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Draft London-wide child protection guidelines were published this week to reduce inconsistencies in practice across the capital and to improve inter-agency working.

The guidelines, published at the launch of the London Child Protection Committee, are intended to replace locally negotiated inter-agency or inter-borough protocols currently found within individual area child protection committees' guidance and procedures.

The need for the London committee and guidelines was identified by an audit of the city's ACPCs, commissioned by the Metropolitan Police, which revealed totally different working practices across the 32 boroughs.

Deputy assistant commissioner Carole Howlett, who is responsible for child protection issues in the Met, said: "Not only was there inconsistency between boroughs, but different agencies within boroughs were working in silos."

Howlett said the findings, combined with the evidence coming out of the public inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbie, highlighted the need for a more sophisticated system to deal with child protection issues across London.

The new committee's aims include securing consistency by all agencies, providing strategic leadership, disseminating and ensuring adoption of best practice by all member organisations, leading the development of multi-agency training, and influencing the development of policy relating to child protection issues.

Committee members include Howlett, former president of the Association of Directors of Social Services Moira Gibb, regional director of health and social care John Bacon, a director of education and voluntary sector representatives.

Speaking after the launch, Gibb said the guidelines "represented an improvement on the current situation" and would not only improve practice on a multi-agency basis but raise the profile of child protection within each separate agency.

She said they would be officially launched in October after a three-month consultation period, but would not be finalised until after the publication of Lord Laming's final report on the Climbie‚ inquiry.

The draft guidelines list the role of each agency in the child protection system, how information should be shared, the way the referral and assessment process should be carried out, and how child protection enquiries and conferences ought to be conducted. There is also information about dealing with more specific issues such as child prostitution and children who move around.

The procedures outlined in the guidelines would have the status of "mandatory instructions" and define the explicit actions that would have to be taken in specific circumstances. Any supplementary internal procedures developed by agencies would be obliged to refer to and comply with these procedures.

All London Child Protection Procedures from www.acpc.gov.uk