Public Engagement

The National on-line Social Work Survey [forthcoming 2017]

This is a new and widely-applicable means of capturing the views of social workers, stakeholders and service users on a rolling annual basis.   It will provide  an independent means of collecting data which will be analysed using SPSS and NVivo.   The quantitative and qualitative material will capture data to inform further research and enable creation of a new and on-going database to be made available via the UK Data Archive or other suitable repository.

The International Child Justice Project [forthcoming]

The International Child Justice Project is a comparative analysis of welfare and policing models of State welfare interventions, providing an international comparative measure of their ethico-legal framework.  It will map social work responses to referrals against the welfare and policing models of state response to referrals, and their adherence to an algorithm measuring their ethico-legal status.  It will produce an open access global ‘map’ showing evidence of where welfare and/or policing models are evident, in what proportion and balance, and the resultant outcomes on welfare interventions for children.

Public Lectures

The public lectures take place at London South Bank University.  The presentation slides are available from:

Devine, L. (Forthcoming 5th December 2016) The results of ‘Rethinking Child Protection Strategy’: A large scale transformative evaluation of child protection and safeguarding referrals and assessments.  Implications for law, policy and practice. In: Contemporary Issues in Social Work: Public Lecture Series, London South Bank University, Lodge Lecture Theatre, London, UK, 5th December 2016.

Devine, L. (2015) Rethinking child protection strategy: Is current intervention strategy justified? In: Contemporary Issues in Social Work: Public Lecture Series, London South Bank University, Lodge Lecture Theatre, London, UK, 7th December 2015.

‘Mind the gap’ Symposia series at UWE Hosted by the National Network for Safeguarding & Child Protection [forthcoming 2016]

We are  establishing and  will run a symposia series to support impact from our Economic and Social Research Council funded research in ‘Rethinking Child Protection Strategy’.

The symposia will create a forum for multi-disciplinary & public debate and dissemination.   The bi-annual events will bring together researchers, practitioners and the general public providing the opportunity for the general public to experience how research can be brought into the ‘real world’, and an opportunity for the public to have direct access to social science researchers and practitioners.  The focus of the events will be on topics with direct relevance to the general public in the context of the welfare/policing dichotomy in State welfare interventions.  The first two symposia will focus on child protection and safeguarding.  Further planned event topics include false allegations, deprivation of liberty, elder abuse, and links between poverty and referrals.