A World of Possibilities: The Vision for 21st Century Childrens Services

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A World of PossibilitiesThe Vision for 21st
Century Childrens Services

• Graham Badman
• Managing Director

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What is the problem we are trying to solve?
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Health Issues

• Obesity and Type 2 Diabetes
• Smoking
• Alcohol
• Low birth weight
• Chronic illness
• Accidents
• Pregnancy and STIs
• Drug misuse
• Emotional and behaviour problems

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Children with limiting long-term illness (LLTI),
2001. Number and percentage of all children,
percentage by tenure type
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Rate of Child Road Casualties per 1,000 0-15 year
olds, by Districts in Kent 2005

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Percentage of 0-18 year olds living in
accommodation with no central heating in Kent
districts, 2001
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Under 18 conception rates in Kent districts,
2003-05
Source Teenage Pregnancy Unit
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Under 18 conceptions leading to abortion in Kent
districts, 2003-05
Source Teenage Pregnancy Unit
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Number of infant deaths per 1,000 live births
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Why is there a need for statutory guidance?
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Essential Features of a Childrens Trust

• A child-centred, outcome-led vision a compelling
  outcome-led vision for all children and young
  people, clearly informed by their views and those
  of their families
• Integrated front line delivery organised around
  the child, young person or family rather than
  professional boundaries of existing agencies
• Integrated processes effective joint working
  sustained by a shared language and shared
  processes
• Integrated strategy joint planning and
  commissioning, pooled budgets
• Inter-agency governance, with robust arrangements
  for inter-agency co-operation
• (Childrens Trusts statutory guidance on
  inter-agency co-operation to
• improve well-being of children, young people and
  their families, DCSF, 2008)

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Essential Features of a Childrens Trust

• Childrens Trusts must
• Place an emphasis on narrowing the outcome gaps
  between children from disadvantaged backgrounds
  and their peers, while improving outcomes for all
• Focus rigorously on prevention and the early
  identification of children with additional needs,
  including those at risk of falling into
  anti-social behaviour or crime, by working
  closely with all partners, including the policy
  and youth justice agencies
• Involve and empower parents, and become more
  responsive to children and young people
  themselves
• Ensure effective planning and commissioning of
  services and the flexible use of pooled budgets
• Drive effective integrated working between all
  professionals working with children and young
  people
• Overcome unnecessary barriers to sharing and
  using information systematically
• (Childrens Trusts statutory guidance on
  inter-agency co-operation to
• improve well-being of children, young people and
  their families, DCSF, 2008)

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Childrens Trusts as a delivery mechanism for the
National Childrens Plan

• Happy and healthy securing the wellbeing and
  health of children and young people
• Families are the place for nurturing happy,
  capable and resilient children. Parents have
  made it clear that they would like better and
  more flexible information and support that
  reflects the lives they lead
• Safe and sound safeguard the young and
  vulnerable
• Keeping children and young people safe from harm
  but also enabling them to learn, have new
  experiences and enjoy their childhoods
• Excellence and equity individual progress to
  achieve world class standards and close the gap
  in educational achievement for children from
  disadvantage families
• Every young person to achieve their potential and
  enjoy their time in education

(Childrens Trusts statutory guidance on
inter-agency co-operation to improve well-being
of children, young people and their families,
DCSF, 2008)
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Childrens Trusts as a delivery mechanism for the
National Childrens Plan

• Leadership and Collaboration system reform to
  achieve world class standards and close the gap
  in educational achievement for children from
  disadvantaged families
• Create an early years and schools system where
  all institutions are consistently achieving at
  the level of the best
• Staying on ensure young people are
  participating and achieving their potential to 18
  and beyond
• Ensure an appropriately skilled workforce in
  order to compete in the global economy
• On the right track keep children and young
  people on the path to success
• All young children to enjoy happy, healthy and
  safe teenage years and to be prepared for adult
  life
• Making it happen the vision for 21st century
  childrens services
• System wide reforms to the way services for
  children and young people work together

