Ensuring comprehensive financial planning for child protection

Organised by the Ministry of Women,
Family & Community Development and
UNICEF,  Nov 20-22, 2019, Kuala Lumpur

By Jim Lim

Thank you for inviting me to speak. In my experience, social workers employed in the public sector tend to avoid talking about money. NGO workers however, frequently do, as they usually have to find money to run their projects. It would be helpful to repeat the underlying purpose for getting this organisational aspiration right. We are trying to “ensure comprehensive financial planning” because: 

• Child protection ranks low in developmental priorities and systemic “under-funding”, and
• Whatever resources there are available, it is often poorly deployed through an absence of strategy and hence, being at risk of losing its effectiveness. 

It ranks low because politicians are not familiar with child protection and for many too, there are numerous competing priorities that need the country’s investment. Ensuring comprehensive financial planning becomes very important because we are dealing with very scarce resources! 

Because of this, financial planning must be undertaken with honest effort and rigour and there must also be proper financial governance against what needs spending on. 

In this talk, there are no hard economic facts. I have deliberately not relied on socio-economic data of countries so as to examine how much a country, relative to its published wealth or GDP, GNI, spend on child protection services. I feel that such comparisons are not relevant for today’s purpose. This talk is about an approach in financial planning and resource allocation, to ensure that we get the best outcomes in child protection work. I am talking more about strategy and the drive for change and how comprehensive financial planning is critical in the successful management of that change.

Throughout the last few days of this conference, we have heard about child protection services, ranging from how to protect, how to develop mechanisms, how to share and collaborate amongst ourselves and our agency partners including good practices. I am sure many of us will have come away “fired up” from those engaging dialogues. 

As part of the wider objective of enhancing capacity through effective service delivery strategies, we must never lose sight of our primary goal, which is “to safeguard and to promote the welfare of children”.

With those simple aims in mind, there is only institution that has the power, authority and legitimacy to act, to initiate action, is the government. That is, the lead has to come from governments! 

Governments must take the lead

The government has to assume primary responsibility for the safeguarding and protection of the “vulnerable” within its borders and within its communities. This is the role of the state. The funding and  investments will have to come from governments. But, financial planning will be our task, as we are charged with implementing the policy and service delivery. I am addressing you as social services planners.

So, what I am saying is that after the political endorsement comes the resources needed to put this safeguarding infrastructure in place. And for child protection, it is the task of a government-appointed agency to kick-start the process, or indeed, within the job description of a Children and Families Commissioner, as suggested yesterday by Prof Siti Hawa Ali.   

We have seen, from the presentations of our ASEAN colleagues that their respective governments, like Malaysia, have introduced pieces of legislation to protect children, spelling out why and, spelling out how. Sadly, in my view, many have not spelt out what the consequences are, if those arrangements failed to protect!

It is sometimes assumed that passing legislation will solve many of the problems. 

Yes, passing legislation is a first step.  It gives us the mandate and it offers legitimacy and is backed by the necessary force of the law. A responsible government will demonstrate its duty in a diligent way, if it also provides the financial resources for the legislation to be effective. Anything less is mere window dressing, and it appears the case in some countries.

Very briefly and for those who don’t know, in the UK, almost all social work services, including child protection are funded and run by local authorities and not by central government.  

The UK central government offers partial funding to the local authority’s revenue budget. Local authorities have revenue raising powers too and many use the revenue raised from this form of local income tax to fund local services. 

Each local authority or a council, sets its annual budget and allocates a percentage to social services (social work) based on the local social services plan. So, we do a plan. Chief officers like myself will often fight hard with education, housing, environmental services and other services to get a bigger share of the budget for our services. 

Central government also manage and run agencies (sometimes called “Quangos” or quasi autonomous non-governmental organisations). The task of registration, regulation, inspection and enforcement, as well as matters pertaining to practice standards and service standards are covered by such “Quangos”. Such a regulatory agency or agencies undertake inspections for professional and service breaches, failures and non-compliance. For example, in the UK, there are “arms-length” inspection units, such as the Office for the Standards in Education (Ofsted) and a social services inspectorate, now restructured into a Health Commissioners’ Office. They inspect all social services and schools intermittently, and their reports are on placed on public display. 

