Every month, Assente works with at least 30 senior staff from a range of health, social care and housing services. We deliver a one day training course to assist those involved beyond the initial alert, understand what's expected of them - bringing meaning to the Association for Directors of Social Services (ADSS) agreed competencies for Safeguarding.
I haven't met anyone on the programme who doesn't express a real concern to offer effective safeguarding practice to the most vulnerable in our society. All have been shocked at Panorama's programme filming of the abuse of adults with learning disabilities by their paid carers in 2011.
So, why then do some managers still sometimes hesitate to alert - to pick up the phone and put a call through to the Local Authority Helpdesk to say -
'We're working with someone who's really vulnerable and we're worried about them. What do you think? Are we doing the right thing? Should something else be being done? Is there something else that could be relevant to the situation that we can't see?'