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Childrens Trusts as a delivery mechanism for the
National Childrens Plan

• Poverty blights childrens lives and has
  far-reaching effects on all outcomes, which is
  why the government has committed to halving child
  poverty by 2010 and eradicating it by 2020.
  Poverty is not just about low income. Other
  factors include access to high-quality health
  care and social services, child care an
  important enabler of parental employment family
  support, decent housing and transport and the
  quality of the local amenities, including
  cultural and leisure facilities. The partnership
  arrangements necessary to take a strategic
  approach to tackling this wide range of issues
  should be embedded within the Childrens Trust.
  Links with the wider Local Strategic Partnership
  will enable partners to focus on issues such as
  economic development and job creation, especially
  for the hard to reach securing sufficient
  childcare for working parents skills and
  training and community regeneration.

(Childrens Trusts statutory guidance on
inter-agency co-operation to improve well-being
of children, young people and their families,
DCSF, 2008)
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Ideas Ideals Aspirations
Pessimism
A source of child family learning multi
agency intervention and support
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Poverty - key facts

• 3.8 million children are living in poverty in the
  UK today
• Since 1999, 600,000 children have been lifted out
  of poverty
• In 2005/6 child poverty rose by 100,000 - the
  first rise since 1999
• The majority of poor children (57) live in a
  household where at least one adult works
• The majority of poor children (58) live in a
  household headed by a couple
• Over two-thirds of those below the poverty
  threshold at any one time have been in poverty
  for at least three of the past four years
• End Child Poverty 2007

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Indicators of disadvantage

• No parent in the family is in work
• Family lives in poor quality or overcrowded
  housing
• No parent has any qualifications
• Mother has mental health problems
• At least one parent has a long-standing limiting
  illness, disability or infirmity
• Family has low income (below 60 of the median)
• Family cannot afford a number of food and
  clothing items
• Families and Children Study (Social Exclusion
  Task Force ) March 2007

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The Changed Nature of Society

• There were 236,980 marriages in 2006 - the lowest
  number since 1895
• In 2006 there were 12.2 divorcing people per
  1,000 married population
• One in ten families are step families
• One in four families are lone parent families
• Nearly 200,000 children do not live with their
  parents
• The average use of the internet is 13.8 hours for
  12 - 15 year olds - more important than
  television
• The average child sees at least 10,000
  commercials a year
• 87 of 12 - 15 year olds own mobile phones

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Key concepts for addressing poverty

• Learned optimism
• Capability (in families and communities)
• Resilience

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What is our vision?
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Positive About Our Future - Kent Children and
Young Peoples Plan Update 2008-2011

• In Kents successful communities, achievement
  exceeds aspiration, diversity is valued and every
  child and family is supported. Children and
  young people are positive about their future and
  are at the heart of joined up service planning.
  They are
• Nurtured and encouraged at home
• Inspired and motivated by school
• Safe and secure in the community
• Living healthy and fulfilled lives

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KCT Priorities for Children and Young People

• Priority 1
• To reduce the impact of poverty (generational and
  situational) on
• childrens lives by tackling the underlying
  causes and mitigating
• the effects
• Priority 2
• To draw on and improve resilience in CYP to help
  them make
• informed and healthy/safe choices and develop
  coping strategies.
• To include a focus on Children Young People
  with emotional
• and/or mental health problems
• Priority 3
• To improve parenting by implementing Every
  Parent Matters and
• developing more effective multi agency support
  and early
• intervention for families experiencing problems.
  

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KCT Priorities for Children and Young People

• Priority 4
• To improve the quality and stability of housing
  provision for
• vulnerable Children Young people through to
  early adulthood
• Priority 5
• Supporting Vulnerable Children to improve their
  life chances
• including improving the achievement and quality
  of life for young
• carers by implementing the Kent Young Carers
  Strategy
• Priority 6
• To ensure more young people have things to do and
  safe places to
• go in their leisure time and improve outcomes for
  adolescents at
• risk to themselves and potentially others,
  through for example
• implementation of the Integrated Youth Strategy

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KCT Priorities for Children and Young People

• Priority 7
• To increase engagement and participation by young
  people in
• education, employment and society in order to
  prevent disaffection
• and improve security
• Priority 8
• Children and Young People are safe and feel safe
  in the
• communities where they live, go to school, play,
  and work
• (Including CTB priority To take action to reduce
  the incidence and
• impact of bullying in school and the community.)

