Agenda item

to include:

·  Update on Children’s Improvement Programme

·  Update on Priority Families

·  Update on Young Carers

Sophie Russell, Head of Children’s Strategy and Improvement, Tajinder Madahar, Head of Service Children’s Duty and Targeted Services, and Rosaleen Lynch, Service Manager, Action for Young Carers, provided updates of activity within their respective areas of work which linked into the Children and Young People’s Plan priority of Safeguarding and Supporting Children and Families.

Sophie Russell, Head of Children’s Strategy and Improvement, delivered a brief presentation updating the Partnership on the Children’s Improvement Plan. The following points were highlighted and questions responded to;

a)  Ofsted undertook a focused visit during February 2020 and this is an update on the significant work undertaken since then;

b)  2 priority areas were identified for action by Ofsted so the Children at the Heart Improvement Board was established to focus on addressing these areas;

c)  a clear strength-based practice model was relaunched using the well-established Signs Of Safety approaches to support consistency of practice, with additional learning resources for social workers such as tools for direct work with children, and the new neglect practice guidance for identifying neglect and working with (not to) families, in addition to working closely with the Safeguarding Partnership to jointly produce a Partnership Neglect Strategy;

d)  frontline social worker teams have stabilised with additional capacity to sure there is time available for purposeful and high quality work with children;

e)  with our partner in practice (Essex Local Authority) we worked continued to learn and develop an understanding of the quality of practice in key areas, delivering diagnostic activity and practice conferences. Colleagues from Essex have been very helpful in supporting a positive direction of travel;

f)  the early help offer for children and families was maintained and funding cuts responded to by creating a more targeted play and youth offer, further improving CAMHS, and building the capacity of our VCS partners;

g)  the rapid pace of the improvement journey has been maintained throughout the pandemic and changes to the Corporate Leadership Team. Services have provided a robust approach in responding to the challenges during COVID-19 and ensuring contact is maintained with vulnerable children and families, providing regular returns to DoE, and ensuring visibility maintained. There has been fantastic work across partners, agencies and education providers, providing assurance that vulnerable children remain safe. This latest period of lockdown has highlighted the importance of Partnership and moving forward together;

h)  the focus was initially on  delivering against priorities identified but now the scope needs to widen  with partners to ensure the most effective impact;

i.  children will benefit from consistently good social work practice;

ii.  services will be enabled and supported to make a difference for children;

iii.  children will benefit from a partnership that works together to improve outcomes for children;

i)  the targeted approach of Youth and Play Services is monitored and can be provided following the meeting. Play and youth targeted work is important in a preventative approach and there are good indicators that they are having a positive impact and reach. Services have adapted contact due to the covid social distancing restrictions;

j)  this is a good opportunity to bring together important strands of work which have previously operated in isolation, ensuring that Partners can co-ordinate work and together.

Priority Families

k)  this is not a local authority initiative but a partnership initiative, with phase 2 (period 2015-2020) now complete, for which the target was met, ranking top within the region with a total of 3,840 payment by results claims, significant and sustained progress claims totalling 3,096, and continuous employment claims reaching 744;

l)  the programme has been extended by a year to 2021, with overall funding available of £1,598,400, with a target of 384 attachments and 643 payment by results. To date, the programme is on track to meet all targets. Central Government has indicated the intention to extend the programme nationally for a further year, potentially with a greater focus on homelessness youth crime demand management, but this has not been confirmed.

Partners welcomed the achievement and the impressive number of claims for continuous employment, which illustrates the excellent partnership working with partners including the seconded Police Officer and specifically the DWP and work of the Troubled Family Employment Advisors, providing very strong performance results.

Tajinder Madahar, Head of Service Children’s Duty and Targeted Services, and Rosaleen Lynch, Service Manager, Action for Young Carers, provided a brief presentation on Support for Young Careers, which is issued with the initial publication of the minutes.

The following points were highlighted, questions responded to and comments made by Partners:

m)  a joint protocol has been established through partnership working with the Carers Federation and  Action for Young Carers, which is being promoted to all social work teams in children and adults alongside the targeted family support for children’s teams;

n)  promotion of the protocol and awareness of young carers has taken place through the ‘every colleague matters’ event, including the offer of presentations to schools at the designated safeguarding leads meeting and the education network meeting;

o)  Young Carers identity cards, which are issued by the Action for Young Carers, have been promoted to GPs, with information displayed at some GP practices, but more is yet to be done;

p)  the number of referrals has declined since the pandemic, but telephone contact has increased, as has the use of zoom, which is often the preferable media for many young people. However, whilst out of school there are concerns that there has been an expectation that young carers would dedicate more time to their caring roles and responsibilities and not maintain school work. Access to suitable IT has also been a concern and efforts have been made to provide equipment, along with supporting young carers with practical help, including support by volunteers;

q)  Young Carers are often particularly cautious about leaving the house and taking COVID-19 back into the home, so remote communication has been particularly important;

r)  further work is required to get GPs fully engaged in helping to identify and support young carers with a whole-family assessment approach to ensure appropriate support can be provided;

s)  as parents and carers recover form COVID-19, including long-covid, there may be a massive increase of young carers, so this needs to be recognised and identification actively sought;

t)  repeat training and awareness sessions need to be on-going across all partners due to staff turnover to ensure awareness is maintained;

u)  some families have provided evidence of the very welcome difference that support can make to young carers and their families, emphasising the importance to identify, refer and support young careers at an early stage;

v)  COVID-19 has made everyone’s life more difficult but this information on available help is valuable so could possibly be forwarded to the Health and wellbeing board for broader health to consider;

w)  There is a newly established self-help group which has been set up by families who have had covid and are experiencing the effects, so this young carer support information may be valuable to share with them, and possibly look to spread your work further and promote more strongly, particularly with regard to the longer-term impact of covid;

x)  Young Carer Referrals can be made by word of mouth so it’s important to make people aware and ensure carers and their families do not feel like they are on their own;

y)  the Young Carers Team is structured to support young people from the age of 5 to 18 years, and 16 to 29 years;

z)  we all need to ensure that the support is in place at an early stage to enable young carers to have the confidence to progress in life, such as into higher education or employment as some may lack confidence beyond their caring role.

Resolved for an agenda item to be brought to a future meeting focusing on Youth and Play Services, to include the reach of the Service and numbers of young people engaged.