Financial year 2020-21

Serious incident notifications

Annual statistics for England on serious incidents that involve death or serious harm to a child due to abuse or neglect, and any death of a looked-after child.

Release type
Published
Last updated
3 updatesfor Financial year 2020-21

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Data sets present comprehensive open data from which users can create their own tables using the EES table tool or download a zipped CSV file.

5 data sets available for download

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  • Serious incident notifications - total only, LA and regional breakdown

    Local authority, National, Regional

    Number of serious incident notifications for the financial year, by local authority and region. PLEASE NOTE: Neither high nor low numbers of serious incident notifications alone should be interpreted as a performance measure of the local authority or its workforce. When interpreting data on serious incident notifications, local authority contextual information is an important consideration. Local authorities with larger populations tend to be more likely to report more serious incident notifications than those with smaller populations. Those with higher levels of deprivation also tend to be more likely to report higher rates of serious incident notifications than those with lower levels of deprivation. In addition, whilst reporting has improved in recent years, the Department cannot be certain that all incidents that meet the definition for a serious incident notification are notified. Data relating to population size, the number of Children in Need and deprivation have been included to provide further contextual information to the data on serious incident notifications.

    Number of rows
    491
    Indicators
    • IDACI Average score in 2019
    • Number of Children in Need at 31 March
    • Number of Serious Incident Notifications
    Time period
    2018-19 to 2020-21
    Create table using Serious incident notifications - total only, LA and regional breakdown
  • Serious incident notifications - all

    National

    Number and percentage of serious incident notifications for the full and each half year of financial year. The data is broken down by the following: - age group; - gender; - ethnicity; - disability; - notification nature; - placement type; and - whether the child is known to other agencies or has a Child Protection Plan (CPP).

    Number of rows
    325
    Indicators
    • Number of serious incident notifications
    • Percentage of serious incident notifications
    Filters
    • Serious incident notifications by characteristic
    • Time breakdown
    Time period
    2018-19 to 2020-21
    Create table using Serious incident notifications - all
  • Serious incident notifications - half year

    National

    Number and percentage of serious incident notifications for each half year of financial year. The data is broken down by the following: - age group; - gender; - ethnicity; - disability; - notification nature; - placement type; and - whether the child is known to other agencies or has a Child Protection Plan (CPP).

    Number of rows
    217
    Indicators
    • Number of serious incident notifications
    • Percentage of serious incident notifications
    Filters
    • Serious incident notifications by characteristic
    Time period
    2018-19 Part 1 (Apr to Sep) to 2020-21 Part 2 (Oct to Mar)
    Create table using Serious incident notifications - half year
  • Serious incident notifications - full year

    National

    Number and percentage of serious incident notifications for the full financial year. The data is broken down by the following: - age group; - gender; - ethnicity; - disability; - notification nature; - placement type; and - whether the child is known to other agencies or has a Child Protection Plan (CPP).

    Number of rows
    109
    Indicators
    • Number of serious incident notifications
    • Percentage of serious incident notifications
    Filters
    • Serious incident notifications by characteristic
    Time period
    2018-19 to 2020-21
    Create table using Serious incident notifications - full year
  • Serious incident notifications - total only

    National

    Number of serious incident notifications for the financial year.

    Number of rows
    8
    Indicators
    • Number of serious incident notifications
    Time period
    2014-15 to 2020-21
    Create table using Serious incident notifications - total only

Data guidance

Description of the data sets included in this release, including information on data sources, coverage, quality and any data conventions used.

Description

This guidance describes the data included in the Serious incident experimental  statistics release. The release methodology, available on the release web page should be referenced alongside this data. It provides information on the data source, coverage and quality as well as explaining methodology used in producing the data.

Coverage

Notifiable serious incidents are those that involve death or serious harm to a child where abuse or neglect is known or suspected, and the deaths of looked after children, whether or not abuse or neglect is known or suspected. Local authorities in England must notify the Secretary of State of such incidents via the Child Safeguarding Incident Notification System.

File formats and conventions

Rounding 

Percentages are rounded to 1 decimal place. They may not sum to 100% due to rounding.

Conventions 

In line with GSS standards, a ‘c’ is used to protect confidentiality. Secondary suppression has been applied where necessary to protect confidentiality.


Contact us

If you have a specific enquiry about Serious incident notifications statistics and data:

Children’s Services Statistics Team

Email: sin.stats@education.gov.uk
Contact name: Andy Brook

Press office

If you have a media enquiry:

Telephone: 020 7783 8300

Public enquiries

If you have a general enquiry about the Department for Education (DfE) or education:

Phone: 0370 000 2288

Opening times

Monday to Friday from 9.30am to 5.30pm (closed on bank holidays)