have).
- In general, car usage amongst this group is the exception rather than the norm, as two in five (41%) young people report that they never travel to school, college, university or work by car, and a further one in four do so rarely (26% travel by car less often than not). The remaining one in three (32%) travel by car every day or more often than not.
- All young people were asked whether they have someone they could talk to about things that matter to them if they were feeling worried or angry. The majority of young people feel they definitely have someone they could speak to in such a scenario (71%), while a further one in four (23%) feel they probably have someone they could speak to. A minority of 6% feel they do not have someone to talk to, or are unsure of whether they do.
- Overall, young people feel that there is not very much of a problem of bullying in their school or college, as reported by over eight in ten (84%). This comprises one in four (24%) who feel that bullying is not a problem at all, while six in ten (60%) feel it is not very much of a problem.



- Around nine in ten young people feel safe during the day in the given situations. Over nine in ten feel it is safe in school or college, 93% feel it is safe in the local community, and just fewer feel safe on public transport during the day (91%) or travelling to and from school or college (91%).

- Amongst all young people primary schools are rated positively (good or very good) by the highest overall proportion (97% rate them as good), followed by universities (96%) and 6th form colleges or Further Education colleges for those aged 16-19 (94%). Secondary schools are also rated positively by the majority (88%). However universities are rated as very good by the highest proportion (39%), followed by sixth form colleges and further education colleges for 16-19 year olds (37%) and then secondary schools (27%), with primary schools rated as very good by one in five young people (20%).

- Young people were asked how they would describe pupil behaviour at their school or college. Half feel that pupil behaviour is generally good (51%), while just over one in three (37%) feels it is acceptable, and one in eight feels it is poor (12%).

Family Intervention Projects Evaluation

This evaluation by the DCSF and the Department for Communities and Local Government examines the national network of Family Intervention Projects (FIPs) which were set up as part of the Respect Action Plan, launched in January 2006. These projects aimed to reduce anti-social behaviour (ASB) perpetrated by the most anti-social and challenging families, prevent cycles of homelessness due to ASB and achieve the five Every Child Matters outcomes for children and young people. FIPs use an ‘assertive’ and ‘persistent’ style of working to challenge and support families to address the root causes of their ASB.

Key findings:
- 53 FIPs were set up during 2006 and 2007. Of these 34 were effectively set up from scratch and the remaining 19 projects existed prior to 2006 and were not making fundamental changes when they became a FIP. Typically FIPs were working with families in their own homes for between six to 12 months. Most projects were either being run by a team within the Local Authority (LA) or a voluntary sector provider.
- 885 families were referred to a FIP between February and October 2007, of these 78% met the referral criteria and agreed to work with a FIP. FIPs appeared to be working with their intended beneficiaries as families had high levels of ASB and criminal activities and were homeless or at risk of becoming homeless because of their ASB. These families were also well known in the area for causing ASB.
- The early outcomes reported by FIP staff for 90 families who completed the FIP intervention displayed considerable improvements in all key areas of the FIPs’ work. ASB and criminal activities had declined considerably at the point families exited from a FIP, as had the risk of families engaging in ASB. The risk of families being evicted had also considerably reduced. The outcomes for children and young people were also reported to have improved.
- Eight features of the FIP model appeared to be critical to its success: recruitment and retention of high quality staff, small caseloads, having a dedicated key worker who manages a family and works intensively with them, a whole-family approach, staying involved with a family for as long as necessary, scope to use resources creatively, using sanctions with support, and effective multi-agency relationships.

Support needs of children and young people who move due to domestic violence

This is the summary report of findings from research funded by the Scottish Executive and commissioned by Women’s Aid. The research explores the views, experiences and support needs of children and young people who have to move home as a result of domestic abuse.

