Integrated Front Door (MASH and Early Help)

Professional Referral changes due to Covid-19 outbreak - please read this before making any professional referrals or reading the pages in this section.

Information for parents and families can be found on our accessing support  or child protection pages. This page is aimed at professionals and agencies, although parents and families may find this detailed information useful. 

The Integrated Front Door

The Integrated Front Door is the term used to cover the services that work across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough to manage the referrals received in respect of children and young people. It includes the MASH, the Emergency Duty Teams (Adults and Children) and the Missing Exploited and Trafficked Hub and the Early Help Hub.   

Customer Service Centre

The Customer Service Centre is the point of contact for all safeguarding concerns regarding children and young people. It enables contacts to be filtered to the relevant service quickly and efficiently through the use of a Pathway document to ensure that children, young people and families receive the right level of intervention in a timely manner.

The MASH is a multi-agency environment with full time involvement from Children’s Social Care, Police, Health, Education, Early Help, Domestic Abuse Services and a number of virtual partners such as Youth Offending, Probation, Fire Service and Housing. All core partner have signed the Information Sharing Agreement which enables detailed information sharing as necessary.

The MASH receives any contact that does not immediately meet threshold for a statutory service but requires multi agency information sharing to ensure that there are no safeguarding issues that have not been identified or addressed. A MASH enquiry is completed with parental consent to share information being obtained.

  • All agencies research and share relevant information held on their data bases
  • Contacts are prioritised using a BRAG (Blue, Red, Amber, Green) rating  and completed within a time period of 24 – 72 hours
  • Providing a secure and confidential environment for professionals to share information

Identifying low level repeat referrals which taken in isolation may not appear concerning

The Early Help Hub sits alongside the Multi-Agency Assessment Hub (MASH). It is Cambridgeshire County Council and Peterborough City Council’s point of contact for families and professionals doing an Early Help Assessment. It coordinates access to targeted early help services in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough and provides advice and guidance on cases managed by the professionals already involved. The Early Help Hub receives contacts that do not need a statutory service (Social Care) but require multi agency support through Early Help Services to support a family’s needs.

For more information visit our Early Help Assessments page.

If you already understand the process - you can use our Liquid Logic - Early Help Module, to make checks or submit an assessment.

Emergency Duty Team provides an out of hours emergency social work and Adult Mental Health service across Peterborough and Cambridgeshire for children and adults services.

There are six full-time MET Hub workers who are line managed by the Senior Practitioner and the MASH Team Manager. The MET Hub is responsible for: 

  • Daily review of all missing / Child Exploitation notifications for Peterborough and Cambridgeshire
  • Populating the missing / Child Exploitation tracker
  • Ensuring that all Child Exploitation / missing notifications receive the most appropriate response and are redirected where necessary
  • Participating in strategy discussions regarding suspected / identified Child Exploitation
  • Acting as the point of contact for police and other professionals in respect of Child Exploitation and children who are missing
  • Undertaking all return home interviews for children from Peterborough and Cambridgeshire who go missing from home or care. The interviews will be completed within 72 hrs of the child or young person’s return home.
  • Following up of return interviews, collating themes, issues and concerns

Cambridgeshire IDVA Service is a team of Independent Domestic Violence Advisors (IDVAs), who provide an independent service offering crisis intervention and support to victims and survivors of domestic abuse. Crisis support is defined as being short-term following a reported incident of abuse.

The IDVA team are employed by Cambridgeshire County Council and based at Cambridgeshire’s Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH). Referrals into the service originate primarily from Police and in addition other partner services.

The IDVA team work across the county, in addition, there are externally funded IDVA’s for:

  • Young people 13-19 years.
  • Victims and survivors from Eastern European A8 countries.
  • Victims and survivors whose referrals come from Addenbrookes and Hinchingbrooke Hospital Services.

IDVA’s are able to:

  • Talk through clients’ options and give information to help them make decisions.
  • Advocate with other partner services on behalf of their clients.
  • Assist with personal safety planning for clients and their children in order to reduce risk.
  • Support clients through the civil and criminal justice system.
  • Support/options given regarding housing and alternative safe accommodation.
  • Provide emotional support.
  • Support is available via telephone or by appointment in a face-to-face meeting.
  • Clients can only be referred with their consent and contact takes place at safe times and in safe locations