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Government guidance designed to clarify information sharing on children and young people could leave practitioners feeling more confused, a leading figure in children’s services has warned, writes Amy Taylor.

Caroline Abrahams, director of public policy at children’s charity NCH, said that the guidance was too long and some of the terminology was overly complicated.

“If I was a practitioner and I was faced with a document of such complexity about information sharing it would not make me more confident,” she said.

The guidance, which was put out to consultation this week, also proposes separate information sharing procedures for health professionals and the rest of the children’s services workforce.

It states that due to the highly sensitive nature of health information a two tiered approach is advised for health professionals.

This would mean that health practitioners who have a reasonable suspicion that a child might be being harmed should contact other professionals to get further information but they should not tell them why they are concerned.

They should then combine this information with their own and if they then decide that there are reasonable grounds for believing a child is in danger they should then consider informing others of the reason for their concerns.

The consultation closes in November.

Cross government guidance – sharing information on children and young people from: www.dfes.gov.uk/consultations