S.47 Enquires Initial assessment process completed without seeing parents or child
Case reference FOI2024/01903
Received 12 November 2024
Published 13 December 2024
Request
FOI Questions
Q.1, You provided 2024 data up to 26th September, so please, how many now, section 47 enquiries initiated in the year 2024 to date? (if you wish to refuse this additional period then respond to 561 at 26 Sept).
Q.2 Can I assume that every single Section 47 undertaken still had an initial assessment?
Q.3 How many of these initial assessments involved meeting with the parents and seeing the child?
Q.4 How many of these initial assessments had no meeting with the parents?
Q.5 How many of these initial assessments had no seeing of the child?
Q.6 How many of these initial assessments had no meeting with the parents and seeing the child combined? I only ask for data to cover 2024 as I would not want the request to exceed the appropriate cost limits under section 12. But if the information is easy to hand I would appreciate the same data for, 2020, 2021, 2022 & 2023.
Response
A: I have been advised that the information requested in question 3, 4 and 6 is not held in a form that would enable it to be located, retrieved and extracted within the Appropriate Time Limit which equates to 18 hours as defined by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limits and Fees) Regulations 2004.
Our electronic reporting systems are unable to run a report for this information. To ascertain the data requested officers would need to manually check files for this information, as the Service Area only capture whether or not each child was seen. We would need to review every assessment to establish if each parent and child was seen. Looking at those open to Assessment at the start of the Section 47 alone, and allowing 5 minutes per Assessment, there are 356 files that would need checking.
This would at a conservative estimate take at least 29 hours to complete. Where the Limit is exceeded Public Authorities are not obliged to supply the information requested by virtue of S12 of the Act. Please take this letter as a refusal notice under S17 of the Act.
The Service Area have advised me that they could answer questions 1, 2 and 5 within the 18 hour limit, please let me know if you would like this information.
Documents
This is Herefordshire Council's response to a freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information regulations (EIR) request.
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