WORKING WITH CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE IN A RESIDENTIAL CARE SETTING
There are relevant legal and rights framework that underpins work with children and young people.These relevant legal and rights framework that underpins work with children and young people in residential care has been streamlined into three different parts;there is The Children's Homes regulations 2001 (amended) and the Volume 5:Children's Homes 2011 - Statutory Guidance on Children's Homes Regulations 2001(amended) as well as the National minimum standards for Children's homes. The Children's Homes regulations 2001 (amended) makes provision about the way in which children's homes are run and ensure that they are managed in a safe reliable and stable way.
Read more
This is important because the consistency of the staff and the way the house is run is vital for the development and well-being of the children and young people. Volume 5: Children's Homes 2011 - Statutory Guidance on Children's Homes Regulations 2001 (amended) is a guideline to ensure that local authorities working with child care home providers follow the requirements set out so that they
can provide consistent and good quality care. National minimum standards for Children's homes states that “It is intended that the standards will be used, both by providers, and by Ofsted, to focus on securing positive welfare, health and education outcomes for children. All providers and staff of children’s homes should aim to provide the best care possible for the children for whom they are responsible, and observing the standards is an essential part.
To make sure that all children and young people living in care are well looked after, the Department of Health and Children has put together a set of national standards for residential care centres. [These
standards describe the proper way to look after young people in care, and they cover things like safetyfor young people and the kind of staff that is employed and how they are trained. It is up to the
health boards to make sure that all the residential centres in the country keep to those standards, no matter where they are and no matter who runs them. The Social Services Inspectorate, which works on behalf of the Department of Health, and the local health boards both provide inspectors to check that the standards are being met. These standards are all contained in an official handbook called National Standards for Children’s Residential Centres. That book should be available in every
Centre, every worker is supposed to read the standards in detail for themselves.
The Department of Health and Children has also provided this young people’s version of the standards, which was written specially with those working with child in mind.
There is also the influence of current policies and legislation on residential care provision. A policy is a document that outlines what a government is going to do and what it can achieve for the society as a whole. It also outlines any and all methods and principles that the government or any entity, for that matter, will use to achieve its directive. Legislation is another term meaning statutory law. These laws have been enacted by a legislature or the governing body of a country. Legislation can also mean the process of making the law.” Before being able to take a position held in a school I would have to be DBS Disclosure and Barring Services which are replaced the CRB check**. This is a regulation within the law which will be looking at an individual’s criminal history ranging from convictions, cautions down to warnings. In the Protection of Children Act 1999 it states that all adults working with children must be DBS checked. Any person who is found to have their name on this list with a
criminal offense regarding children will not be allowed to work within this area. I would have to work under the law of the Children Act 2004 which is there to make sure the welfare and health of the child is protected, this also includes the Every Child Matters in which all children deserve and should expect the levels of care and adhere to this. This also includes in this green paper allowing all services to share information on children that they have concerns over; this is to help all the services
have a better understanding and have the knowledge of that particular child’s risk history so to evaluate what the next appropriate step is to take for this particular child.Health, safety and security issues are extremely important in health and social care sectors in order to protect patients, service users and also those working within the sectors. The country is governed by legislation and regulations to ensure that guidelines are followed to enforce safety and security within an organisation.
Legislation can have many purposes: to regulate, to authorize, to proscribe, and to provide (funds), to sanction, to grant, to declare or to restrict. The Data Protection Act 1998 is an example of a piece of legislation, the purpose of the 1998 Act is to protect the fundamental rights and freedoms of living individuals, and in particular their right to privacy with respect to the processing of their personal data. It puts in place duties on employers/employees to ensure confidential and appropriate handling of 'sensitive personal data', sensitive personal data includes information such as a person's name, date of birth, address, marital status, diagnosis, prognosis, treatment plan and medication. The Data Protection Act also gives individuals the right to see personal data and information held or processed about them, provided they request it in writing. It is an illegal offence to breach any aspects of the Data Protection Act, a breach of confidentiality is only permissible if 'to not breach confidentiality would put someone at significant risk of harm', for example if there was a believable threat of violence or suicide.
The practical application of legislation, policies and procedures and key messages form research and child protection enquiries for residential care settings.This can be done through a number of ways. It can be done by the highlighting the importance of personal safety. For example, this can be possible by through talks from relevant local agencies which will be enforced by the input from PCSO. Also
talks can be arranged for Youth Offending Team worker. It can also be reinforced by inter-agency practice, multi-agency working, integrated approach and information sharing. More so it is important to listen to views and concerns of children and young people; working in an open, accountable and transparent way. This should be done also by following requirements for risk assessment, implications of Serious Case Reviews, legislation, policies on missing children or young people in care, reporting arrangements where abuse inside and/or outside the setting is suspected and the requirements for reporting recording and sharing information. We should also not forget the importance of following the organisational policies for setting