Key findings:
- Information from prior studies suggests that children experiencing domestic abuse are likely to know about it and be affected by it; have sophisticated understandings and information about it; and to have mixed views about refuge life. Earlier studies also suggest that given the complexities of their lives, it can be difficult for organisations to find effective ways to support them.
- Moving school or returning to school following having to move house because of domestic abuse was a major source of anxiety; this seemed to be focused on anxieties about implications for relationships with friends and friendships.
- One theme emerging strongly from the interviews was the value young people placed on having someone they could completely trust to talk to about their experiences. However, finding someone appropriate to fulfil this role could be difficult.
- Support agencies should prioritise helping them maintain old friendships and networks; helping them build new ones where this is not possible.
- Recognition should be given to the value young people in this situation place on being able to talk about their experiences to someone they completely trust who will keep their information private; recognise how difficult it is for them to find support at this time from friends and relatives.
- Schools should acknowledge the difficulties young people have when return in to or moving school in this situation; appreciate this is a very difficult transition; make planned and appropriate provision.
- Schools should take seriously the concerns and anxieties young people have about peer relationships when returning to school or moving school in this situation; find ways to acknowledge this; make planned and appropriate provision.

DCSF Customer Perception Survey

BMG (commissioned by the DCSF) have undertaken this customer perception survey by interviewing 1000 respondents across the UK (a sample designed to be broadly representative of the general public). The survey is structured on the 6 Department Strategic Objectives which the DCSF have.

Key points:

- 65% believe it is very important that 3-4 year olds attend some form of pre-school.

- 80% believe that bullying is a problem in schools, to some degree. Females being more likely to assert this claim.

- The majority of respondents feel that all situations are safe for young people during the day, although opinion is divided when considering situations for young people at night.

- The majority of general public respondents feel that the current quality of publicly funded education is good, with a minority rating any stage as poor to any degree.

- Respondents were most likely to rate the current quality of university or higher education as good as almost nine in ten gave a positive rating here (87%). This is followed by the younger education stages as nurseries, pre-schools and early learning were rated positively by 85%, while 84% feel that the quality of primary education is good. 6th Form colleges or Further Education colleges were felt to provide good quality education by 81%. Secondary schools were most likely to be rated as very or quite poor, by a third of general public respondents (34%), although still the majority of respondents rate secondary schools as good (66%).

- The majority of respondents feel that pupil behaviour is generally good (30%) or acceptable (40%), while around a quarter (27%) feels that it is poor.

- Seven in ten respondents agree that England is a good country for children to grow up in, while just over a quarter disagree that this is the case.

Children and young people's experience of domestic violence

This briefing by the Social Care Institute for Excellence focuses on the experiences of children and young people (under the age of 18 years) of domestic violence between those adults who have, or previously held a parental role towards them. It includes both biological parents and non-related adults significant to the young people.

The effectiveness of interventions is beyond the scope of this briefing which is concerned with the experiences of children and young people in the context of this type of inter-partner violence. In examining experiences and coping strategies it also considers how the voices of children and young people are heard in research and practice, advocacy on their behalf, and evidence-based practice relating to work with children and young people affected by domestic violence.

Key points:
- Professional understanding of, and responses to domestic violence should be informed by the perspectives of children and young people.
- Practitioners need to recognise that domestic violence may be a cause of a range of physical, emotional and behavioural difficulties for children and young people.
- The complex relationship between domestic violence and safeguarding children requires respectful and sensitive handling.
- Children and young people aware of domestic violence have the right to be listened to and need help to understand what is happening.
- Some children and young people cope well despite their experiences of domestic violence.
- Work with perpetrators, though controversial, is an important aspect of reducing domestic violence and its impact on children and young people.

Children feeling safe (Australia)

This report is the third in a series of studies undertaken by the Australian Childhood Foundation, Child Abuse Research Australia and Quantum that seek the views of children and young people about their experiences of childhood in Australia today. It specifically seeks to further explore children’s sense of safety. A national representative sample of 600 children and young people aged between 10-14 years across Australia completed an online survey in April 2007.

Key points:
- Even though on the surface the vast majority of children surveyed believe that Australia is a good place to grow up in, many of them reflect an undercurrent of worry and concern for their own safety and the protection of other children.
- More than a quarter of the children in the sample were actively concerned that they might be hurt by an adult or become a victim of crime. One in five expressed a degree of anxiety about children not being protected from abuse.
- Over half of the children in the sample reported feeling worried about being bullied, teased and not fitting in with their peers.
- The internet, in particular, is perceived as a new source of anxiety and threat for a large number of children and young people. 46% of children reported that they had been exposed to material on the internet which worried them. 27% are worried about the dangers they face over the internet.
- 2 in 5 children surveyed felt unsafe in public places, such as shopping centres, cinemas, sporting grounds, walking to school. Just over a quarter of children (27%) were anxious about catching public transport. In each of these findings, a substantial proportion of girls felt more unsafe than boys.
- Half of the children felt that children their age were not made to feel welcome by adults in public places. 1 in 8 children surveyed wanted better spaces for children to be engaged in childhood activities.
- It is only when children feel safe in the relationships with important adults that they are able to experience a broader sense of safety in the world around them.

