Agenda and minutes

Maria Ward (Maintained Primary School Governor)

Kathryn Craner (Nottinghamshire Police)

Natalie Baker-Swift

Lisa Wilson

None.

Of the meeting held on 6 December 2022, for confirmation.

The minutes of the meeting held on the 06 December 2022 were agreed.

Presentation by Rachel Clark, Programme Lead, Children and Young People’s Mental Health, Public Health and Nottingham and Nottinghamshire ICB, and

Elayne Walker Service Manager Nottingham City Targeted CAMHS d,

Rachel Clark, Elayne Walker, Maddi Popoola, Oliver Godfrey and Sarah Bonney delivered a presentation highlighting the following:

(a)  a refreshed JSNA chapter around the emotional and mental health needs of children and young people was published on Nottingham Insight in 2022. This included key recommendations including a review of inequalities in access to services, development of 0-25 services, support for parents, and access to mental health support in schools;

(b)  the THRIVE Framework provides a set of principles for creating coherent and resource efficient communities of mental health and wellbeing support for children, young people and families. This supports pathway mapping and helps to identify and address gaps in services. Partners have committed to use this model to support change across the system;

(c)  the local Transformation Plan for Children and Young People’s Mental Health is informed by the NHS Long Term Plan 2019 which include increasing access to services, improving waiting times, alignment with other areas, crisis provision. The ICB and partners within the local transformation plan are committed to achieving the mental health investment standards detailed in the NHS Plan;

(d)  governance is provided by the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Executive Group which meets 4 times a year, covering Nottingham and Nottinghamshire. They are responsible for delivery of the local Transformation Plan. The group includes representatives from the ICB, local authorities, education, public health, NHS and non-NHS providers;

(e)  all of the engagement work is underpinned by co-production with children and young people, and since 2017 this has been done with the young people’s group MH2k to support transformation across CAMHS including eating disorders, crisis, support in schools, transition and involvement;

Targeted city CAMHS provision

(f)  presence on social media had been increased following the pandemic. Have Your Say captures feedback and is used to make observable changes to work practice. Videos on Youtube explain services available to access through CAMHS, and what to expect at appointments;

(g)   Single Session Therapy training has been delivered for the Nottingham City Council and Nottinghamshire Healthcare Trust workforce;

(h)  a Health Inequalities Improvement Forum has been established which meets regularly on a monthly basis. This group hears the voices of seldom heard groups and challenges processes within the organisation to become more inclusive and informed;

(i)  the Healthy Little Minds parent/infant relationship team, currently funded by Small Steps Big Changes, will be expanded across the city thanks to Family Hub and Start for Life funding. Only 26% of CAMHS services nationally offer this provision;

(j)  the team regularly attends the Nottingham City Dynamic Support Register meetings, which are an important forum for children with very complex needs to be prioritised and provided with a comprehensive package of care;

(k)  a workforce modernisation plan is underway, with the intention of increasing resilience in leadership by including the Head of Service to the CAMHS structure, and enhancing clinical supervision for high and low intensity trained therapists. The THRIVE Model has been embedded by developing a Single Point of Access team which  ...  view the full minutes text for item 26.

Report of the Director of Children’s Integrated Services

Ailsa Barr, Director of Children’s Integrated Services, delivered a presentation and highlighted the following:

(a)  an inspection of Local Authority Children’s Services took place from 4^th-22^nd July 2022, and a report was published in September 2022 identifying four areas of broad judgement. The overall effectiveness was deemed inadequate due to the experiences and progress of children who need help and protection;

(b)  the Council is committed to improving services and outcomes and an action plan has been produced. Ofsted confirmed this action plan accurately reflects the findings of the inspection. The action plan is overseen by a Children’s Improvement Board, which is chaired by an independent advisor from the Department for Education;

(c)  eight specific areas for improvement were identified by Ofsted:

·  the effectiveness and timeliness of responses to children’s needs when first presented;

·  management oversight and direction of front-line work and the local authority designated officer (LADO);

·  social work capacity;

·  placement sufficiency for children in care and those with complex needs;

·  the service response to care leavers aged 21 or over;

·  the service response to young people who are aged 16 or 17 and present as homeless;

·  the quality and timeliness of return home interviews;

·  oversight of children missing from education and those who are electively home educated;

(d)  following the identified areas for improvement, the following steps have been taken:

·  increased social work capacity and service manager capacity;

·  implementation of new systems, processes and guidance to increase the timeliness of responses;

·  working with partners to improve multi agency information sharing and decision making;

·  implementation of a recruitment and retention package for social workers to attract and retain social workers;

·  working with Human Resources to improve advertising and recruitment processes;

·  securing additional resources for the Missing from Home team to enable timely return home interviews and quality assessments that feed into a robust safety plan;

·  improved visibility of the LADO and improved oversight of allegations against professionals;

·  working with the Children’s Commissioning Team and D2N2 to improve residential capacity for children who come into care;

·  working to increase the number of foster carers;

·  working with partners and internal departments to improve the local offer for care leavers;

·  working with housing aid to increase capacity for 16-17 year olds who present as homeless.

(e)  further developments required include further improving the timeliness of decision making at the point of contact, further focus on recruitment and stabilisation of the workforce, continued improvement on the consistent application of thresholds for decision making, and increased residential and foster care provision;

(f)  monitoring visits will take place every 3-4 months until the next full inspection, focusing on a specific area of practice. They focus on service users and frontline workers.

None.

Sam Morris suggested additions to the forward plan of:

·  Care Leavers and the local offer.

·  Children at risk of exclusion.

With these additions, the forward plan was noted.