To report possible abuse or for general advice contact the Children & Young People Information Service on 01454 868008 in office hours. The Children & Young People Information Service is the first point of contact and provides information and access to social work services to members of the public and related professionals. For out of hours emergency child protection issues contact the Emergency Duty Team on 01454 615165 or the Public Protection Unit of the police on 0117 9455969.
If you have a good reason to suspect that a child is being abused, you should contact someone who knows what to do. Do this as soon as you can and before the situation gets any worse. You may feel uneasy about reporting what you know or have seen, but you may feel much worse if you don’t.
Social workers from your locality social work team will need to talk with you if possible and find out how serious the situation is. They try hard to help families become more able to cope with caring for their child and whenever possible keep the family together.