Children's services leaders are calling on professionals across the sector to support social workers by making better use of the common assessment framework (CAF).
Their plea follows the publication of an evaluation by Loughborough University, funded by the Local Government Association (LGA), of Lord Laming's child protection proposals.
It found that professionals should be using CAF more often to identify children's needs, instead of simply referring cases to social care.
Andrew Cozens, strategic adviser for children, adults and health services at IDeA, said CAF was supposed to unify professionals across children's services, but progress had been patchy.
"Quite a lot of children have got stuck in CAF, as a way of holding their cases," he explained. "That is at least in part down to lead professionals being unwilling to take on cases."
He warned that lead professionals, whose role includes assessing what intervention children and young people may need, were fearful of dealing with cases because of the current spotlight on safeguarding.
"This is a key issue for children's trusts and local safeguarding children boards to sort out at local level. Despite all the wrap-around services we now provide, such as extended schools, there is still a default back to social care. That's why social workers are having to deal with many more assessments."
John Chowcat, general secretary of children's services union Aspect, said improving the use of CAF was vital: "There is a lot of progress to be made with the police, who have nowhere near enough involvement, and with health agencies."
Marion Davis, incoming president of the Association of Directors of Children's Services, said professionals from all children's disciplines should be initiating CAFs.
She added that social workers should be allowed to differentiate between cases in deciding whether or not children needed full initial assessments, and backed the LGA's call to scrap Lord Laming's recommendation that every referral should lead to an initial assessment.
"It's unsustainable, financially and in terms of workload on the frontline."
Social workers needed to spend more time on the frontline, she warned.
