Changes in Working Together to Safeguard Children 2026 and possible actions for schools.

When the government released the update of Working Together to Safeguard Children (WTSC), I and I suspect many others felt a sense of overwhelm- not another piece of guidance. But we need to remember that WTSC does not just impact schools, but all those involved in safeguarding children. Even so it does raise questions why WTSC 2026 was released now before the final passage into law of either the Crime and Policing Bill or the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. Both of which will lead to further change and probably further updates of WTSC.

Regardless, we have an important update of WTSC which comes with a number of accompanying documents, including the  updated Children’s social care national framework and Improving practice with children, young people and families. There are also an updated version for children and families (often useful to share with staff) and the legal framework which lists the legislation which WTSC is based on and refers to.

I will attempt here to summarise the changes that are most likely to impact schools and identify actions that schools may need to consider in response to this.

Key Themes

There are number of key themes that reoccur throughout the guidance and give an indication of both governmental thinking and the learning from recent Child Safeguarding Practice Reviews.

The role of Schools

In many ways the biggest change for schools is that there is no change. Schools and education settings are still not listed as a safeguarding partner and continue to be regarded as a pivotal agency. This issue was again raised in the  White Paper, Every child achieving and thriving, but is not actioned here. Though WTSC does indicate that education strategic leads and Chief Executives of multi-academy trusts should be included within safeguarding partnerships (p18).

What is made explicit throughout the guidance is the important role of early education and childcare settings, schools (including independent schools, academies, and free schools), colleges and other education providers in safeguarding. This should strengthen our involvement and the respect we receive within safeguarding processes.

At a more practical level, schools have a clearer role in community based Early help (para 128-133), should be involved in Section 47 enquires (p.97) and there is greater clarity about information sharing with schools (see below). In addition:

Strategy Meetings

There is some useful clarification on the role of schools and education settings within strat/ strategy meetings (p.93-96). Firstly, Strat meetings should be multi-agency involving at a minimum a local authority social worker, health practitioners and a police representative who should have expertise, skills and experience in child protection practice. However, they may also involve the child’s educational setting or childcare provider, the elective home education team/home education service (if a child is being home educated or if the child’s parents or family want to home educate the child), probation, housing and/or welfare support. Interestingly, the flow diagram on p.110 explicitly includes education/ childcare as those to be involved in a strat meeting.

Elective Home Education (EHE)

Both implied and explicitly stated within the focus on the role of schools is a deeper consideration of EHE (para 133 and 250). This is a difficult balance between parents’ right to educate their children other than at school and the increased risk experienced by some children who are EHE. The guidance is clear ‘where a child is home educated, the plan should reflect this appropriately, ensuring that the education is suitable and in the child’s best interests.’ (Para 194). This highlights the importance of any request to move to EHE being considered through a safeguarding lens.

Also implicit within this is the importance of school attendance. Alongside WTSC, the DfE has released additional guidance for social workers about school attendance. This may well also be useful for schools when looking at educational neglect.

All children including babies and unborn children

There is a clear and repeatedly stated commitment throughout the guidance to a system that covers children of all ages from unborn children to teenagers (for example, para 245).

At the same time there is an added focus on the additional vulnerabilities of babies and unborn children. This reflects the learning from the review into the death of Victoria Marten: Protecting all vulnerable babies better (Feb 2026). WTSC states that children means ‘babies, children and young people’ throughout. Some parts of the guidance also apply to unborn children recognising their vulnerabilities and the need for early, pre-birth assessment and planning, while remaining consistent with the legal position that rights begin at birth. The guidance continues about the need for a child centred approach for babies recognising their specific vulnerabilities and ensuring that their needs and experiences are actively considered and represented. This includes, but is not limited to, interpreting non-verbal and pre-verbal cues, observing interactions, and remaining professionally curious, particularly when relying on parent or carer accounts. It also recognises their dependence on their parents.

In addition to this and an entire new section on babies and unborn children (paragraphs 205-208), there are references to them spread and embedded throughout the document.

Whole Family Culture

There is a much greater focus on the whole family and needs of all members of the family and how they impact on each other. Also on the importance of adult and children’s services working together to identify needs and provide services. Much of this is spread throughout the document including:

Recognition of the need to work in partnership with parents who are often the experts on the children they care for and should be involved in decision making about them (p.20).

