Keeping the Promise- Support for Families Children and Young People - Update
North Lanarkshire Council · 13 September 2022
Back to Education, Children and Families Committee — 13 September 2022 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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North Lanarkshire Council Report Education, Children and Families Committee Does this report require to be approved? ☒ Yes ☐ No Ref AG/AH Date 13/09/22 P080.1 Keeping the Promise: Support for Families, Children and Young People - Update From Alison Gordon, Head of Children, Families and Justice/CSWO Email gordonal@northlan.go.uk Telephone 01698 332001 Executive Summary High quality whole family support, which recognises and mitigates the impact of poverty and adversity, is fundamental to supporting all children and young people achieve their potential in line with the ambitions of the Plan for North Lanarkshire. It is also fundamental to the delivery of the Promise. The Council and its partners are ambitious in working together to create more flexible, wrap around, cohesive and integrated support for families to ensure that every family who needs support gets the right support at the right time and to fulfil children’s rights to be raised safely in their own families, wherever possible. This report provides an update to committee on four specific strands of this work supporting our wider ambition: 1. Family Group Decision Making 2. Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Support and Services Framework (CMHWB Framework) 3. Investment in family engagement workers 4. Whole Family Wellbeing Fund Family Group Decision Making and the services delivered through the CMHWB Framework are successfully improving outcomes for children by engaging with families in strengths-based and trauma-informed ways of working and this report provides an overview of the impacts of these services and how we are enhancing provision to prevent children requiring more formal interventions. Additionally, the report provides information on investment the service is making in family support and local planning with the respect to Whole Family Wellbeing Fund, a Scottish Government initiative to support the strengthening of family support nationally in line with their commitment to keep the Promise.
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1. Background 1.1 As highlighted in reports to the previous Education and Families Committee, The Promise is an ambitious call to recalibrate and transform whole systems and culture to ensure all children enjoy nurturing and loving relationships in which to thrive. The Promise therefore places prevention and family support at the heart of its vision of care and support in which as many children and young people as possible can achieve their potential within their own families. 1.2 The Promise Plan 21-24 published on 31st March 2021 sets out 5 key priorities for the first phase of this programme including a focus on ‘Whole Family Support’ with an expectation that the 10 key principles of family support outlined within the Promise are embedded into practice by 2024 and that there is a place in every community for families with children ‘to stay and play with their children and get support and advice’. This aligns closely with the aspirations of the Plan for North Lanarkshire and in particular plans to develop community hubs as a central vehicle to both delver support and to enhance community capacity and to support all of our children reach their potential. 1.3 In parallel to other developments to address the mental health and wellbeing needs of children and young people through additional investment in CAMHS services and school counselling, the Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Board, jointly chaired by COSLA and Scottish Government, has overseen the development of a Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Support and Services Framework. This Framework has a complementary focus on early support for children and young people within the context of their families and communities. This shares the aspirations of the Promise, focusing on co-production and support which is accessible where and when children, young people and their families need this most. 1.4 Previous reports to committee have provided information on the review of intensive family support service provided through social work and subsequent improvement activity including the expansion of out of hours support, as well as our use of small direct budgets for families to provide tailored, early and accessible support to address pressures associated with the pandemic. In May 2021 we also reported on our intention to expand Family Group Decision Making and the planned use of the CMHWB Framework monies to expand early support for mental health and wellbeing including through neuro-developmental family link workers and the development of cluster-based Recommendations It is recommended that the Education, Children and Families Committee: 1) Endorse the developments activity outlined in this report and the next steps as set out in section 2. 2) Endorse the plans outlined in paragraphs 2.16 – 2.21 to take forward planning for the use of the North Lanarkshire allocation of monies under The Whole Family Wellbeing Fund. The Plan for North Lanarkshire Priority Support all children and young people to realise their full potential Ambition statement (9) Invest in early interventions, positive transitions, and preventative approaches to improve outcomes for children and young people
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support in partnership with the community and voluntary sector. Progress and early evaluation of the impact of these developments is outlined below as are the opportunities created through the new national Whole Family Wellbeing Fund. 2. Report Family Group Decision Making 2.1 Family Group Decision Making (FGDM) is a strength-based way of working which takes a structured approach to involving wider family and support network in decision making and planning for children and families. It is rights-based and aligned with the principles of UNCRC. Research in Scotland has found very good outcomes associated with this approach in reducing the risk of accommodation (Mitchell et al, 2018). As such FGDM is a key component of North Lanarkshire’s commitment to keep The Promise by supporting and nurturing relationships within families and preventing the accommodation of children wherever possible. 2.2 Previously committee was advised of the intention to increase capacity for FGDM. From January 2022, the Family Group Decision Making team now comprises one permanent and four temporary social workers based within intensive services and funded both through realignment of resources and external funding from the Promise Partnership Fund. 2.3 Over the year July 2020 to end of June 2021, the FGDM service has begun to make considerable progress in successfully supporting children remain within, or return to, their families. Family meetings have achieved the following outcomes: • 18 children referred as at risk of coming into residential or foster care have successfully remained living with parents or family members; • 9 children in foster care have returned to live with parents or other family members; • 6 babies whose names were placed on the Child Protection Register pre-birth as at potential risk of significant harm have been supported to remain safely in the care of their parents post birth. 2.4 Most importantly family meetings have enabled children to benefit from loving and safe relationships within their families. The service also estimates that the FGDM approach may have avoided costs of circa £991,000 based on the number children above moving out of care or remaining with their families, over a 12-month period. Next Steps 2.5 Two of the posts are funded from a successful bid the service made to The Promise Partnership Fund to deliver Life Long Links; a specific use of family group decision making for care experienced young people to maintain relationships, or re-connect, with people in their kin and social networks. This approach addresses the critique of The Promise that too often the care system has failed to work effectively with families when children enter care, or when they leave care as young adults, leaving young people without positive informal support networks to fall back on economically and emotionally. Following successful completion of the required training, the two social workers have now started working with care experienced young people to find and (re)establish contact with significant people through the FGDM approach. A further application is being prepared to secure Promise funding to continue this service into 23/24.