In such a scenario, it is possible to develop local services which are locally accountable and regulatory-type services are centrally accountable; the local ones  responsive to local community users and the central ones ensuring there is professional service standardisation across the country. 

Funding and making things happen

To recap so far. Following legislation, governments should decide on a financial delivery plan. The government can decide on its service delivery options, either from direct funding of services or, a combination of contracting and purchasing from the third sector and the private sector.  Because the government cannot afford to spend on services on their own and by themselves, unless you are Qatar or perhaps, Brunei, it must engage with the third sector and the private sector to deliver such services. I am not advocating that we do this with direct child protection intervention services, but certainly with shelter, support and rehabilitation services, such as foster care and residential care, this is easier to do.

Comprehensive financial planning is important as there is an over-riding need for a competent and capable workforce. In all countries, a national training and development plan as part of an HR strategy is necessary.  

Equally, law enforcement agencies must also be involved in shared learning activities and schools’ participation is essential. Social work and related organisations such as family or early years centres in the public, private or independent sector must become “learning organisations” too, supporting and providing the necessary placements for civil servants and social work trainees to receive first-hand experience of child protection work. Their partnership with higher learning providers is essential as we undertake the process of workforce development. 

From the above, it is therefore important for us to build capacity and for us to build networks. 

Driving change: Building capacity

Building capacity will require money definitely, but not all just money, more like “smart money” because we want it well directed towards agreed priorities. We need to identify what needs to be invested and what return on investments can one expect? Of course, we need to exercise proper financial governance when costing and budgeting the whole enterprise.

So, how does one build capacity? We need to ensure that money invested has those returns which form part of simple and easy to understand key performance indicators or KPIs and the models we come up with have the capacity to be sustainable. Therefore, the ROI can be linked to sustainability through the use of social capital as expressed in child protection work and in community safety and in community cohesion initiatives. KPIs are just a tool to be more convincing to politicians, and help account for how the money is spent, including targets.

Driving change: Building networks

Building networks is about working closely together through effectively engaging with the local community and its key players and resources. The doctor’s surgery, the community health centre, early years centres and even schools are places where community leaders and workers are to be seen. This multi-agency network or, even a closely supervised local volunteers’ network, will be immensely resourceful, as it will meet the preventative aims as well as the protective objectives, ensuring that social intelligence built up within the locality will help, with regards to a child protection plan for the individual child or sibling group.

Developing on the same theme of multi-agency working together, it is imperative that financial delivery plans include the full funding of mechanisms for multi-agency collaborative work and developing practical working arrangement for the diverse range of professionals and workers whose services impact on children. For example, we cannot say we must all meet regularly as we are committed only, but do our organisations make time for us? Do our employers contribute to the costs of attending those multi-agency meetings? You cannot rely on professionals all the time, and regard their commitment as an expectation, you cannot have all these “on the cheap”. They must be funded! 

In the UK, the child tragedies of recent years, Victoria Climbie, Peter Connolly, led to a government commissioned report by Professor Eileen Munro of the London School of Economics examining the CP social worker’s workload and proposing a new systemic approach to child protection work. Her report sought to strengthen the multi-agency’s collaborative network, reinforcing the collective teamwork approach. Ask me later to talk about Munroe, if you are interested.

I have often being asked by local politicians during the course of my work, how do you protect children? I often say to them, how long have you got? It is a complex question. However, it is quite straightforward, on another level.

