On 27 January the Care Inspectorate wrote to all chief social workers advising them that responsibility for analysing serious incident reviews had transferred from Scottish Government to the Inspectorate and that there was new guidance in place.

This guidance places a responsibility on a local authority to carry out a review when an offender subject to statutory supervision (excluding a registered sex offender) becomes involved in a serious incident.  Local authorities are asked to submit these reviews to the Care Inspectorate which will provide comment and which will aggregate the findings and lessons learned.

Separate guidance applies when registered sex offenders become involved in serious incidents (http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2012/01/12094716/1).

Responsibility for analysing reviews of such incidents does not lie with the Care Inspectorate but with multi-agency public protection strategic oversight groups.