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The Purpose of the Kent Childrens Trust

• Core purpose KCT is a strategic partnership at
  County level, as required by the Children Act
  2004, with a key focus on commissioning improved
  outcomes for children and young people in line
  with the ECM framework
• It will fulfil this core purpose by
• Agreeing priorities for improvement across
  childrens services through the development of
  the Children and Young Peoples Plan for Kent
• Assessing needs through rigorous research and
  performance management across childrens services
• Engaging CYP and their families in service
  development
• Identifying opportunities for integrated
  commissioning and developing stronger partnership
  arrangements including pooled budgets to improve
  outcomes
• Working with the Kent Childrens Safeguarding
  Board to keep children safe from harm
• (The Kent Childrens Trust Partnership Agreement
  2008)

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The Purpose of the Kent Childrens Trust

• Championing the needs of children and young
  people particularly vulnerable groups
• Focusing on preventative and early intervention
  services for children, young people and families
• Ensuring that joint commissioning agreements
  between the PCTs and KCC are in place and
  regularly reviewed to improve health outcomes
• Ensuring that mainstream and additional funds are
  used to improve outcomes for children, families
  and young people and provide value for money
• Maintaining excellent relationships with
  providers including schools, hospital and
  community health services, the criminal justice
  system, youth services and the voluntary and
  community sector
• Taking account of the requirements of central
  government and responding to external review and
  inspection

(The Kent Childrens Trust Partnership Agreement
2008)
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KCT working through 23 Local Childrens Services
Partnerships

• Decision making at the most local level that is
  consistent with excellent performance (outcomes
  for children), value for money (quality and
  infrastructure) and within the strategic
  framework established by the Kent Children and
  Young Peoples Plan
• The Trust is committed to supporting a strong
  network of LCSPs and partners will ensure their
  agency is actively engaged at the locality level
• The KCT will work closely with the LCSPs and
  agree the Local Children and Young Peoples Plans
  to ensure outcomes improve for local children
  within the framework of the Kent children and
  Young Peoples Plan
• Strong performance management arrangements will
  ensure clear reporting to and from the Trust to
  Local Childrens Services Partnerships

(The Kent Childrens Trust Partnership Agreement
2008)
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Local Childrens Services Partnerships
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LCSP Arrangements for Team and Integrated
Working Preferred Model for Phase 1 development
from September 2008
LCSP Partnership Board (the local commissioning
group)
LCSP Manager
8 13 Team Leader
0-7 Team Leader
14-19/24 Team Leader
Existing cluster team members for example EWO
Existing cluster team members for example Early
Years SENCO
Existing cluster team members for example
Specialist Teacher
Proposed additional deployment from September
2008 for example Social Work Assistants
Proposed additional deployment from September
2008 for example Primary Excellence Project
Headteacher
Integrated working with partnership staff for
example CAMHS Primary Mental Health Workers /
District Community Development Managers
Integrated working with partnership staff for
example Health Visitors
LCSP Support Team Administration, Finance
Project Support

• Notes
• A preferred model for discussion NOT yet agreed
• Based on phases of childhood adolescence
  following the National Childrens Plan
• Team Leaders drawn from existing team members
  NOT a new post
• Team structure providing support for day to day
  deployment and line management but NOT
  restricting integrated working across and within
  teams
• Certain posts will be located in a team for line
  management but will operate across all age ranges
  for example Extended Schools Development Manager

G\ Trust Arrangements\LCSP General\LCSP
Structures\Kent Childrens Trust LCSP Preferred
Model March 2008
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The Local Childrens Services Partnership
Pathfinders