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2.6 Given the benefits to children and young people and the additional cost/benefits to the council, further work will be undertaken on potential budget solutions within available resources to secure the ongoing funding of the FGDM service. This aligns with the council’s involvement in wider work with the Promise nationally on Human and Economic Cost Modelling (HECM), intended to support a rebalancing of spend towards effective early support. Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Support and Services Framework 2.7 Following the publication of the Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Support and Services framework (CMHWB Framework) noted in paragraph 1.3, North Lanarkshire was awarded £938K for 21/22 to deliver the aims of the framework. This money has been awarded again for 22/23. Supporting children’s mental health and wellbeing is inextricably linked to supporting families holistically and planning to use these new monies has been made with reference to priorities set out in the Children’s Services Plan and to advance the ambitions of early intervention and prevention to support children and their families. The Framework therefore complements and enhances supports to children made available through schools as part of their commitments to promote health and wellbeing and core family support provided by the social work service and CLD. 2.8 Between January and June 2022, 2,224 children and young people accessed support through the Framework to help meet their emotional wellbeing needs. Anxiety was the most frequently reported concern, affecting nearly half of the young people using the supports. This aligns with the findings of the large-scale Strengths and Difficulties (SDQ) questionnaire conducted across schools in 2021 and mirrors the most commonly reported reasons for young people accessing schools’ counselling. 2.9 A range of services have been developed and offered to children, young people and families, in line with the principles of the Framework. In summary the services include: • Let’s Introduce Anxiety Management (LIAM) – support for children and young people experiencing anxiety delivered by Educational Psychologists • Increased support to care experienced young people at evening and weekends delivered by social work intensive services. The number of care experienced young people aged between 16 and 26 in contact with and supported by services has increased by a third over the past year through the introduction of this enhancement to the service. • An enhancement to Living Life to the Full (LTTF) to enhance reach to care experienced young people; BAME young people, young people with disabilities and LGBT young people. This course is delivered by CLD to help young people work out why they feel the way they do and make helpful changes. The positive impacts of this are summarised on the attached link Sway (office.com). • Family link workers providing early support to families where children are affected by neurodevelopmental difficulties and one family support worker based in the Dalziel and Braidhurst clusters who is piloting an approach with local GPs to provide earlier intervention, preventing the need for a referral to CAMHS. 2.10 In addition to the supports noted above and building on the Community Solutions Model developed in Health and Social Care and the empowering cluster model, schools and community and voluntary (CVS) organisations facilitated through VANL (Voluntary Action North Lanarkshire) have worked together on tailored supports informed by local needs analysis. This approach has been developed and strengthened through a second phase with a stronger emphasis on (1) co-production with families; (2) practical
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and emotional family support and (3) the service priorities of addressing anxiety and related school attendance issues through holistic engagement with families. Over the period January to June 2022 1,811 children and 654 families have received support across 11 school clusters. The following illustrates the breadth and variety of projects: • One parent families – ‘Creating Connections’: To support single parent families to maintain and improve their family health and well-being, develop skills, awareness, and confidence, address the impact of living in poverty and gain equal access to local resources and services. • A-Jab Fitness & Emotional Support- ‘A-jabs boxing for better mental health’: To support young people experiencing attendance difficulties and in conflict with the law to explore emotions and how these can impact their actions. • HomeStart- ‘Practical Steps Towards Change’: to provide emotional support, friendship and practical help to parents and carers of children at the P1-P3 stage who are experiencing difficulties engaging or re-engaging with their primary school post- pandemic. • Lanarkshire Community Food & Health Partnership- ‘Big Chef Little Chef’ • VIP- ‘Creative Transitions Project’: to re-engage young people in education through creative activities such as music, dance, gardening and exercise. Next Steps 2.11 The approach to using the Framework to develop local supports through Empowering Clusters will be expanded across all 23 school clusters in North Lanarkshire in the school session 22/23. Local need, the evaluation of supports in the previous session and the service priority of whole family support will direct the shape of these supports. 