Agenda item

Documents attached: -

• Paper outlining a series of questions to support the Improving Lives Select Commission’s scrutiny of Rotherham’s Early Help Strategy.

• Cover report outlining details of Rotherham’s Early Help strategy.

• Early Help for Children, Young People and Families – Rotherham’s Strategy to reduce inequalities for families. 

Councillor G. A, Russell, Chairperson of the Improving Lives Select Commission, welcomed Officers to the meeting who had prepared a presentation informing members of the Select Commission about the development of Rotherham’s Early Help Strategy.  The Select Commission were asked to consider the areas of the Strategy they considered could be most effectively addressed by the scrutiny process. 

Warren Carratt, Service Manager – Strategy, Standards and Development, Children and Young People’s Services was the Local Authority’s Lead Officer in relation to the Early Help Strategy, attended the meeting to provide a presentation that gave a detailed overview of the Strategy.  A number of issues were covered, including: -

• Timeline of the development and evolution of the present day Early Help Strategy;
  • Linkages with other strategies, including child poverty, the introduction of the Common Assessment Framework and the Prevention and Early Intervention Strategy.
  • Impact of budget reductions and their role in the Council’s changing organisational and management structure, such as loss of Director-level portfolios and organisational structure.
  • National reviews informing policy development locally: Munro, Field and Allen – however, they were not policy directives and during 2012 detail had been announced by the Central Government in relation to the Troubled Families initiative.    

The Early Help Strategy’s definition was: - 

“We are committed to identifying the need and supporting children, young people and families at the earliest possible stage.  We will change our focus to a preventative and early intervention approach with a radical shift of ways of working and resourcing to support this.  This is a significant step forward for integrated working in Rotherham.”

“Intervening early and as soon as possible to tackle problems emerging for children, young people and their families or with a population most at risk of developing problems.  Effective integration may occur at any point in a child or young person’s life.”

• There was a clear moral imperative to undertake this process;
• There was a strong financial argument to take an early help approach;
• Every Child Matters;
• Rotherham’s Early Help Strategy was partnership-wide.  Children and Young People’s Services was the lead Directorate.   

The Continuum of Needs ‘windscreen’ had been re-designed specifically for use in Rotherham, and included four categories ranging from Universal, Vulnerable, Complex and Acute.

·         Children and families could quickly escalate between the levels of need;

·         The Early Help Strategy could be initiated when a child or a family was at any stage of the Continuum;

·         A child, and their family, could be placed on the Early Help continuum before their birth when there were known concerns;

·         Partner organisations and strategies included Learning Communities (schools), Safer Neighbourhood teams, 11 Most Deprived Areas (although areas not in the classification would not be left out), Common Assessment Framework.

Case studies of how the Early Help Strategy helped families who were classified as ‘universal’, vulnerable’ and ‘complex’ were shared with the Select Commission.

Preparation for adopting the Early Help Strategy had been undertaken: -

·         Workforce development programme had been developed – including a competence model for all front-line staff;

·         Creation of an Integrated Youth Support Service – incorporating Youth Service, Youth Offending Service and Connexions careers advice into one unit;

·         From April, 2013 onwards, Ofsted would conduct multi-agency inspections and all services had undertaken preparation for the new framework;

·         Performance management of the Early Help Strategy was being developed.  This would be considered in the context of: -

o       Welfare Reforms;

o       Numbers of Child Protection Plans could increase or decrease as a consequence of the Strategy;

o       Regular measurement and reporting would take place;

o       There would be robust analysis of the Strategy to demonstrate the impact of the funding. 

Discussion ensued on the information presented on the Early Help Strategy.  The members of the Improving Lives Select Commission raised the following issues: -

• Were the funding streams for the Strategy sustainable?
  • The Early Help Strategy sought to remove duplication, its focus on prevention avoided escalating costs at a later stage.
• Engagement of Housing Champions – ensuring they knew about the aims and reporting mechanisms available;
• The role of the Lead Worker assigned to children and families:      
  • Not necessarily a Social Worker;
  • Lead Worker would be a professional who had engaged well with the family and was trusted by them;
  • Logistical and admin support would be provided by Family for Change Co-ordinators.
• Development of ‘step up’ and ‘step down’ strategies for entering and leaving the continuum of needs were in place;
• Performance management and challenging poor performance;
• Ensuring that the branding of the strategy and the workstreams did not stigmatise the individuals and families involved, or made them feel reluctant to take part;
• Was work underway to ensure that services and agencies were not duplicating one another?;
• Were different services aware of what each other were doing?

The Chairperson thanked Warren Carratt for the informative presentation that he had provided, and Joyce Thacker and Councillor Paul Lakin were thanked for their contribution to the discussion. 

Resolved: - (1)  That the information shared be noted. 

(2)  That scrutiny of the Early Help Strategy be incorporated into the Improving Lives Select Commission’s work programme, including the operation of the different agencies and services within the Early Help Strategy. 

(3)  That the Early Help Strategy sub-group of the Improving Lives Select Commission continue to meet.  

(4)  That regular performance monitoring updates be provided to the Improving Lives Select Commission.