• Pathfinder LCSPs were set up in
• Maidstone 2
• Tunbridge Wells
• Rural Shepway and Shepway 1
• An independent review found that the Pathfinders
  had made a major contribution to the future
  partnership arrangements by committing themselves
  and the resources at their disposal to developing
  new ways of working together that will benefit
  children, young people and their families in
  their local areas
• The evaluation has reflected a genuine learning
  process, enabling us to learn from what has gone
  well and less well

Sharing the Learning from the Pathfinder Journey
(Endersby) 2008)
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National Workforce Development

• The vision for the Childrens Workforce
• World Class, personalised and integrated services
  need to be available to every child
• The culture change needed to support further
  development of integrated and personalised
  delivery of services should not dilute the
  specialist skills and knowledge, or focus of any
  of the people who are coming together to deliver
  the services
• We need to ensure that people have a strong
  understanding of their roles and
  responsibilities, so that by working together as
  a team, people from different parts of the
  workforce can achieve more with individual
  children and their families than they would be
  able to do working on their own

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The core and wider childrens workforce everyone
who works with children and young people and
their families or who is responsible for their
outcomes
Building Brighter Futures Next Steps for the
Childrens Workforce, DCSF, 2008
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National Workforce Development

• Schools
• Increased investment in the quality and the
  diversity of the school workforce
• A new generation of school leaders
• Developing world class skills
• Social Work
• Various initiatives to attract trainee social
  workers
• Pilot a framework for professional development
• Test approaches to re-model roles and practices
• Attract more people into foster caring and
  further improve the support provided
• Explore the value of a social pedagogic approach
  in childrens homes and consider the development
  needs of residential care workers

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National Workforce Development

• Early Years
• Continue to up-skill and professionalise the
  early years workforce focusing primarily on the
  private, voluntary and independent sector
• Improve the youth workforce in line with Aiming
  High for Young People through improved
  leadership and management, recruitment and
  continuous professional development
• Review the youth justice workforce and those
  working in other agencies supporting youth
  offenders and those at risk of offending
• Health
• The Next Steps Review is considering how health
  and social care will be delivered over the next
  10 years and beyond
• Another stream is looking at the need for a
  flexible workforce which puts the patient at the
  centre of care
• Updating the framework for Children, Families and
  Maternity Services to that it better reflects
  Childrens Services

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How are we doing?
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Joint Area Review
4 outstanding 3 good 2 adequate 1
inadequate
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Joint Area Review

• Main Findings
• Multi agency child protection work is good, with
  well managed and in some instances innovative
  services
• Early intervention and preventative services has
  significantly reduced the number of children
  being referred allowing social care services to
  focus on identifying and work with those most at
  risk of harm
• CAMHS, though strengthening, still have areas to
  be developed
• Effective action has resulted in the majority of
  looked after children living successfully in
  stable and excellent quality family placements
• KCC has demonstrated commitment to maximising the
  life chances of LACs through the Pledge
• Too few benefit from annual health assessments
• GCSE results have significantly improved
• Specialist services for UASC are culturally
  sensitive and effective
• Strategic direction for services to support
  children and young people with learning
  difficulties and/or disabilities is good
• Strong commitment to change programme
• Multi-agency working in assessing needs and
  planning and reviewing provision is good with
  effective focus on early identification and
  intervention
• Good information for parents about education but
  less so for other services

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Joint Area Review

• Main Findings
• Services to reduce teenage conception rates and
  improve the sexual health of children and young
  people are adequate overall
• Provision of sexual health education has improved
  and there is good support to young parents
• Robust, up to date information is needed to
  assess the impact of provision and target
  resources
• Partners have successfully focused attention on
  underachieving and vulnerable groups and have
  narrowed the participation and attainment gaps at
  ages 16 and 19. Clear strategic objectives,
  strong local planning structures and good, local
  and flexible implementation plans are in place as
  part of a strong overall 14-19 strategy
• Service management is outstanding overall, with
  strong leadership across the partnership, clear
  political direction and a transformation agenda
  that is well understood across the partnership
  and drives the work of an enthusiastic and
  skilled multi-disciplinary workforce
• The capacity to improve is also outstanding. A
  clear vision is supported by appropriate
  priorities for the future and there has been an
  impressive track record of effectively dealing
  with problems whilst maintain good or better
  value for money. There is clear evidence of
  being able to deliver a range of well-managed and
  quality assured service improvements.

