Safeguarding children and supporting families: A longitudinal programme evaluation using routine data

Background: Oxfordshire County Council introduced Family Solutions Plus (FSP), a family-centred safeguarding model emphasising whole-family support alongside statutory1 protection. Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of FSP in enabling children at risk to remain safely with their families, and to contribute methodological innovation to the evaluation of complex social care interventions. Participants and Setting. The study included 6816 children in statutory safeguarding services across three cohorts: pre-FSP (n = 2218), transition (n = 3145), and post-FSP (n = 1624). Methods: We developed an approach to reorganise routine administrative data to track individual child journeys through services. Propensity score matching and doubly robust regression were used to reduce bias and strengthen causal inference between pre- and post-implementation cohorts. Results: Compared to the pre-FSP cohort, children receiving FSP had fewer and less intensive care plans, spent significantly less time in services (Child in Need: 107 days less; Child Protection: 166 days less; Looked After: 8 days less), and were 53 % less likely to reach the most intensive intervention (p < 0.01). They were also more likely to step down and less likely to escalate between plans. Conclusions: FSP was associated with improved outcomes for children and families, with reduced disruption and more responsive support. The study makes three unique contributions: (1) a methodological innovation enabling analysis of individual child journeys in administrative data; (2) the application of robust matching techniques in social care evaluation; and (3) evidence that therapeutic, family-centred safeguarding can reduce statutory involvement while maintaining safety.