• The need to avoid families having to repeat their story with smoother transitions between the levels of the safeguarding system (para 144)

• A focus on Family Help Services (see more below) to improve family functioning and build the family’s own capability to establish positive routines and solve problems (para 149)

  
  

Within this are further elements

1.       An understanding and further consideration of the reasons that families might not engage with services including parents and carers of disabled children, those whose children are at risk of, or experiencing, harm from outside the home, or birth parents who have had other children removed, in addition those experiencing abusive behaviour within their own intimate relationships, which may include coercive or controlling behaviour, teenage relationship abuse and ‘honour’ abuse including forced marriage and female genital mutilation, or abuse related to faith or belief such as allegations of demonic possession. (p.16 and para 145). A substantial list, but the point is that we need to consider why parents are struggling to engage with services and professionals, not just write it off as non-compliance.

2.       A recognition of the impact of parental adverse experiences and the impact of previous services (para 186) including that practitioners should also consider the needs of parents who no longer have children in their care. Offering support to parents who have had a child removed can help prevent future removals and support effective and stable reunification. (Para 142). This again reflects the learning from the Victoria Marten Review.

3.       A focus on family group decision making. This is an umbrella term for voluntary, family-led decision-making forums in which a child’s family network has all the resources, adequate preparation, relevant information and a safe and appropriate environment to make a plan in response to concerns about a child’s safety and wellbeing, working alongside skilled practitioners. At pre-proceedings stage, practitioners should consider the use of an independent coordinator and families should be offered “private family time”, unless there are safeguarding concerns which would mean this might be considered inappropriate or unsafe (para 202 and elsewhere).

4.       All practitioners need to consider that children are likely to be experiencing simultaneous harms or multiple harms, not just a single issue.

Anti-discriminatory practice

In part, reflecting the findings of the recent Child Safeguarding Practice Review: “It’s Silent”: Race, racism and safeguarding children (March 2025), the need for and focus on anti-discriminatory practice is repeated throughout the guidance including the need to

• Challenge racism and discrimination (p.20)

• Identify groups of children who may be disproportionately over- or under-represented in services (para 44 and 109)

• Be inclusive, anti-discriminatory and responsive to the needs and experiences of children and families of different ethnic, cultural and religious backgrounds. Practitioners should remain alert to any bias in practice that may adversely impact particular groups or communities and consider children foremost in terms of their vulnerability to harm (para 250)

• Assess actual or likely significant harm through an anti-racist, anti-discriminatory and culturally aware framework, applying knowledge of faith, beliefs and family cultures that can positively and negatively impact on children, whilst maintaining a core focus on the safety and wellbeing of the child (para 246)

• There is also clear recognition and description of the impact of adultification (para 219 and 250)

  
  

Children in Care

Looked After Children living in the full range of situations- residential, kinship, special guardianship or foster care- are a key focus and repeatedly listed in this guidance. It is made explicit that these children and their specific needs may look different to other children (para 142) and should be considered within Multi-agency Safeguarding Arrangements. Also the need to consider the particular vulnerabilities of looked after children in relation to certain types of harm, including sexual exploitation. Practitioners should also be aware of the other factors that may increase a child’s vulnerability, for example SEND, being placed out of area, a history of frequent missing episodes or being deprived of their liberty (para 229-233).

Further it is made clear if a child is placed out of area that must be in the child’s best interest and the LA must notify the receiving authority so provision of the child education, health etc can be ensured.

There is new and additional information on kinship placements though the guidance and in the glossary.

Child Criminal and Sexual Exploitation

This continues to be an area of high concern in WTSC with additional information spread throughout the guidance. This includes recognition of the additional risks children with SEND, those missing from home, care or education, looked after children, and those with previous experience of abuse or neglect. With the reminders that perpetrators, including those acting in organised groups, may purposefully target children who are already vulnerable (Para 218) and the potential impact of adultification for black children. This can, also, affect children from a range of minoritised backgrounds, as well as those in contact with the youth justice system and those who are looked after (para 219).