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Joint Area Review Recommendations

• Immediate action
• The local partnership should
• Disseminate the report findings to children and
  young people in the area
• Ensure that all eligible young people have a
  Pathway Plan that is regularly reviewed
• Health partners should
• Improve IT infrastructure and data collection to
  enable continuous assessment of performance and
  early recognition of variations in teenage
  conception rates and sexual health data so that
  services can be more effectively targeted
• Avoid young people in need of in-patient mental
  health services being admitted to adult
  psychiatric wards.

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Joint Area Review - Recommendations

• Action over the next six months
• Health partners should
• Commence work to ensure that there is sufficient
  and accessible specialist CAMHS provision for
  children and young people with learning
  difficulties and/or disabilities
• Other areas for development
• The provision of lead worker/professional for
  some families
• Improved timescales to secure housing adaptations
  for children with learning difficulties and/or
  disabilities and improvement publicity concerning
  entitlements in such respects
• Improved quality of accommodation and resources
  in alternative education centres
• Improve the quality of accommodation for care
  leavers
• Improve the consistency of leisure and recreation
  provision for children and young people with LDD
  and take further action to tackle transport and
  cost barriers

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So what will the framework for Trusts look like?

• It wont just be for Trusts. It will make a
  reality of Local Governments power of
  well-being, influence and inform the whole of
  economic, environmental and social policy
• Centre around concept of learned optimism which
  will pervade all multi-disciplinary training. It
  will challenge the nature of professions and lead
  to a new meta language for action not explanation
• It will provide a new language of discourse that
  bridges the gap between the casual and the formal
• It will inform the development of Childrens
  Centres so that children never lose their
  curiosity

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So what will the framework for Trusts look like?

• It will inform teachers views of themselves as
  role models, the norms they portray and predicate
  school organisation
• It will be centred on family learning seeking the
  positive influence of parents on children and
  children on parents
• The crucial need for cognitive development and
  emotional stability will be central to the
  commissioning framework
• It will provide mechanisms that deal with or
  influence both income and physical conditions.
  For example
• Nutrition
• Housing
• It will define strategies to prevent progression
  into the criminal justice system not use it

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So what will the framework for Trusts look like?

• It will provide and use information and data for
  individuals, communities and the services that
  support them
• It will induce capability and resilience in both
  individuals and communities
• It will be outcome driven
• Immediacy will be the key component and all
  agencies will do simple things well
• Its success will be judged by the community
  served who will have a voice in both
  commissioning and decommissioning of services

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What else can we do?

• What are the simple things we can do? For
  example
• Every school in a deprived area to run a
  breakfast club
• Every Childrens Services professional to take a
  family approach and be alert to the signs of
  distress
• Avoid inadvertent segregation eg every school to
  have a clear policy re affordability of uniform,
  school trips etc.
• Major function in signposting/directing to
  support and helping families to access benefits
• Helping families to use their funds effectively
• Debt counselling and dissuade families from
  getting credit at high interest rates
• Ensure that PSHE includes the Hidden Rules to
  ensure young people can escape poverty
• Promote healthy living especially the benefits of
  a balanced diet

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Moving Forward

• Next steps
• How can you help to make the Kent Childrens
  Trust vision a reality at a local level?
• What needs to change within the team in which you
  work?
• How can you contribute to the Local Children and
  Young Peoples Plan?
• What else do you need to know? Who else do you
  need to talk to?

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• The Green Belt is a Labour initiative and we
  intend to build on it.
• (John Prescott)