Agenda item

Report of the Cabinet Member for Children & Young People

The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People shared the local Authorities (LA’s) recognition that Early Help is more effective in promoting the welfare of children than a reactive approach to services. As part of Working Together to Safeguard Children (2018), Early Help was identified as “providing support as soon as a problem emerges, at any point in a child’s life, from the foundation years through to the teenage years.” Effective early help relied upon local organisations and agencies working together to: identify children and families who would benefit from early help; undertake an assessment of the need for early help; and provide targeted early help services to address the assessed needs of a child and their family which focused on activity to improve the outcomes for the child.

As part of the LA’s responsibility to promote interagency working and co-operation to improve the welfare of all children, a partnership strategy was being produced. Whilst Staffordshire has had an Early Help Strategy since 2015, a new version was being developed in partnership to meet the needs of local families and take account of local and national changes. Families’ feedback and views on the effectiveness of Early Help had been instrumental in helping develop this new strategy, with the strategy being refreshed through the Early Help Operational Group.

Members considered the draft joint Early Help Strategy, noting that the intention was to work more effectively together, avoiding agencies taking different approaches to early help and providing one coordinated response.

Whilst being encouraged by the strategy, Members raised concerns that its success was dependent on effective working together across partner agencies and queried how confident Officers were in achieving this. During Covid some communications between agencies had been adversely affected. However, it was an aspiration of the Family Hub model to ensure a single point of contact to simplify access to services and support. Although it was early in the process partners appeared to be positive about the proposed approach and the improvements this would make for families in their navigation of  services.

Members noted that 26% of Staffordshire children did not reach the expected levels of development across all Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) indicators, asking whether these children were waiting too long for the support they needed. 1 in 4 children not being school ready showed there was more work to be done to address this, however the figure had been 50% four years ago, evidencing the improvements that had been made through work with nurseries and other providers.

Last year should have been the first set of Year 6 SATs taken by a cohort of children who had received early help initiatives and it had been hoped that this would have demonstrated the level of success achieved through early help initiatives. Unfortunately, due to Covid these exams had not been taken and therefore it was not possible to use this as an evaluation of improvements made.

Staffordshire had a good network of Children’s Centres which would form part of the Family Hub developments. The Committee were heartened that nationally Staffordshire were in the top quartile for children meeting their EYFS indicators, however there remained more work to be done. It was also important to acknowledge that for pre-school children the work was often with parents and carers to help them understand how best to support their child’s development. The Hungry Little Minds initiative was shared as an example of work with parents and families, where parents signed up for emails which gave simple but important advice to help them support their child’s development.

The Committee had some concerns around how those in need of support were identified. Staffordshire had a data base that included a range of 70 different indicators, including detail from external partners, which helped to build a composite picture of the family. This had been used during the pandemic to help identify those families that might need greater support and allowed a more proactive and targeted response. This data could also be used to produce a predictive analysis report which helped highlight those children in need of support.

Members asked whether there was evidence that families might regard early intervention support as “interfering”. Some families assumed that there was an element of judgement to support services, but officers worked hard to overcome for this, with examples of the range of this work shared with the Committee.

Good communication was vital to this work, and this would be addressed as part of the delivery and implementation plan. This work was iterative as the support structures, partners and staff within them constantly changed. However, the Strategy would form the guiding light to help show the agreed direction of travel, the implementation plan being crucial to its effective delivery, as was the continual development of effective communications.

Members noted the importance of good relationships between those involved in Early Help and stressed the importance of face-to-face meetings in developing these.

Within the Strategy percentage figures for children were given around a range of indicators, such as being a young carer, achievements at school or being obese. Members suggested it would be useful to have an indication of the number of children who would appear across multiple indicators.

The Committee congratulated Officers and the Cabinet Member on the strategy development. Because Early Help was so important they suggested that, once the final strategy was available, all Members of the Council should receive training and/or a briefing on this initiative.

RESOLVED: That the new joint Early Help Strategy be welcomed and the Committee’s feedback help inform the strategies development.