Also the need to work collaboratively to with children, parents and carers and community partners, to understand the context in which harm is occurring and to determine the actions that each agency can take to reduce harm. (page 90).

The glossary includes an explanation of Group-based Child Sexual Exploitation.

Domestic Abuse

The are a number of key threads in the additional and updated information on domestic abuse.

• A focus on the recognition of children as victims of domestic abuse in their own right (para 132 and elsewhere)

• The importance of Operation Encompass (Para 83, 143, 284 etc).

• Recognition of the risk of abuse within teenage intimate relationships (para 220)

Underlying all these is a need for all those involved in safeguarding to have training and understanding of domestic and sexual abuse, including controlling and coercive behaviour, teenage relationship abuse, ‘honour’, faith- or belief-based abuse, as well as parental conflict that is frequent, intense and unresolved (para 140 and elsewhere).

Information Sharing and Explanation

There is a key theme about information sharing and even more for explanations and reasoning behind decisions, including decisions for no further action (NFA) or not to proceed with a criminal investigation (p.99 and elsewhere). Equally, when they receive a referral the LA must inform the referrer about the next course of action, even where there is no course of action and the reasons for that decision (p.82 and para 252).

Further, there is a reminder that a decision not to proceed with a criminal investigation should not determine whether the threshold for actual or likely significant harm has been met (p.99). Similarly at a strategy meeting all agency decisions should be recorded, including a decision not to take further action and the reason for it. For example, where criminal action has been deemed inappropriate or unnecessary by the police.

Moreover, that child protection activity should be led and overseen by expert, skilled and experienced social workers supported by multi-agency practitioners with child protection expertise (para 249). There is additional information on the importance of working together to share and analyse information, in partnership with parents and family (para 247-248).

This is part of a focus on multi-agency work, particularly that child protection means multi-agency with a focus on collaboratively working across agencies including strong and effective information sharing, joint decision making, shared practice, accountability, governance and quality assurance frameworks and coordinated, evidence-based interventions (para 243). It also relates to the role and recognition of education settings in safeguarding and the importance of ensuring that we have the information we need and are given a voice to share our knowledge and understanding of children and their families (para 245 and within the National multi-agency practice standards in para 254).

Processes

Many of the changes in WTSC are in Chapter 3 which focuses on Providing help, support and protection. This covers the full process from community based support to children being taken into care. Each LA is required to have a clear threshold document for universal and community-based early help which include an assessment. It should cover the role of Best Start Family Hubs and Family Help.

There also significant changes in the procedures in Chapter 5: Learning from serious child safeguarding incidents. These impact schools less directly, in the procedural sense, unless there are involved in these reviews. Understanding and keeping up to date on the finding and learning in these reviews remains vital.

One of the key themes within this section is the idea of smoother transitions between the different levels of support, so that plans, existing information, assessments and activities, including those set up as part of community-based or targeted Early Help, are transferred through the system. (p.79 and para 252).

Best Start Family Hubs

Best Start Family Hubs should bring together practitioners from multi-agency partners, with a strong emphasis on health and education - particularly during the early years - creating a clear local parent pathway from pregnancy through to the age of 19 (or 25 for young people with SEND), connecting families to services across the full spectrum of need. Hubs work closely with other local children’s services to safeguard children and help families facing complex problems, in particular those who are supported in Family Help, such as families where domestic abuse is a factor. For families who no longer require the support of targeted and specialist services, Hubs offer an ongoing, local support network. (Para 127)

Lead practitioners

This remains a controversial issue in many areas where more and more responsibility and leadership for safeguarding is pushed back onto schools. The guidance is clear that lead practitioners role can be a range of people, including social workers and other local authority employed staff (including those who work in a Best Start Family Hub), as well as those based in partner organisations. Decisions about who holds the role of lead practitioner should consider capacity and capability. Practitioners who begin working with families at the targeted early help stage can continue to lead work with families if the child is later assessed to be a child in need (Section 17 of the Children Act 1989). The Families First Partnership programme guide provides operational details on lead practitioner roles and responsibilities, and expectations for coordinating a multi-disciplinary team around the family (para 138).

