Devon County Council has refuted union claims that children on its child protection register are allocated to "fictitious" social workers.

A council spokeswoman said: "It is not policy nor practice to use fictitious names of social workers for child protection or looked-after children cases."

Social services in Devon do have some cases where children are managed through a Help Desk.

This practice means that the children do not have a named social worker. Their cases are overseen by a Practice Supervisor/Team Manager and, pending the introduction of a new IT system, they may be identified by use of an IT pseudonym.

If a child protection or looked after child case cannot be allocated to a social worker, then they are linked to a named practice supervisor who monitors risk and initiates any action which may be needed. An IT pseudonym is not used for these cases.

Social services have now undertaken a countywide review of all Children's District Teams and can confirm that the practice complies with all the county council's expectations.

The spokeswoman said: "We do know the numbers of unallocated child protection and looked-after children cases and there is no intent to disguise or hide this.

"We are aware of where the pressures are in the system to allocate child protection and looked-after children cases, and we are addressing these issues through a variety of strategies, including workload management and planned recruitment and retention."