Dramatic film aiming to change the child protection system

A middle-aged woman sits on the floor dressed only in a vest and pants sobbing uncontrollably like a child.

It’s an uncomfortably dramatic opening to a training video created by retired children’s social worker Diane Goring. 

The aim is to put social workers and other professionals involved in child protection in the shoes of a young person experiencing abuse.

Actors are used to give voice to children who have been killed based on real-life tragedies highlighted in serious case reviews.

They also play the roles of social workers, teachers, nurses and police officers in the 30-minute film.

Silent Voices draws together learning from hundreds of serious case reviews in a unique training tool to encourage professionals to be more “curious” and investigative.

“I read lots of inquiry reports about child deaths which was difficult reading,” said Goring who spent more than 30 years in children’s social care and has written child protection policies.

“I picked out certain things that are really prevalent in the reports, like disguised compliance, how easy it is for any worker to get hoodwinked, which comes up again and again. 

“It’s trying to help workers deal with the most challenging clients. To have the right skills to be assertive in their practice, but in a good way. To be questioning and quizzical in their practice.

“Everything in the video is backed up by evidence. It examines human motivations of why people should be in this work and it is from the child’s perspective.

“My aim isn’t to rock the boat but I want it to be seen by professionals involved in child protection.”

Now living in Somerset, Goring was previously a social worker in Solihull, where six-year-old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes died after suffering horrific abuse at the hands of his father and his father’s partner.

“Arthur Labinjo-Hughes was the catalyst for doing this,” said Goring. “We saw him on our TV screen begging for food, so hungry and thin. Shortly after the video was taken he died. He was one of several children that kept hitting the headlines where there is public care involvement.”

A safeguarding inspection following the tragedy found the local multi-agency safeguarding hub had been “over-optimistic and lack professional curiosity”.

Following a government review, new multi-agency child protection teams are planned for every area in England.

These will lead when a section 47 inquiry is triggered and include a new role of lead child protection practitioner  – a social worker with “substantial frontline child protection experience”.

However, Goring worries that professionals working with families through new family hubs being rolled out may not have the skills to recognise signs of abuse to trigger Section 47 investigations.

“If you are in a situation where you are working alongside people and have built up a certain level of trust, you may deliberately not see things, or are not skilled to see things.

“We have young people coming straight into social work from college or university who may not have life experience. It is a lot to put on young shoulders.”

The video can be purchased via Goring’s website by giving a discretionary donation to charity Save the Children.

Together with collaborator Karl Corniffe, an independent social worker, and actress Mandy Finney who plays the crying child in the video, she is also offering cost-covering training sessions based on the video.

Goring, an artist whose drawings representing child protection have so far earned £630 which she donates to Save the Children, said: “We plan to tour the video across the country. Some of the reports I read detail where children have died and I’m trying to exhibit and offer training in those local authority areas.”

Through retired, Goring is still driven in a determination to make a difference to vulnerable children and the child protection system.

“I could just now relax and do some painting and forget about this. But it is too important.

“If you have a social conscience you have to act. We need to get back to basics about caring for one another and all humankind.”

To obtain the video contact Diane through her website: https://www.dlgfineart22.co.uk/