Let us be practical. You ensure, amongst many things, that children are not harmed by:

1. Requiring health and safety risk assessment in public homes and buildings where children have access, including strict compliance by building operators. Last year, a landslide resulted in the tragic deaths of many young people from a children’s home in Malaysia. The home was not registered, am I right? But it had been operating for many years;
2. Ensuring that adults who may pose a potential risk to children are prevented from formal contact, through introducing registration processes, “barring and vetting” schemes including criminal records checks;
3. Ensuring there is constant public information about child protection, ranging from young children being taken on motorbikes without helmets, to the wearing of seatbelts in cars, and to heavy penalties on employers who use child labour;
4. Ensuring that the enforcement and regulatory agencies are well funded and their officers rigorously monitored to reduce the risk of corrupt practices;
5. Careful and considered investment in developing a strategic plan for workforce development for people working with children in child care centres as well as establishing a social work workforce which is fully regulated so as to command public confidence;
6. Ensuring that those responsible for causing harm to children are quickly apprehended, are charged and are not allowed to pose harm in the future;
7. Establishing a register of offenders which curtails employment and any related paid activities with children, and last but not least;
8. Ensuring that children are regularly listened to and believed. 

Summary

To summarise then, ensuring comprehensive financial planning will entail respective Governments to take a lead role in assuming responsibility for child protection and the passing of relevant legislation. 

Governments need to commit resources towards neglected and abused children and develop its vision, with adequate levels of resources, allocated and properly monitored. Governments must be honest and make provision for the inspection and audit of its own performance. 

The strategic investment plan, with robust financial governance measures, would include the establishment of a governmental agency which can be national or, it can be devolved locally to run a social work child protection service. Or, indeed have a Children’s Commissioner, as a quango, who would direct and set up the arrangements for such a service.

As the main financial planning is about developing a financial delivery plan alongside a child protection plan, the initial steps must be to urge individual countries to undertake an audit of their position in terms of their workforce capabilities and to devise a relevant plan to increase both capacity and competency. From what I have heard, I think many have made good progress but there are still many areas for improvements. 

So, their strategic planning template must include building a competent workforce operating with social care agencies and children’s organisations and supported by a range of facilitated services, foster care for example, to promote the welfare of children and to support their families and carers. 

Funding for public services will inevitably be influenced and shaped by the country’s prevailing political ideology although there is unlikely to be great differences in scope or form, within the countries in the ASEAN region. In short, there are three main sector partnerships which governments must take full account when deliberating on child protection strategies, the professional sector and the third sector and the crucially, the community.

There are many other related issues which arise from this theme and that discussion is for another time, perhaps. I shall end here and I am happy to take questions. I will answer them to the best of my ability. 

Thank you

• This presentation was made at the Conference on Child Protection under the section, “Enhancing capacity and strategic service delivery within a national and regional context”. Organised by the Ministry of Women, Family & Community Development and UNICEF, the event was held on Nov 20-22, 2019, at Berjaya Times Square Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. 
• Read more about Jim Lim here.

Summary of talk by organisers

Based on the assumption (see programme paper) that there is general underfunding for child protection services as believed to be the case in Malaysia and in the neighbouring ASEAN countries, this session will begin with exploring the duties and responsibilities of governments, both local and national, in ensuring “adequate investments” appropriate with their declared intentions, i.e. legislation enacted and policies passed and whether the initiatives arising from them are effective in meeting its safeguarding objectives. For example, are continuing concerns about child protection related to the Governments’ lack of determination (political will) in ensuring that the laws passed are endorsed by people who know, or similarly, “fit for purpose”?  So, what must be done? 

It is hoped that the session can develop a draft action plan, based on principles for protection and the promotion of welfare and in conjunction with Government, to develop a structural response to child protection involving the community and society at large. Each country should review the draft “protection template” within the context of their own situation/circumstances. 

The session will also explore the investments needed in developing a professionally competent workforce; key institutional players concerned with education, training and workforce planning and development. The issue of regulation and compliance across the spectrum of children’s services with regards to practitioners and providers are also important aspects associated with financial planning with respect to the wider safeguarding objectives. There will also be an opportunity to explore issues relating to effectiveness in multi-agency collaboration and working together. 

Based on the speaker’s own experience, a number of suggestions complementing and working towards developing a multi-agency framework aimed at increasing effectiveness in child protection will be proposed for this session and it is hoped that participants will be able to assess its relevance and application within their own countries or region.