Safeguarding Children Who Go Missing: Risk, Harm and Empathy

This resource focuses on children who go missing, the harm they experience while they are missing, and how we care for them when they return. The content is designed to help practitioners develop confidence in their practice with children who go missing and to motivate them to robustly advocate for children who are at risk.

Description

In this replay, conversations with Tanya Conway-Grim, Richard Eastwood and Charlie Hedges provide deep insight into how children experience being missing and returning, and help us to feel what's at stake. They help us develop an understanding of the push and pull factors that influence whether a child goes missing and the degree to which they are at risk of harm when they are missing. We'll be challenged to reflect on the language we use to talk about children who go missing and to consider how it influences our approach to them.

We'll critically reflect on the use of – and approaches to – return home interviews, and ask whether they help us to understand what has happened to children and prevent further missing episodes. 

We'll question why we believe some children are more at risk of harm than others when they are missing. Importantly, we'll reflect on our shared responsibility to acknowledge, and to be intentional about addressing, the disproportionate number of Black children who go missing and the known disparities in the responses to Black and Asian missing children.

There's a lot at stake. Those who harm and exploit children rely on us not taking episodes of missing seriously enough and not forming the kinds of trusted relationships with children that can disrupt patterns of abuse. We have to know and do better if we want to stop children from going missing and being at risk of harm.

These resources will help you:

• Develop an understanding of the number of children who go missing in the UK and the range of responses to them when they return: feel what's at stake
• Critically reflect on the language used to talk about, and with, children who are or have been missing
• Deepen our understanding of the vulnerabilities of children who go missing and the risk of harm they face
• Reflect on how a child who has returned from a period of being missing might experience our approach to them
• Acknowledge the biases and assumptions around children who go missing and how that impacts on the way we care for them on their return
• Reflect on the factors that put children from marginalised communities at higher risk of going missing, and the disparities in how they are treated when they return
• Develop confidence in our ability to take the insight from the webinar into improving practice with children who go missing
• Feel motivated to robustly advocate for children and develop the confidence to challenge poor practice where you see it

Further reading