Agenda item

-        Warren Carratt to report

Warren Carratt, Service Manager, Strategy, Standards & Early Help, gave the following powerpoint presentation:-

 

What is “Early Help”?

-          ‘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 intervention may occur at any point in a child or young person’s life’

 

Statutorily

-          Working Together 2013 put requirement on Local Safeguarding Children Board to assure itself of the effectiveness of Early Help provision

-          No duty on individual agencies (and taken away from schools) but expectation there and included in OfSTED framework

 

Health and Wellbeing Strategy

-          Links to all priorities but specific strong links with Dependence to Independence, Aspirations and Expectations and Prevention and Early Intervention

 

Pathways to Whole Family Early Help

-          Children’s Centres working with 0-5 year olds

-          Targeted Family Support working with primary aged children

-          Integrated Youth Support Service working with teenagers/young adults

-          Community Development Team Outreach working with SEN

 

Role of Early Help Assessment Team

-          To provide co-ordination of step downed contacts from CART

-          To be a central point of contact for families requiring Early Help

-          To broker services where required

-          Not to replace Localism but support where there is none in place

 

Early Help Challenges

-          Predominantly unqualified workforce

-          Many issues underpinned by adult mental health (mild to moderate)

-          If it works, Social Care need never become involved

-          Linked into broader societal context e.g. Welfare Reform

-          Often about case management

-          Not Social Care aftercare

 

Trends

-          Schools disengaging from lead working but need is still there

-          Interdependent with other provision e.g. CAMHS, EPS, CDC etc.

-          Early Help is part of a wide ranging system where one or more areas of support are reduced the impact on the whole system needs to be assessed

 

Families for Change Provision

-          Providing connectivity (not duplication) of existing provision or new provision where gaps are identified

-          Evidence based

-          Co-working where required with existing services

-          Only for families with poor attendance and anti-social behaviour or worklessness

-          Little overlap with Pupil Referral Units, Parenting etc.

-          Subject to rigorous Payment by Results scrutiny and challenge from Audit and DCLG

-          Family Recovery Programme focussed on most complex cases (Social Care)

 

Where’s the Gap?

Causal Factors

-          Reduction in Services and/or Service redesign

-          Limitations of existing initiatives (e.g. Families for Change)

-          History of chronic, long term neglect

-          Insufficiency of planned, facilitated step down

-          Where to go for challenge/support

 

Early Help Support Panel

A multi-agency forum where:-

-          Services can be commissioned and where innovative, fast-track approaches can be tested

-          The quality of multi-agency work can be assured and challenged where required

-          Support for families can be brokered

 

What we value

-          Localism and the capacity, trust and freedom of local services to provide effective early help within their own communities wherever this is possible

 

What we know

-          We are not yet providing excellent integrated Early Help Services

-          Some Services are commissioned and/or delivered by the “centre” and not community based

-          We do not and will not unite Early Help provision under one management line or organisation umbrella (nor should we)

-          The system is being pushed apart

-          Practitioners want to succeed though they need help and better awareness of pathways to access this

-          Social Care are a key partner and the way this interfaces with Early Help providers is in constant need of review and revision

 

Discussion ensued on the presentation with the following issues raised/clarified:-

 

·           Attempts had been made to mitigate the impact of the proposed reduction of Children’s Centres as much as possible by focussing on staff and services and providing outreach work.  There was to be an event on 2^nd April to discuss the way forward

 

·           The voluntary and community sector was a resource that needed to be tapped into.  Analysis of the work of the sector had shown the variety of work it did with children and young people providing an alternative service to families and individuals around Early Help

 

·           1 of the best ways of determining how well agencies were doing with their work on Early Help was to look at how many children became a Child in Need or subject to a Care Plan and work from that point.  All agencies needed to work together and ascertain why Early Help had not had an influence.  The Local Safeguarding Children Board would concentrate on Early Help’s performance and look at why a child became the subject of a Care Plan

 

·           Agencies had a tendency to work at crisis level rather than prevention and early intervention

 

·           Essential that the voluntary and community sector were utilised more

 

Resolved:-  That the presentation be noted.