‘Child to notice’ dashboard - monitoring public protection notice (PPN) safeguarding referrals for children

The aim of the dashboard is to review occurrences from the previous 24 hours when the force have been informed about or attended child-related incidents but have not submitted a public protection notice (PPN) safeguarding referral.

The overarching aim is to encourage officers to submit PPNs where there are child safeguarding concerns. 

The intended outcomes of the dashboard are to:

• increase the workforce’s knowledge of when a child PPN safeguarding referral is required
• improve the force’s ability to track PPNs to completion 
• reduce the number of further queries about a case subject on future audits

North Yorkshire Police conducted an exercise in 2023 to identify solutions where child-related incidents had occurred but no PPNs were submitted when required. In response, the force developed a ‘child to notice’ dashboard.

Planning process

The ‘child to notice’ dashboard was initially used by the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) to monitor children coming to notice overnight who were deemed to be high-risk. North Yorkshire Police’s safeguarding inspection coordinator became aware of the practice in a thematic inspection report published by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS). The safeguarding inspection coordinator and a data manager approached the MPS to discuss the building and managing of the dashboard. 

The proposals for a dashboard were discussed at the vulnerability board, chaired by the assistant chief constable (ACC) who approved a three-month pilot. Three performance managers in local command areas were identified to review child-related incident cases on a daily basis. A monthly working group was established to monitor the progress of the dashboard pre-pilot, midway and post-pilot. During each meeting, the dashboard was refined through user feedback to ensure it was user-friendly. The working group consisted of:

• performance managers
• detective inspectors from the multi-agency screening teams for both local authority areas
• safeguarding inspection coordinator 
• data manager

Building the dashboard

The data manager built the ‘child to notice’ dashboard, also known as v1, using Power BI. The data fields included in the dashboard were based on user needs, which includes:

• risk grading indicated by the submitting officer
• category of risk, such as sexual, physical, emotional or risk outside the home 
• vulnerability assessment Team (VAT) risk assessment 

Implementation

Data from the dashboard is then transferred onto SharePoint Excel documents for the performance managers to review each incident from their areas. The working group decided that incidents recorded for multi-agency risk assessment conference (MARAC) or strategy meetings could be omitted from the search criteria. Each performance manager reviews five to 15 incidents daily from Monday to Friday, which has been found to be manageable alongside other aspects of their role. The performance managers are supported by the safeguarding inspection coordinator and detective sergeant from the multi-agency screening teams with PPN submission queries.

Post-pilot and costs

Post-pilot the intention is to provide a rapid service recovery within 24 hours where applicable, seven days a week. This is to reduce the number of missed opportunities to implement child safeguarding actions.

There were no costs required to develop or implement the ‘child to notice’ dashboard. 

An evaluation has been conducted by North Yorkshire Police. The evaluation report was written after the working group’s post-pilot meeting and covers the following:

• the planning of the dashboard 
• the development process of the dashboard
• the findings from the cases which had missed PPNs

The evaluation identified knowledge gaps and raised them within the report for additional learning opportunities. The working group meetings and Excel spreadsheet data informed the evaluation.

After the end of the pilot, data was abstracted from the Excel spreadsheet, reviewed and presented in a briefing paper to the safeguarding senior management team and the vulnerability board.

The findings revealed 11% of incidents involving children required the submission of a PPN referral. The majority of these incidents were classed as high-risk submissions by the performance managers. 

The dashboard has provided some indication on the types of PPNs which have not been recorded. When reviewing the data, PPNs which were missed included violence, physical or sexual incidents. Identified missing themes enabled the performance managers to check where officers had repeatedly missed child at risk PPN submissions, and provide feedback to the officers. As the pilot progressed, areas have seen a reduction in the number of incidents that need checking from the dashboard for missing PPN submissions.

The next review is due in October 2026, which will measure if there has been a reduction in the number of missed PPN submissions.

What went well

• After initial resistance, the performance managers have been able to confidently identify cases and justify the need for the dashboard. 
• The regular meetings of the working group have provided consistent feedback on how to improve the dashboard and implement shared learning.

Challenges

• Initially the three commanders were concerned about the capacity and skills of the performance managers. To resolve the issue, the ACC approved that the roles sat within their command and were not the responsibility of the screening teams.
• The pilot covered the performance managers working week, this meant that only incidents from Sunday to Thursday were reviewed. The intention post-pilot is to cover incidents from across the whole week. 
• The grading on the PPN is often incorrect, which affects the triage process conducted by the safeguarding team, who will prioritise the highest risk. The help button for the grading field requires updating and simplifying. Once the change has been made, this will need to be publicised across force, to ensure that the gradings are more aligned to the risk level.

Recommendations for other forces

• It is recommended that a standard operating procedure should be written to ensure that any officer covering the performance manager role is trained to correctly record information.
• Any changes to the Excel recordings for data need to be discussed and agreed in advance with an explanation of why and how to complete the columns to avoid confusion.
• It is important to ensure all the relevant roles are involved in the working group from the outset.