Appearing before the public accounts committee, Jonathan Slater, who became permanent secretary at the DfE in May, said data collected by central government is beginning to show a link between levels of staff turnover and agency rates in children's services departments and Ofsted child protection judgments.
He added that there are "promising signs" that the DfE will be able to spot issues as they emerge thanks to the new datasets, which it began collecting in 2014.
"The quality of data to inform early intervention is obviously crucial," Slater told MPs.
"One of the things the department did in the last six years was start collecting data for the first-ever time on what's actually happening on the ground on agency staff, on turnover rates, on actual caseloads.
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