Guidance

Safeguarding children affected by a parent's alcohol or drug use

How alcohol and drug treatment and recovery commissioners and providers can safeguard children affected by their parent or carer's alcohol or drug use.

• From: Department of Health and Social Care
• Published: 4 December 2018
• Last updated: 1 October 2026
  Show all updates

  1. 1 October 2026

     Updated guidance to reflect current safeguarding policy and programmes. It also focuses more on workforce expectations and ways of working, the effects of stigma and trauma, and pregnancy and the perinatal period. The page also now includes a self-assessment checklist to support commissioners and service providers to assess and improve current performance.

  2. 4 December 2018

     First published.

Applies to England

Documents

Safeguarding children affected by their parent or carer's alcohol or drug use

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Safeguarding children affected by a parent's alcohol or drug use: self-assessment checklist

ODS, 8.53 KB

This file is in an OpenDocument format

Details

Commissioners and providers of adult alcohol and drug treatment and recovery should use this guidance to:

• understand the steps they should take to protect the welfare of children affected by a parent’s or carer’s alcohol or drug use
• understand the implications and requirements of child statutory and practice guidance for adult alcohol and drug services
• improve joint working between social care and alcohol and drug services

The guidance includes a self-assessment checklist to help local partnerships:

• assess current policies and practices for safeguarding children
• identify what they can do to improve performance in line with guidance
• assess the roles and responsibilities of individuals and organisations within their local partnerships