Recommendation 59: National LADO standards
From The Residential Schools Investigation Report, published 1 March 2022.
Recommendation
The Department for Education and the Welsh Government should: introduce a set of national standards for local authority designated officers in England and Wales to promote consistency; and clarify in statutory guidance that the local authority designated officer can be contacted for informal advice as well as when a concern or allegation needs to be referred.
In brief (written by this site)
The recommendation asks for national standards and clearer statutory guidance for local authority designated officers. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, summarising a UK Government response of June 2022 on a web page archived in July 2022, reported that the government was considering reviewing the statutory guidance Working Together to Safeguard Children, including revised content on the role of designated officers and a potential public consultation (The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, Jul 2022). In that July 2022 summary, it also noted the Welsh Government stating in June 2022 that designated officers already adhere to professional standards as qualified social workers, alongside ongoing work by Social Care Wales on national minimum standards for safeguarding training (The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, Jul 2022).
Sources
AI-generated summary of the record on this page, checked by a second model and automatic checks, 19 Oct 2026. The record below is the sources' own words.
Government response
No government response to this recommendation is on the record yet.
Delivery
No statement on delivery from Department for Education has been found in the sources searched (last checked 2 October 2026). This is separate from the response above.
The tracker describes this as a long-term recommendation: systemic or cultural, with no single completion point.
What other bodies have found
In their own words. These do not change the delivery statement above.
Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (25 July 2022)
On 30 June 2022, the UK government stated that it was considering the scope and timetable for a review of the statutory guidance Working Together to Safeguard Children. It stated that it will consider revised content on the role of local authority designated officers, and that it will consider running a full public consultation on changes to the statutory guidance. On 30 June 2022, the Welsh Government stated that in most, if not all, cases designated officers are qualified social workers and, as such, already adhere to professional standards. However, in addition, Social Care Wales is working on national minimum standards for safeguarding trainin
From: Recommendations - Residential schools investigation report
Site note: These are the Inquiry's own words, from its recommendations page for the Residential Schools investigation report, captured by the Internet Archive on 25 July 2022. They are the Inquiry's account of what the body told it, not the body's own words.
Responsible bodies
Themes and tags
Who has spoken
- Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse
Finding