New research reveals that LBWF repeated its failings over Whitefield many times elsewhere, suggesting it has had a more general child safeguarding problem than previously ever admitted

As hitherto reported (see links), the recent Local Child Safeguarding Practice Review (LCSPR) of child abuse at Whitefield during 2014-17 concludes that (a) there were various problems with the pupils’ statutory education, health and care (EHC) plans; (b) some of the LBWF staff involved in the case lacked professional curiosity, and adopted the wrong focus; and (c) LBWF had worked with the other safeguarding agencies in a way which was ‘fragmented and lacked co-ordination’.

The LCSPR provides no broader context for these failings, which is a pity, because a search through the relevant sources shows that they were by no means confined to Whitefield, either pre-2014-17 or after.

In other words, what happened at the school was not an outlier.

To substantiate this finding in more detail, it’s necessary, first, to look at the 17 Ofsted inspections of LBWF children’s services (either as a whole or in part) which occurred between 2011 and 2026.

The year 2011 is a useful starting point because at that time LBWF’s children’s services were at a low ebb, exposed by the Waltham Forest Guardian as one of the worst 15 performers in the whole country, and presiding over a situation where ‘a significant proportion’ of children remained ‘at risk of inadequate protection’.

Three years later, at the next inspection, Ofsted found that there had been a degree of improvement. But overall, it believed, LBWF was not yet delivering ‘good protection, help and care for children, young people and families’, the Ofsted ‘expected minimum’.

However, from then on, right down to 2026, Ofsted was far more positive and complementary. Its conclusion in 2017 gives a flavour:

‘Services for children in Waltham Forest are good and have significantly improved since the last inspection in 2015. Leaders have made strong progress to establish a resilient, sustainable and child-focused service. This is underpinned by strong, effective political and corporate support. They share with partner agencies a clear, ambitious vision and core values’.

That’s the overall picture. But looking closer shows that, for all the good news, there was still one serious failing that Ofsted returned to again and again, something that the LCSPR found at Whitefield, too, namely problems with the EHC plans.

The following excerpts from the Ofsted reports show how often this was cited:

January 2013 Inspection of child protection

‘Child protection plans ensure that children are appropriately protected. However, the majority of written plans were not sufficiently specific, or measurable. Often plans contain too long and exhaustive lists of actions or requirements that some parents found confusing or simply unachievable, rather than being focused on the key actions required’.

November 2014 Children’s services inspection

‘Areas for Improvement…Ensure that children’s plans…are outcome-focused and that case records are of high quality, including more detailed planning records for child protection enquiries’.

January 2017 Local Area SEND inspection

 ‘The quality of EHC plans is very variable. Although most new plans are completed within the required timescale of 20 weeks, the final version shared with parents often lacks sufficient detail to be useful…There is too much jargon or confusing terminology that has been cut and pasted from professional reports…

It is taking too long for statements of special educational needs to be converted to EHC plans. Far fewer children and young people with statements in Waltham Forest have been issued with a plan, compared to other areas’.

January 2019 Children’s services inspection

‘What needs to improve[:]…The quality of children’s plans to ensure that they are child-specific and identify timescales for change’.

March 2019 Local Area SEND inspection

‘Many parents and carers told inspectors that they are concerned about how well EHC plans are co-produced…[and] communication between professionals and families, and the effectiveness of the local area’s arrangements for annual reviews of EHC plans’.

February 2025 Area SEND full inspection

‘EHC plans are not consistently being updated when there have been significant changes or for transitions to different key stages…The quality assurance of EHC plans and annual reviews lacks rigour and is not robust…Currently, there is no coordinated multi-agency approach to moderate EHC plans and annual reviews for quality, effectiveness or  weaknesses.’

The other two LBWF failings that the LCSPR cited, fragmented and uncoordinated partnership working, and lack of professional curiosity, were equally ubiquitous, as demonstrated by a search through the NSPCC synopses of the 14 Waltham Forest child safeguarding practice and serious case reviews that occurred across the same time period.

Again, excerpts tell the story.

Child W 2011

‘Findings include: practitioners were insufficiently sensitive to obtaining an understanding of the significant cultural and/or individual values…and the planning and conduct of child protection enquiries by staff at a hospital in Islington, Waltham Forest’s Children’s Social Care and the Police had significant shortcomings’.

Child B 2012

‘Findings include: a failure to collate and analyse information about parents’ backgrounds; a lack of concern about missed health appointments…and insufficient investigation into parental substance misuse’.

Child M 2017

‘Findings include: inconsistent information sharing processes resulted in no one agency having an overview of the child’s history and needs’.

Child S 2017

‘Learning points focus on: coordination and leadership…healthy scepticism about long term drug use; reporting and sharing information in drug services…transferring information between areas…police sharing information’.

F and H 2018

‘historical information about children relating to child protection and/or health records has the potential to go missing in the transfer between schools which can impact directly upon safeguarding assessment work in terms of timely access to the full picture’.

Alan and Brenda 2019

‘Learning themes include…professional curiosity…record and information sharing within and between agencies… and professional supervision’.

Child D 2020

‘Learning includes…practitioners do not always record important information which results in significant information not being shared when required; there is a tendency for some practitioners to minimise the significance of parents using alcohol and being over optimistic about reports by parents of their alcohol consumption’.

Kubus 2023

‘Learning themes include…inaccuracies in documentation and record keeping; communication and escalation pathways…Recommendations include…ensure that accurate quality documentation is maintained, irrespective of the challenges posed to staff’.

Children L 2025

‘Many services and professionals involved which resulted in lengthy meetings and gaps in information sharing, which resulted in lack of clear actions and direction with late or no distributed minutes’.

Children M 2025

‘The review highlights…Fragmented information sharing across agencies’.

To sum up, all three LBWF failings which the LCSPR highlighted at Whitefield were to be regularly found elsewhere.

And, of course, that poses an unsettling question: for if regulatory agencies have noticed the same failings again and again and in different settings, why hasn’t LBWF ever rectified them?

At present, the answer to this question is elusive. It doesn’t seem to be a matter of money being a constraint, as LBWF’s finances were buoyant for most of this period. That points to the political choices made by senior Labour councillors and their allies at the apex of Town Hall staff. But it’s unlikely that any will hold their hands up and explain, as one of their core values always has been ‘to control the narrative’ and at all costs avoid reputational damage.

Indeed, it’s  worth underlining once again that most of what happened at Whitefield only came to light because of determined work by the BBC’s Noel Titheradge, with the LBWF cabinet portfolio holders, scrutiny committee chairs, chief executives, and deputy chief executives who have held office since 2014, and been well rewarded for doing so, remaining conspicuously silent.

What’s indisputable, though, is that the LBWF failings have caused serious damage, particularly because those impacted have tended to be the poor and disadvantaged.

Most obviously, if in 2017 LBWF had investigated Whitefield as it should have done, that is with appropriate focus and professional curiosity, and if the school’s EHC plans had been properly completed and kept up to date, the abused children and their families would not have had to wait until the last couple of years for the full horror of their treatment to become public, and restitution by civil action to begin.