line and support practice 3. Using technology to achieve frictionless sharing of information between safeguarding partners The evidence gathered and products delivered by these projects will play a key part in delivering the DfE’s ambition in this area. Background The DfE want to take a step forward in children’s social care and enable better use of data and advances in technology to make significant progress for children and unlock better use of resources. Recording of information and data is an important element of social work. It both provides information for decision-making and creates lasting records that help people with care experience make sense of their life story. Part of what social workers record is directly relevant to their work with the children and families on their caseload. However, social workers also spend time recording information and data for wider audiences and purposes. CMS are designed to support both social work with children and families and statutory data collection, but statutory data collection is often prioritised in how CMS are structured. This can get in the way of CMS supporting good social work practice. 19 DfE Project 2A: User research into social worker inputted data to CMS To contribute to priority two above, the DfE commissioned the project reported here to explore, through user research, recording practices regarding the data social workers input to CMS. The inclusion criteria meant that only local authorities (LA) rated as good or outstanding by Ofsted were eligible to lead the work. The DfE commissioned both Essex County Council and Leeds City Council to lead on the above project. Essex focused on Children Looked After (CLA) pathways and Leeds focused on Children in Need and Child Protection pathways. Essex County Council submi