Sheffield SafetyNET (www.sheffieldsafetynet.gov.uk) ensures the early identification of children’s needs so that more effective support can be given where appropriate. The project aims to prevent children from ‘falling through the net’ of service provision and to ensure their support needs are met as early as possible to prevent an escalation of vulnerability. Created to support up to 10,000 practitioners involved in providing a child-focused service to the 114,000 children of Sheffield, SafetyNET introduces new working practices to ensure that all professionals working with a child or young person communicate more effectively.

Sheffield currently has 60 practitioners using the system with phased roll-out to all 10,000 scheduled for early 2005. A working prototype of SafetyNET was developed in 2003.

Sheffield is one of 15 trailblazer Local Authorities funded by the ISA Team of the DfES (Department for Education and Skills), tasked with establishing best practice for Information Sharing and Assessment. It needed to create an accurate single record for each child using information from Education, Social Services and Health departments. Infoshare has helped Sheffield achieve this with complex data matching tools and which comply with the Data Protection Act.

“We chose Infoshare for data matching because it has more experience than others in providing the software to match names from disparate sources, which was crucial for this project,” explained James Randall, ICT Manager, Sheffield SafetyNET. Its ‘customisable rules’ function is a key benefit too, as we can apply name matches which follow rules designed by us to meet local needs. An integrated audit trail also means that we can go back and examine inaccuracies and correct matches where needed.”

SafetyNet does not hold lists of ‘at risk’ children but instead examines the frequency and reason for practitioners accessing a young person’s record. A service professional is notified when certain thresholds are met and subsequently contacts each of the people who accessed a record to build the complete picture for each case.

“The system is designed to encourage communication between professionals working with children, not to store sensitive case information. Other systems at Sheffield, not accessible via the web, meet this vital but distinct requirement,” explained Randall. “SafetyNET leaves as much of the risk assessment as possible to front-line professionals and the only information held about any individual is name, address, date of birth and gender – the system itself has no concept of a ‘vulnerable child’.”

SafetyNET uses high security measures and user-authentification processes and has been designed to be as easy to use as possible and accessible via web browser to allow future access from PDAs or Smartphones. Sheffield is also developing an online service aimed at children themselves written in an easy-to-understand way, which allows them to identify services and groups that are there to support them.

Audit trails of the Infoshare system can be turned into depersonalised unique IDs; these are used instead of name and address and shared anonymously by systems dealing with sensitive or confidential information and only decoded when required. Sheffield does not currently use this functionality as information only flows from agency systems into SafetyNET but when there is a need to exchange information across authorities the requirement to anonymise individual records could be crucial.

“SafetyNET has got the balance between people and IT exactly right, creating a true best practice approach to Information Sharing and Assessment,” commented Adrian McKeon, managing director, Infoshare. “By turning the normal approach to an IT project on its head, Sheffield has created a model which focuses on people and work practices first, makes sure the underlying data is right second and finally tackles the IT element – only then will the IT work to support such a scheme. With future Government plans afoot to expand ISA initiatives to all local authorities, it’s essential that successful projects like SafetyNET are out there working already.”

For further information please contact:

Adrian McKeon, Business Development, Infoshare Ltd.
Tel: 0208 541 0111
Email: adrian.mckeon@infoshare-is.com