2.12 A key component of the Framework is to provide support that is accessible to young people and which they can access without gatekeeping or referral systems. The partnership is therefore also in process of procuring an online support service for young people which will provide advice, support and assistance within a safe clinical and care governance framework. Further Developments 2.13 Supporting children and young people attend school and engage in their learning through positive relationships is a priority for the service. The issues that impact on school attendance, compounded by the pandemic, are multifaceted and require bespoke and targeted support. The service is therefore investing, through Scottish Attainment Challenge funding, in 18 family engagement workers to add capacity to the Empowering Clusters and ASN establishments to work with families to identify and address the barriers to school attendance. 2.14 Almost 1 in 3 adults in Scotland say they have been negatively affected by the drug or alcohol use of someone they know. In North Lanarkshire, the number of drug deaths has fallen overall in the previous two years, however, deaths per 100,000 population in both 15-24 (15 North Lanarkshire, 10.3 Scotland) and 25-34 (41.8 North Lanarkshire, 29.3 Scotland) age groups were higher than the national averages between 2017 and 2021. This is a particular concern as parents of young children feature highly in these age groups. Working alongside partners to support families holistically when impacted by drug use is therefore a further priority for the service and we have been successful in securing additional monies through National Drugs Mission Fund, matched by the Council, to create 6 family engagement
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workers within early years, to provide holistic and preventative support to families with young children impacted by drug use. 2.15 Recruitment of all these additional posts is in process and the committee will be updated on the impact of this investment in due course. These investments are part of our wider approach to family support using strengths-based working, in an integrated way with partners, to ensure a family support approach meets need flexibly 7 days a week in line with The Promise. Whole Family Support Fund 2.16 As a key part of its commitment to keep The Promise, The Scottish Government’s 2021- 22 Programme for Government committed to investing £500 million of Whole Family Wellbeing Funding (WFWF) over the lifetime of the Parliament to support the development of holistic whole family support services. It also sets out the ambition that by 2030, at least 5% of community-based health and social care spend should be going towards preventative whole family support measures. This commitment aligns well with the Plan for North Lanarkshire and the Council’s own pledge to keep The Promise made in August 2020. 2.17 In July 2022, the Scottish Government announced its allocation of ‘Tranche 1’ of the WFWF for Children’s Services Planning Partnerships. The aim of the fund is to transform the way family support is delivered by ensuring families can access seamless and holistic support that is wrapped around their individual needs, and crucially prevent needs escalating to the point that child may become looked after. North Lanarkshire has received a grant of £2.351 million for 22/23 to be overseen through the governance of the Children’s Services Partnership (CSP). 2.18 Within the CSP, and as reflected above work is already underway towards fulfilling the commitment to delivering family support in line with 10 Principles of Family Support set out in The Promise: Whole Family Support - The Promise. We plan to use this ‘Tranche 1’ investment to more radically transform the current system and to improve access to support. Through our strategic needs analysis, we know that families do not always access such support universally and early on before problems become more challenging. This is borne out by child protection referral rates to social work increasing while there has been a steady decline in the numbers of children whose names are placed on the child protection register. We also know that families still need to navigate different systems to get the holistic support they need. Our intention is to focus investment on addressing this gap so that at universal level families know who to reach out to for advice and support and at additional and intensive levels the right wrap around support is mobilised seamlessly. This will be done in alignment with our approach to refreshing GIRFEC in North Lanarkshire. 2.19 It is envisaged that Tranche 1 work will involve a focus on the following areas that seek to improve accessibility, integrated service delivery and person-centred approaches: • Universal offer of support 7 days a week provided in different ways • Greater flexibility about when and how support is delivered to maximise choice and control for families • A whole family approach by joining up and bringing to families support that addresses fundamental needs such financial advice and help and employability by harnessing and improving access to existing expertise within our services.
