Requirements for Staff receiving a referral
The Helpdesk staff will follow their operational procedures. These are set out in the Business Process Policy for the Safeguarding and Corporate Parenting Service, available on the Council's intranet.
Helpdesk staff, in consultation with their manager, will decide whether the information should be dealt with under the Business Process Policy or under the Common Assessment Framework and will advise accordingly.
The recipient of the referral will, in consultation with a manager, decide within 24 hours what action to take and will provide feedback to the referring agency, at that time, on the course of action decided upon.
In deciding what action to take, consideration must be given to whether or not a criminal offence may have been committed against the child. Helpdesk staff and Emergency Duty Team staff should follow the procedure set out in the Business Process Policy and should work to the protocol (Police and CSS) agreed with the Police. The protocol is available in the document library of these procedures.
Helpdesk staff and Emergency Duty Team staff must check whether or not there is special guidance given in the Particularly Vulnerable Children section of these procedures and if so, act upon that guidance.