Munro review may adopt police risk assessment methods

The Munro review is looking at adopting police risk assessment methods for all child protection workers, according to a former police chief who sits on the team.

Russell Wate said the Metropolitan’s Police Child Risk Assessment Matrix (CRAM) model, developed after the Baby P case, was felt to be a good example, as was the Association of Chief Police Officers’ National Decision Making Model.

CRAM breaks down children’s situations into the categories of “victim”, “suspect” and “household”. Within each, officers must answer a series of risk factor questions to record how much they know about the child. The aim is to quantify concerns and ensure areas of risk do not go unnoticed.

Wate, who used to be a detective chief superintendent in Cambridgeshire and was involved in the Soham murders inquiry in 2002-3, was speaking at the 10-year anniversary seminar of the Child Abuse Investigation Command, set up after the Victoria Climbié case.

He said the Munro review was also considering multi-agency safeguarding hubs, such as those in Devon, Cornwall and Haringey. It involves teams of social workers, police officers and health representatives, among others, assessing all initial referrals to children’s services.

Multi-agency training was also being examined to see whether there were parts of it that could be carried out on a national scale. The Working Together to Safeguard Children Guidance was likely to be transformed into an A5 summary that child protection workers could carry around with them, Wate added.

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