Analysis of Children & Young People's Plans

This NFER paper follows similar reports in recent years which summarises the main trends emerging from Local Authorities (LAs) Children and Young People's plans. This analysis is based on a representative sample of 50 LA plans.

Key points:
- Current priorities to LAs are commissioning, safeguarding and looked after children. The plans format and presentation was also analysed.
- On commissioning: half of LAs referred to commissioning, with a big focus on the development of a commissioning strategy since 2006. Where joint commissioning teams where mentioned they mostly referred to Primary Care Trusts and Council or LA teams. Most were commissioning by service, whilst some are commissioning by ECM area. CAMHS is the priority area for joint commissioning and looked after children are the priority group.
- On safeguarding: the priorities were child protection, closely followed by violence and abuse with all LAs reporting they had a Local Safeguarding Children's Board in place.
- On looked after children: the priority was on ensuring participation of looked after children in service planning and reviews; improving placement quality, stability and choice; educational attainment and improving health. With regards ECM the focus was on "staying safe" and "enjoy and achieve".
- Format and presentation (this analysis relates to 106 plans): plans are either highly designed or mainly word-processed (about half each). The average length has grown by an additional 22 pages to 74 pages since 2006, but there is wide variation in the length of plans. 69% of plans used pictures etc. (I think this is enough on this here, if you want more read the report).

Child abuse and adult suicide

Child abuse victims are among the most at-risk groups of committing suicide in later life, according to research.

A study in Canada involving 3,000 adults found that those who had been abused as a child were far more likely to have attempted suicide. Just under a third of sexual and physical abuse victims had attempted suicide, compared to just six per cent of those who had not experienced abuse.

Of those that took part in the survey, around one in ten had experienced either physical or sexual abuse. Repeated abuse over a number of years and abuse by a family member was the most strongly associated with suicide attempts. The research, which has been published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, was carried out by academics at the McGill Group for Suicide Studies in Montreal.

Safeguarding children report 2008

This report by Ofsted (on behalf of 8 inspectorates) examines arrangements for safeguarding children, is the 3rd such report and assesses arrangements for safeguarding children and young people in four key areas:

1. the effectiveness of the overall safeguarding systems and frameworks that are in place
2. the wider safeguarding role of public services
3. the targeted activity carried out to safeguard vulnerable groups of children. This includes updated evidence on the groups considered in the previous report, including asylum-seeking children, children in secure settings, looked after children and children treated by health services
4. the identification of and response to child protection concerns by relevant agencies.

Some key points:
- Local Safeguarding Children Boards have grown in independence but are still not fully developed.
- Strategic Partnerships are developed in all areas, but still need to improve joint commissioning and the management of high risk offenders.
- CRB checking is standardised, but good practice is not always followed.
- Inspections found evidence of a strong commitment by agencies to focus on the wider safeguarding needs of children and young people in addition to child protection.
- A shared, consistent understanding of safeguarding is still lacking, particularly between social care services and the criminal justice system.
- Some children and young people continue to express significant levels of concern about their personal safety and about being bullied, particularly in institutional and secure settings.
- There is better identification of needs at an early stage and increasingly effective provision of preventive and earlier intervention services.
- Many areas have identified domestic violence as a high priority area for action.
- Most areas are making good progress in developing the Common Assessment Framework.

The report goes onto make a series of recommendations, relevant at national and local level.

Danish model reduces youth crime in Scotland

In 2005 East Renfrewshire Council (ERC) made a commitment to implement an approach to preventing and addressing youth crime and anti social behaviour, based on Danish principles. The resulting project, School, Social Work, Police and Community (SSPC) is led by Social Work.

This report examines the funding, delivery of outcomes and output of the programme.

