Health care professionals need to keep up-to-date with changes in child protection policy, procedures and practice to ensure that lessons learned from past tragedies benefit the generation of children that follow.

Recent government guidelines and legislation^7,8 place emphasis on:

• preventing abuse and neglect
• improving multi-agency working
• encouraging early intervention when problems are identified
• supporting all children, whatever their background or circumstances, to achieve five key outcomes: being healthy, staying safe, enjoying and achieving, making a positive contribution, economic well-being⁹

Examples of developments in recent years include:

• appointment of a Minister for Children, Young People and Families
• publication of the ‘National Service Framework for Children, Young People and Maternity Services’¹⁰
• appointment of the first Children’s Commissioner for England, a ‘champion’ for children
• pilot schemes for shared electronic records and developing single unique identifying numbers for children.