However this changes at Section 47. For Section 47 enquiries where the lead practitioner is not a social worker, a social work qualified practice supervisor or team manager should lead the section 47 investigation. Where the decision is taken that the child will become the subject of a child protection plan, the lead practitioner should always be a social worker (para 172).

Family help including targeted early help and Families First Partnership Programme

The aim is that Family Help creates a seamless system of help and support for children and families focused on building consistent relationships with lead practitioners, simple and effective assessment and planning, and clear interventions that support improved outcomes (para 123). Also that children and families should not be left waiting to access help and support when issues arise (para 121)

Targeted early help services delivered through Family Help, are coordinated by a local authority and/or their partners to address specific concerns within a family. Examples of these include parenting support, mental health support, domestic abuse services, youth services, youth offending teams and housing and employment services. Targeted early help should be provided for children and families who have multiple and/or complex needs, or whose circumstances might make them more vulnerable. This could include where a child is living with wider family members under a kinship arrangement. Targeted early help might also be appropriate to support a pregnant person to provide safe and effective care for their unborn child. (para 134)

This is clearly linked in the guidance with the Families First Partnership Programme (FFP).

Further Areas of abuse

There are several other specific areas of abuse that are highlighted, often by repetition within the guidance.

• Child Sexual Abuse: The importance of the role of health and the need to communicate effectively and clearly with children and parents taking into account any needs relating to disability, ethnicity, language and culture is emphasised. (para 179 and elsewhere).

• Honour based abuse: This is a constant reference throughout the document raising the profile of this under-reported form of abuse.

• Online and emerging technology: There is recognition of the overlapping nature of on and offline abuse, particularly around grooming, sexual exploitation, criminal exploitation, radicalisation and the role that online platforms, including gaming and social media platforms, can play in grooming children and facilitating and/or causing harm (para 141).

  
  

Vulnerable Groups potentially at greater risk of harm

The guidance provides additional information or focus on certain groups of children with potentially at greater risk of harm. Much of this information is laid out in paragraph 250 and/ or the Glossary. These include.

• Young Parents (para 157)

• SEND (para 250) and throughout with a particular focus on the need for appropriate communication.

• The impact of poverty and the distinction between poverty and neglect

• Those already known to services.

  
  

Possible actions for schools.

• To update your policies to reflect the changes. This is likely to focus on ensuring that the key themes are reflected and echoed in your school’s policies rather than adding large quantities of additional information about specific areas. Though you may wish to consider if your policy includes:

o   Information about anti-discriminatory practices and information about adultification

o   Information on any proposed move to Elective Home Education.

o   Clarity that children experience simultaneous and multiple harms.

o   Involvement of DSLs at Strategy Meetings

o   Something about why parents/ carers might not engage with services, including indications that domestic abuse, ‘honour’ abuse including forced marriage and female genital mutilation, or abuse related to faith or belief such as allegations of demonic possession may affect them as well as children.

o   Explicit information that children in care includes children living in residential, kinship, special guardianship or foster care and that their safeguarding needs and vulnerabilities need particular consideration.

o   Explicitly includes information about children as victims of domestic abuse in their own right and within teenage intimate relationships

• Ensure accurate recording of ethnicity and analyse safeguarding records considering this information. This may feel uncomfortable, but learning from It’s Silent reinforced here is clear that this key to good practice understanding the positive and negative impact of faith, beliefs and family cultures of children. this is particularly important at time when we are seeing a growth in racism and faith-based prejudice. You may want to consider some additional training in this area.

• When children with SEND are involved with social care and other agencies, schools need to be proactive to explain how to communicate with them appropriately and support colleagues to do this.

• Ensure that you are receiving information from Operation Encompass and to challenge it when this is incomplete or not delivered in a timely manner e.g. before the start of the next school day. It should include information about all the children connected with the home, even if they were not physically present or resident at the time of the incident (para 143).

• Schools need to be confident that they are entitled to information, feedback and explanation from social care and police even when the decision is that there should be no further action.

• Schools need to be firmer in their expectations/ requests to be included in strategy meetings in line with pages 93-96 and the flow diagram on page 110.

• Check that the Designated Teacher for LAC is aware of the wider focus on children in care in this guidance.

For more information, please attend my webinar on 20th April at 4pm. Click here for tickets