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2.20 The planned phased roll out of community hubs provides the ability to introduce a small number of ‘test of change HUBs’ in our communities that introduce a new approach to family support in the coming 12-24 months connecting services locally and co-locating existing services to improve access to family support. 2.21 As referenced in 2.6 above, North Lanarkshire is one of three local authorities/partnerships in Scotland chosen to work with the Promise Team at national level to work on the human and economic cost of modelling of care in order to achieve the strategic shift in investment to relationship-based and preventative support for children and families; a direction of travel which aligns well with the Plan for North Lanarkshire. The data and evidence from this work will inform how investments made with Tranche 1 monies can be sustained in the longer term as support and resources are moved upstream. We therefore see both these programmes as mutually beneficial in testing whole system change. 3. Measures of success 3.1 Reduction in the numbers of children becoming looked after and accommodated 3.2 Children and young people have strong and trusting relationships 3.3 Children and young people feel safe and supported in their own family and community 4. Supporting documentation 4.1 The Promise Plan, March 2021 https://thepromise.scot/plan-21-24/ 4.2 Community Mental health and Wellbeing Supports and Services Framework Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Supports and Services Framework (www.gov.scot) Alison Gordon Head of Children, Families and Justice Social Work /Chief Social Work Officer
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5. Impacts ( http://connect/report-template-guidance ) 5.1 Public Sector Equality Duty and Fairer Scotland Duty Does the report contain information that has an impact as a result of the Public Sector Equality Duty and/or Fairer Scotland Duty? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? If Yes, has an assessment been carried out and published on the council’s website? https://www.northlanarkshire.gov.uk/your-community/equalities/equality-and-fairer- scotland-duty-impact-assessments Yes ☐ No ☐ r Financial impact Does the report contain any financial impacts? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, have all relevant financial impacts have been discussed and agreed with Financial Solutions? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Family Group Decision Making: x1 post is permanently in the establishment; x2 posts are funded through realignment of existing resources temporarily; and x2 posts funded through a grant of £100,000 from The Promise Partnership for 22/23 As noted above funding for new Family Engagement Workers posts has been drawn from SAC funding whilst Family Link Work posts in Early Years are joint funded through National Drug Mission Monies and EY funding. Both of these initiatives are currently funded on a temporary basis and therefore continuation will be subject to both evaluation and the availability of funds. Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Framework (CMHWB Framework) initiatives are supported by a Scottish Government Grant to Children’s Services Planning Partnership via the local authority of £938,000 in 21/22 and again in 22/23. Whole Family Wellbeing Fund: Scottish of Government grant to the CSPP via the local authority of £2,351,000 for 22/23. It is anticipated that further recurring monies will be made available for the duration of this parliament and the service has asked the Government for clarity about levels of funding for parliamentary term to assist with planning, recruitment and retention of staff linked to family support. The governance for CMHWB Framework and WFWF sits within the Children’s Services Partnership Board. Responsibility to ensure funds are allocated in line with the aims of the partnership lies with the Board. While these grants represent a welcome and significant investment in family support, planning for this investment is in contrast to the wider resource pressures/savings requirements within core budgets. There is a risk, therefore, that changes and enhancements to service provision are not sustained, particularly in the context of increasing need as families face greater financial difficulties. 5.3 HR policy impact Does the report contain any HR policy or procedure impacts? Yes ☐ No ☒
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If Yes, have all relevant HR impacts have been discussed and agreed with People and Organisational Development? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? 5.4 Legal impact Does the report contain any legal impacts (such as general legal matters, statutory considerations (including employment law considerations), or new legislation)? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, have all relevant legal impacts have been discussed and agreed with Legal and Democratic Solutions? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? 5.5 Data protection impact Does the report / project / practice contain or involve the processing of personal data? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, is the processing of this personal data likely to result in a high risk to the data subject? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, has a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) been carried out and e- mailed to dataprotection@northlan.gov.uk. Yes ☐ No ☐ 5.6 Technology / Digital impact Does the report contain information that has an impact on either technology, digital transformation, service redesign / business change processes, data management, or connectivity / broadband / Wi-Fi? Yes ☐ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Where the impact identifies a requirement for technology, has an assessment been carried out (or scheduled) by the Enterprise Architecture Governance Group (EAGG)? Yes ☐ No ☒ 5.7 Environmental / Carbon impact Does the report / project / practice contain information that has an impact on any environmental or carbon matters? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? 5.8 Communications impact Does the report contain any information that has an impact on the council’s communications activities? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? 5. Risk impact Is there a risk impact? Yes ☒ No ☐
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If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the key risks and potential impacts, highlighting where the risk(s) are assessed and recorded (e.g. Corporate or Service or Project Risk Registers), and how they are managed? There are risks to outcomes for children and young people and to the reputation of the council if action is not taken to strengthen family support. There are also financial risks associated with a growth in the number of children experiencing formal care, should there be an insufficient focus on providing high quality and flexible intensive support and effective early intervention. Most initiatives described in this report are funded through temporary funding streams and there remains therefore challenges re sustainability should underlying need within the community grow or they be unsuccessful in shifting the balance of care towards early intervention,