Joint working: Your guide to surviving a media crisis

It's a council's worst nightmare. Something awful happens - the death of a child known to social services, for example - and the media pounces. Recent high-profile cases will have acted as a warning for local authorities up and down the country. Haringey Council faced the full glare of the media spotlight when the Baby P case broke almost a year ago. The authority should have been prepared - its reputation was still recovering following the inquiry into Victoria Climbie's death in 2000.

Haringey spent £19,000 on media consultants after the Baby P scandal broke, trying to restrict the damage - arguably with limited success. Other councils at the centre of a media storm in recent months include Kirklees Council, which was criticised over the Shannon Matthews case when it emerged that the girl had previously been on the child protection register before she was kidnapped by her mother.