Children's Services at a large local authority and one of its foster families.
The foster family has a young child in its care with severe behavioural and emotional problems that is prone to self-harm. Everything had been made completely safe in his bedroom but concerns were still arising at night as he had access to the remainder of the house.
The obvious solution was to lock the child in its bedroom, but this presented an additional concern regarding fire safety. If a fire were to break out the child would be trapped in the bedroom.
Safelincs worked with Children's Services and the local fire service to come up with a way in which this problem could be resolved.
The solution was to fit a magnetic lock (mag lock) on the child's bedroom door. The strong electromagnet keeps the door closed but if a smoke alarm in the house is triggered the electricity supply to the magnetic lock automatically cuts out and the magnet loses power, releasing the door which can then be opened.
The foster parents are now able to sleep safe in the knowledge that their child cannot come to harm outside his room. At the same time if there was a fire the child would not be trapped.
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