Call 020 8379 3196, Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm
Call the adult abuse line on 020 8379 5212.
Abuse is when someone does or says something to make you feel upset, scared or frightened. This is never acceptable and abuse is never your fault. It can take place anywhere and comes in many forms. Types of abuse include:
- Disability hate crime - abuse that is motivated by hostility or prejudice based on person's disability.
- Discriminatory abuse – including forms of harassment, slurs or similar treatment because of race, gender and gender identity, age, disability, sexual orientation or religion.
- Domestic violence – including psychological, physical, sexual, financial, emotional abuse and ‘honour based violence’.
- Financial or material abuse – including theft, fraud, internet scamming, coercion relating to financial affairs or arrangements (such as wills, property, inheritance or financial transactions), or the misuse or misappropriation of property, possessions or benefits.
- Modern slavery – including human trafficking, forced labour and domestic servitude. Traffickers and slave masters use whatever means they have at their disposal to coerce, deceive and force individuals into a life of abuse, servitude and inhumane treatment.
- Neglect and acts of omission – including ignoring medical, emotional or physical care needs, failure to provide access to appropriate health, care and support or educational services, and the withholding of medication, adequate nutrition, heating and other necessities.
- Organisational abuse – including neglect and poor care practice within an institution or care setting, including care provided in one’s own home. This may range from one off incidents to on-going ill-treatment. It can be through neglect or poor professional practice as a result of the structure, policies, processes and practices within an organisation.
- Physical abuse – including assault, hitting, slapping, pushing, misuse of medication, restraint or inappropriate physical sanctions.
- Psychological abuse – including emotional abuse, threats of harm or abandonment, deprivation of contact, humiliation, blaming, controlling, intimidation, coercion, harassment, verbal abuse, cyber bullying or unjustified withdrawal of services and supportive networks.
- Self-neglect – including hoarding and neglecting to care personal hygiene, health or surroundings.
- Sexual abuse – including rape, sexual assault, indecent exposure, sexual harassment, inappropriate looking or touching, sexual teasing or innuendo, sexual photography, subjection to pornography or witnessing sexual acts, or sexual acts without consent or with pressure to consent.
If you are experiencing abuse it is important that you don’t keep silent. The Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) has representatives from adult social care, the police, hospital trusts, nursing, mental health services and housing. We give information and advice, so you can make an informed choice about help you need, or action you want to take.
If you see or know of a worrying situation, do not ignore it. Get in touch with us and we will do something about it. This may mean acting directly on your information and contacting other services to help stop an abusive or neglectful situation.
We will also provide information and offer practical advice to the person suffering abuse, so that they can make an informed choice about any help they might need, or any action they may wish to take. If they are unable to make an informed choice, care will be taken to support and protect them.
If you tell the police, Enfield Council, or someone else you can trust, they will:
- listen to you and help you to stay safe
- find out more about what has happened
- give you help and support
Making safeguarding personal
In Enfield, we work with the principles of Making Safeguarding Personal:
- Empowerment
- Prevention
- Proportionality
- Protection
- Partnerships
- Accountability
Our Making Safeguarding Personal video follows some of the cases from the warning signs video to show how these principles work in action