{"id":20464,"date":"2026-09-17T11:25:06","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T10:25:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/?p=20464"},"modified":"2026-09-18T13:02:30","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T12:02:30","slug":"information-sharing-duty-what-early-years-providers-need-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/information-sharing-duty-what-early-years-providers-need-to-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Information sharing duty: what early years providers need to know"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A new Information Sharing Duty Statutory Guidance came into effect in September 2026, bringing greater clarity about when information should be shared to help safeguard and promote the welfare of children.<\/p>\n<p>The key message is simple: where information may help another agency assess need, identify risk, make decisions or provide support for a child, there is now a stronger expectation that it should be shared.<\/p>\n<p>This marks a shift from asking &#8220;Can I share this?&#8221; to &#8220;Should I share this?&#8221; when it is in a child&#8217;s best interests.<\/p>\n<p>The guidance also reassures practitioners that data protection legislation should not be viewed as a barrier to appropriate safeguarding information sharing and highlights the importance of sharing concerns early, before needs escalate.<\/p>\n<p>For early years providers and childminders, this means considering whether information about a child&#8217;s development, attendance, wellbeing, family circumstances or emerging concerns could help another professional support that child and family more effectively.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/assets.publishing.service.gov.uk\/media\/6aa2a5b1c5796a7a179c665a\/Information_sharing_duty_statutory_guidance.pdf\" rel=\"noopener\">Information sharing duty &#8211; statutory guidance from DfE<\/a><\/p>\n<p>To find out more and what this means in practice, join one of our Safeguarding and Inclusion Forums this term, where we will be exploring the changes and their implications for early years settings and childminders.<\/p>\n<p>To book onto a safeguarding and inclusion forum, visit the Devon Education Services Shop: <a href=\"https:\/\/devoneducationservices.co.uk\/events\/4a2978a6-28c5-48fa-a3ad-d4e7f2fe3d9c\/Early-Years-and-Childcare-Safeguarding-and-Inclusion-Forums-SIFs\" rel=\"noopener\">Early Years and Childcare: Safeguarding and Inclusion Forums (SIFs) | DES<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new Information Sharing Duty Statutory Guidance came into effect in September 2026, bringing greater clarity about when information should be shared to help safeguard and promote the welfare of children.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":649,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-26 12:37:16","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/649"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20464"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20490,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20464\/revisions\/20490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devon.gov.uk\/eycs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}