NSPCC-ChildLine merger

An inherent tension in this merger will be that between universal and targeted services. Despite its much larger size, the NSPCC specialises in targeted services aimed at children who are deemed to be at risk. The much smaller ChildLine, on the other hand, has the goal of being a universal service that all children know they can use. NSP is for children in particularly bad situations; ChildLine seeks to be there for all children, because all children have problems from time to time. In some cases those problems are truly ghastly, eg sexual abuse; in others they are relatively minor, eg a bit of loneliness after moving to a new school. ChildLine seeks to be there to address a much broader range of experience, it seems.

The NSP's online counselling service, There4Me.com, does appear to seek to be a universal service, though, which I think is great. It's worth noting, however, that I can imagine some conflict between ChildLine's policies regarding when to contact social services, and those of the NSPCC:

Advisers work for the NSPCC and have a legal duty to keep children and young people safe. This means that if they know who you are, and you have talked about yourself or someone else being hurt or abused, then this information needs to be passed on to a social worker or the police to keep you safe from harm.

I won't be bothered to look it up right now, but a gander at the Southampton University evaluation of there4me says that one weakness of the service is that when a child protection issue arises, the counsellors can have a tendency to switch from being child-centred to a more process-based role. In this case, the real weakness (or one of them) is that the child will feel tricked: for a while the counselling was all about them, then it becomes more about the child protection process. This latter bit is of course a huge - probably the central - complaint that kids have about their interactions with social services: the centre of attention and energy seems to be not the children, but making sure that the system works as the rules say it should. It's about process, rather than individual. (Note that I'm not implying that the NSPCC shares this weakness; I really don't know enough about them to say much of anything.)

Regarding how the two agencies will fit together, here's an article in this week's Society Guardian. Of particular interest for me is the following:

Efficiencies in backroom functions will mean more money can be spent on the service. The work of the two charities is complementary, she says. For example, NSPCC's lobbying operation can be brought together with the children's testimonies gathered by ChildLine.