Protecting Children at a Distance Delphi Quantitative Data 2021

The following dataset consists of a spreadsheet file containing survey data from the second-stage of the Protecting Children at a Distance study.

The study utilised a two-stage modified Delphi methodology to elicit responses from safeguarding leaders from all professional disciplines involved in child safeguarding and protection. The first stage, which took place between June and September 2020, comprised 67 interviews with London-based safeguarding and child protection leaders within seven professional groups: Children’s Social Care, Health, Mental Health, Police, Education, Law and Safeguarding Partnerships. Interviewees’ priorities and responses informed the questions and response options for the second stage, a national survey distributed to similar professional groups in February–March 2021, which elicited 417 responses for analysis. Respondents represented all regions in England, with London and the South East accounting for 45% of overall survey representation. Respondents were a very senior and experienced group of respondents with a predominantly strategic perspective, including Directors of Children’s Social Care, Safeguarding Partnership Independent Scrutineers/Business Managers, headteachers or Designated Safeguarding Leads, Designated and Named Health and Mental Health Professionals, Police safeguarding leads at area level, and local authority and children’s panel lawyers.

Ethical approval for the study was granted by the King’s College London Research Ethics Committee [LRS-19/20-19420]. Stage 1 was deemed a service evaluation by participating NHS organisations. The Health Research Agency (HRA) confirmed that NHS ethical approval was not needed for stage 2 on 13th January 2021. The study is funded by the King’s Together: Multi & Interdisciplinary Research Scheme and the Economic & Social Research Council Impact Acceleration Accounts Social Science Impact Fund.