WATE-(17) Response Historic AI-assessed

Require reporting of absconsions to social worker and independent follow-up

Recommendation

It should be a rule of practice that any absconsion should be reported as soon as possible to the absconder's field social worker and that the absconder should be seen on his return by that social worker or by another appropriate person who is independent of the home.

Published Evidence Summary
The following publicly available evidence relates to this recommendation:
No specific published evidence regarding requiring reporting of absconsions to social workers and independent follow-up or the government's response to this recommendation has been identified from the provided official sources. A search on legislation.gov.uk for 'Waterhouse Inquiry' returned no results. The most recent evidence available is the search interface for gov.uk content.
How was this assessed?
Assessed by gemini-2.5-flash on 24 Mar 2026
Checked data held on this site (government responses, progress updates, independent evidence)
External sources searched: www.gov.uk, www.legislation.gov.uk, hansard.parliament.uk
This recommendation requires implementation across many organisations. The assessment reflects central policy response, not adoption in individual organisations.
Jurisdiction
UK-wide
Response
Historic

No government response recorded.

Source
Report Waterhouse Inquiry — Final Report 16 Feb 2000
Recommendation age 26.1 yrs
Last formal update No formal updates