BETC London aids child protection collaboration

The agency created an interactive game and a film for the ACPO conference on national child protection and abuse investigation, which took place at the end of last month.

The film was created to demonstrate how the police and health, education, and social care bodies need to work in conjunction with each other to protect children from abuse.

The game, which delegates at the conference were encouraged to play, showed four manoeuvrable characters that have to work together to rescue a child from a burning building. The four characters each have to hold a corner of a blanket to catch the child.

The National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) hopes the activity will inspire further collaborations between the four agencies.

The concept and copy was created by BETC, with Neil Dawson acting as creative and art director, working with copywriter Clive Pickering.

Game production company Siyona Tech handled the game construction, while film production company Four Walls TV worked on the short film.

Nick Duffield, a spokesman for the NPIA, said: "This was an inspired piece of work by BETC that brought to the fore the need for all agencies to work together to eradicate the abuse of children.

"Sadly, we have seen on a number of occasions, such as the tragic deaths of Victoria Climbie and baby Peter Connelly, the absolute need for police, health, education and social care to adopt a united approach to child protection.

"The film was a perfect analogy of this and the game will help to continue to promote this crucial message."

BETC is in talks about further work on the project.

Follow Loulla-Mae Eleftheriou-Smith on Twitter @LoullaMae_ES

This article was first published on campaignlive.co.uk