It is not your role to determine whether abuse has taken place or reach a threshold of certainty before speaking up. Your responsibility is to notice and to report. Waiting for certainty is one of the most common failures identified in serious case reviews.

Working Together to Safeguard Children 2026 states this position explicitly. Data protection law requires sharing to be necessary, proportionate, relevant and recorded - not avoided. Believing GDPR prevents sharing is a dangerous misconception.

Bruising on a baby who is not independently mobile is one of the strongest indicators in child protection practice and is reported every time regardless of how reasonable the explanation sounds. Evaluating the account is the DSL's role, not yours.

Emotional abuse expressly includes a child seeing or hearing the ill-treatment of another. Under section 3 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, this child is legally a victim of domestic abuse in her own right. Option C is actively dangerous: raising domestic abuse concerns with parents can increase the risk to both child and non-abusing parent.

You can never promise confidentiality to a child. Option C contains two leading questions. Option D promises an outcome outside your control. Being honest is both safer and more reassuring than a promise you cannot keep.

'Tell me about that' is the smallest possible open prompt - it invites the child to continue without supplying a name, act or answer. A is leading. B reads as blame. D criticises someone the child may love, which can cause them to retract.

Safeguarding records must never be destroyed, rewritten or obscured. An amended record with a visible dated audit trail remains credible; a rewritten one does not, and correction fluid destroys the original entry entirely.

This is one of the Seven Golden Rules. Where a child is at risk or there is a perceived risk of harm, consent is not required - and may not be an appropriate basis for sharing at all. Protecting a child from harm takes priority over privacy.

Where a concern is about the person you would normally report to, you go outside the setting. No policy can require you to raise a concern with the individual it is about. Option A warns the person; option B repeats the most common failure - waiting for certainty.

Physical comfort is a necessary part of caring for very young children - withholding it harms them. The protection comes from visibility, not distance. Option C removes the child from view. Option D delays comfort a distressed toddler needs now.