Adult safeguarding caseloads are continuing to mount in England, government data has shown.
The numbers of safeguarding concerns received by councils increased by 4% year on year in 2024-25, from 615,530 to 640,240, the eighth consecutive annual rise in referrals, according to data from the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).
At the same time, the number of adult safeguarding enquiries under section 42 of the Care Act 2014 rose by 4.9% between 2023-24 and 2024-25, from 176,560 to 185,270, the fourth rise in this metric in successive years.
The enquiries carried out in 2024-25 involved 148,830 people, 5.5% up on the 141,080 affected in 2023-24.
While the number of section 42 enquiries has risen since 2020-21, there was a third consecutive fall in the number of other safeguarding enquiries, of which there were 10,285, 33.8% down on the 15,530 recorded in 2023-24. These involve cases
About the adult safeguarding data
- The 153 English local authorities are required to provide data for the annual safeguarding adults collection (SAC), which is now the responsibility of the DHSC.
- The SAC defines a safeguarding concern as "a sign of suspected abuse or neglect that is reported to the local authority or identified by the local authority".
- The DHSC said there is a wide variety in the number of concerns recorded by councils, with some authorities not recording those filtered out at the front door.
- It said there is evidence that the variation in recording has decreased since a joint Local Government Association and Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) guide to what constitutes a safeguarding concern was published in 2020.
- Under the SAC, a section 42 enquiry is counted when an investigation is initiated in response to a concern and the statutory criteria are met: that a person has needs for care and support; is experiencing, or is at risk of, abuse or neglect, and, as a result of those needs, is unable to protect himself or herself against the abuse or neglect or the risk of it.
- The DHSC said there were variations between areas in the points at which a section 42 investigation is triggered after information has been gathered following a concern.
- 'Other' safeguarding enquiries are those carried out when the section 42 criteria are not met.
Self-neglect case numbers rise significantly
Councils concluded 178,135 section 42 enquiries during 2024-25, up from 166,170 in 2023-24, with rising numbers of all forms of abuse or neglect apart from organisational abuse.
Neglect/acts of omission remained the most common form of recorded harm, accounting for 40.8% of cases (72,660), compared with 43.1% (71,560). As in 2023-24, this was followed by physical (41,675), financial (33,130) and psychological abuse (29,265) and then self-neglect (23,000).
Of the five most common forms of harm, self-neglect saw the biggest percentage rise year on year, increasing by 24.3% on the 18,510 recorded in 2023-24.
The place of self-neglect within adult safeguarding remains controversial in social work, given that it does not involve harm from a third party, and is tension with the Care Act principle of practitioners starting from the assumption that the person is best placed to judge their wellbeing (section 1(3)(a)).
The Care Act statutory guidance states that decisions on whether to initiate safeguarding action in relation to self-neglect should be based on whether the adult is no longer able to protect themselves from the resulting harm.
Location, source and identification of harm
In most concluded section 42 cases, the alleged harm happened to a person in their own home (51.9%) - consistent with previous years - with 31% of cases taking place in a care home.
Similarly to previous years, the source of risk was most commonly someone known to the person (57.3%), followed by a service provider (34.1%).
As in 2023-24, risk was identified in 80% of cases and, in the vast majority of these (76.6% of the total), the council took action in response.
In two-thirds of cases where risk was identified (95,405), the risk to the person was removed, while in a further 25% it was reduced.
Making safeguarding personal
The dataset also includes questions on how far people were asked about what they wanted from the safeguarding process and whether these outcomes were achieved. Though voluntary, most councils submitted data in relation to these.
In 123,035 of 141,185 recorded cases (87.1%), the person or their representative were asked about the person's desired outcomes from the enquiry and in most of these cases (103,390), these preferences were expressed.
In two-thirds of these cases (67.9%), the person's preferences were fully achieved, while in a further 27.1% they were partially achieved.