Some key points:
- An integrated response is the most effective and beneficial approach to dealing positively with vulnerable, damaged or difficult young people.
- Shared aims, practice, and ethos are at the core of what is making the approach operate successfully.
- It is a key strength of the Group, and exemplary practice that members do not say "this is not my remit". If something needs to be done they are in a position to do it then they do so.
- The approach fits with the relevant standards for the quality of the youth justice process and fits with the standards for the range and availability of programmes.
- We recommend, as a preventative measure, targeting resources on the transition from primary to secondary education, and in the first term of the first year at high school.

Youth Crime Action Plan

The UK Government have published their Youth Crime Action Plan, a joint plan between the Ministry for Justice, DCSF and Home Office. The plan which has a focus on early intervention and none-negotiable challenge and support.

Key points:

- Extension of family intervention projects.

- More use of ASBO's and Parenting Orders and sanctions for those parents who do not engage.

- More "community" work for offenders, overseen by new citizen's panels.

- More support for young offenders on release of custody.

- Local Authorities to take responsibility for education and training of young people in custody.

- Everyone over 16 found to be carrying a knife can expect prosecution.

- Increasing the provision of youth services at times when offending is likely.

- Making permanent exclusion from school an automatic trigger for Common Assessment Framework assessment of needs.

- Expanding Safer School Partnerships.

- Working closer with Local Authorities to improve family support which will help ensure problems are addressed early.

- Plus a series of longer term changes to legal processes for the most serious offenders.

See BBC news article

Byron Review Action Plan: safe use of technology

The Byron Review Action Plan set's out the government's response to Dr. Byron's review of technology.

Key Points:
- Full acceptance of all the recommendations of the Byron Review.
- Establishing a UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS) whose members will come from industry, the third sector and other key partner organisations. One of the first tasks the Council must undertake is to develop a Child Internet Safety Strategy and this plan is the first step towards achieving that.
- Plans to raise awareness of e-safety issues among children, young people, parents and other adults through a public information and awareness campaign. This needs to be more than a one-off advertising campaign and should ensure that e-safety messages are part and parcel of communications to parents, young people and children, which will empower them to keep themselves and their families safe.
- Reforming the classification system for video games, which Dr Byron said many parents remain confused about.
- Government will work with industry to improve information and support to parents on video games.
- Better regulation including Rolling out of the new kitemark for parental control software.
- Better support for schools including: providing guidance and support to schools on e-safety; ensuring that Initial Teacher Training takes account of e-safety issues; ensuring extended schools support children and families around e-safety and media literacy; and ensuring school inspection frameworks support and challenge schools in improving e-safety (Ofsted).

Child poverty and maltreatement

This NSPCC report draws on incidence studies (number of new cases within a time period) and prevalence studies (proportion of the population affected by maltreatement). The authors are keen to note that poverty does not cause maltreatment and that many parents in poverty do excellent jobs at raising their children, however the evidence is clear that a link between poverty and maltreatement exists:

"We have found that different measures of material deprivation remain independently predictive of child maltreatment. This includes factors that may refer to neighbourhood characteristics, such as the housing tenure, or overcrowding in the home, as well as more individual measures such as car ownership. Poverty in all its manifestations is damaging to children’s well-being”

Key points:
- There is an association between socio-economic status, financial problems in the family and parental child maltreatment, though it is much stronger with physical and emotional maltreatment and absence of physical care than with either sexual abuse outside the family or absence of supervision.
- Compared to young professional respondents, young people working in semi-skilled or unskilled jobs were three times more likely to have suffered serious physical abuse, and ten times more likely to have experienced a serious absence of care in childhood; compared to respondents in higher education, they were twice as likely to have experienced such neglect.
- There is a ‘clustering’ of children on child protection registers in deprived areas of cities.
- Generally, stronger links are found with neglect and physical abuse, while the link with sexual and emotional abuse is much weaker.
- Correlation does not establish cause. There are specific problems in attributing cause in child abuse. The causative pathways are complex with many inter-related variables at work and disentangling the relative influence of different variables is problematic.
- The most widely used and accepted theoretical perspective for explaining the relationship between poverty and maltreatment focuses on stress. It is argued that the multitude of factors associated with poverty and social deprivation, especially when compounded by drug misuse or mental health problems, negatively impact on parenting by increasing vulnerability to stress.
- In order to better safeguard and support children and families living in poverty, more awareness and understanding of the impacts of financial hardship and the different forms of adversity that families are living in need to be recognised if their needs are to be effectively met.