NO2ID

Neil,

Thank you for sending through your request. As you may or may not be aware, the implementation of ContactPoint is still being finalised and a number of local authorities are currently putting in place processes to handle 'Shielding Requests' such as this one.

Before we take any further action, can I ask you to consider the following criteria from the ContactPoint statutory guidance laid down by Section 12 of the Children Act 2004.

4.38 It is vital that shielding (and thereby disclosing the whereabouts of a child or young person) is only applied where there are strong reasons, for example, where a practitioner has reason to believe that not doing so is likely to:
● place a child at increased risk of significant harm;
● put a child’s placement at risk (in the case of adoption);
● place an adult at risk of significant harm, and/or
● prejudice the prevention or detection of a serious crime.

4.39 Such cases could arise for example where:
● a child/young person is adopted where there is little or no contact with birth parent(s) or wider family members;
● a child/young person and/or their parent/carer, are fleeing abuse or domestic violence; and/or
● a child/young person and/or their parent/carer or family member are subject to police protection.

If you still feel that you request meets this criteria then we will arrange an appointment for you to come to our offices to provide proof of ID and evidence of your reason to shield.

I look forward to your reply.

Thank you

4.38 It is vital that shielding (and thereby disclosing the whereabouts of a child or young person)

Please note that this is not opting-out - the original post is misleadingly titled. All it does (in theory) is reduce the size of the set of officials who have access to certain personal details stored on ContactPoint.

Access to shielded records

In order to ensure that ContactPoint does not inadvertently confirm or indicate the whereabouts of a child or young person with a shielded record, a practitioner will only be able to find a child record by inputting information that is visible on a shielded record. No records will be returned if a search is made using information from any non-visible field.

Relevant people in local authority ContactPoint Management Teams will have access rights to view hidden information on shielded records so they can, where there are child protection concerns, ‘broker’ contact between users working with the same child/young person.

Users with child protection responsibilities such as police officers or social workers may be granted an access right that enables them to override the shield and gain access to the hidden information on a shielded record. An attempt to override the shield will prompt a message reminding the user that accessing the shielded record will trigger an immediate investigation. Where users choose to proceed, they will only be able view the hidden information until they log out of the record. If they require access to the same information again, they will have to repeat the process. If another user searches for the child record, it would still appear shielded to them.

In most authorities it will be the ContactPoint Manager only who will make stringent checks to ascertain whether the need for disclosure is valid. In rare cases some highly specialised workers such as Emergency Duty Social Workers, Police domestic violence units can request an Emergency Shield Override but this will be subject to subsequent audit.