Coventry Safeguarding Children Board Newsletter

Coventry Safeguarding Children Board
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Chair's welcome

janet

We were lucky enough to hold our last LSCB meeting at Sherbourne Fields Special School, an Ofsted badged outstanding school for children and young people with a range of disabilities.  A small group of very articulate pupils talked to the Board about their school, their hopes and their fears.  They were so clear and so impressive that we subsequently asked them whether they would agree to be young safeguarding advisers to the Board.  I am delighted to say that they accepted. Their first project will be to advise University Hospital Coventry and Warwickshire on how to improve the hospital environment so that it is more accessible and welcoming for children and young people with disabilities.

Janet Mokades

Independent Chair, Coventry Safeguarding Children Board

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Someone that sticks: A challenge to services

The LSCB has spent over a year listening to the views of children and young people.  It has asked them what makes them feel safe and happy.  A key theme that has emerged is the need for consistency and continuity in worker or service.

Young people have told us how upsetting it is when they have created a bond or a good working relationship which is then disrupted. Having strong and trusting relationships with staff is key to young people sharing information about their life and needs and being willing to accept help accessing other services.

There are different types of disruption, for example, for looked after children a placement change or a change in worker can result in changes to their home.  For other children, changes in education such as school attended can result in needing to get to know new friends and staff.  Some young people and their families have told us that they have experienced workers moving on, and have not been informed of the change or because they were no longer eligible for a service (due to age or location) they could not keep a preferred worker. 

We have heard about the good work that goes on and the difference this makes to children and young people.  A parent told us about the role of the worker in the Family Nurse Partnership that had enabled her to be a better mum and leave a relationship where she experienced domestic violence.  Secondary school age children showed us the way that school staff had been a constant in their lives, and cared for them, supporting them through difficult home circumstances.  A young mum brought her baby to the LSCB with her dedicated midwife, and she explained the power of having a person just for her – that knew her and she could call when she needed to.  Parents told us how the bringing together of services in a Children’s Centre, as part of Acting Early had helped them understand the importance of bonding with their baby.

We know that workers value the relationships they build with children and families.  However, the systems in which they work sometimes do not allow them to continue to work with a young person.  Sometimes, this is will be the right thing, as part of a young person’s recovery is moving on to another worker or service.  Most times though, children, young people and their families benefit from continuity and consistency.

The LSCB believes that all services should consider the structures they have in place, and how they impact on the experience of children and families.  They should do all they can to minimise changes in workers wherever and whenever possible.  Where they are unavoidable a managed handover is important.  This might be between agencies or within organisations.   Ideally, there should be face to face to handover meetings but if this is not possible, electronic or written handovers should be completed.  These are things that can be done now.

In an ideal world, all the services that help to safeguard children would be thinking about whether they could do things differently in order to guarantee that vulnerable children and young people get the continuing support of one committed person for as long as they need it.  Because they have told us that this is what they want and that this is what works. This is our challenge to services; can you start thinking about how you might do this in the future?

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Support for faith organisations around their safeguarding responsibilities

Faith organisations have an important role in safeguarding children and supporting families and like all organisations that work with children they need to have appropriate arrangements in place to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. Safeguarding Children Boards have a role in engaging and supporting faith organisations around this work. (Working Together to Safeguard Children 2015)  

A project has been started between Coventry Safeguarding Children Board and Coventry Muslim Forum to support the Forum around their safeguarding responsibilities. There are 24 Madrasahs in the Forum where children are taught about the Islamic Faith.

Support is being given around safeguarding policies and procedures including safer recruitment practice.

Support is also being given to ensure that all appropriate staff receive Level 1 safeguarding training. A number of Designated Safeguarding Leads have completed a Train the Trainer course and work is now being done to develop the training session. Support will be given around delivery and there will be on-going liaison and reviews to ensure that the training is kept up to date and there is feedback on the numbers of staff trained.

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Preventing extremism

The LSCB have recently reviewed their response to the Prevent Duty, which was introduced last summer and which requires public bodies to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. The Duty complements statutory safeguarding guidance and is intended to help schools, childcare providers, local authorities, health bodies and others to think about what they can do to protect children from the risk of radicalisation and how to access support to do this. At its core, the Duty states “Safeguarding vulnerable people from radicalisation is no different from safeguarding them from other forms of harm”.

Key aspects of the Duty are:-

  • To ensure that those working with children and young people understand the risk of radicalisation, and recognise vulnerabilities that might lead people towards extremism.
  • To be aware of how to share concerns and what support might be available to respond to vulnerability.
  • To recognise the key role of the LSCB’s in promoting partnership working, for example through sharing information and effective multi-agency responses.
  • To be aware of the work of the Channel Panel – the multi-agency group which focuses on providing support at an early stage to people identified as being vulnerable to being drawn to terrorism. 
  • For local partners to build the resilience of young people to extremism, for example encourage awareness of on-line safety and appreciation of fundamental British values.

The LSCB have agreed to hold a joint event together with the Safeguarding Adults Board to look at how to safeguard against radicalisation, this will be held on 20 April, at Lyng Hall School. If you want to find out more about Prevent, training opportunities, or if you have any concerns regarding this agenda then contact Geoff Thomas, Prevent Co-ordinator, Coventry Safeguarding Board tel 024 7683 1437 Geoff.Thomas@coventry.gov.uk.

A really helpful website with materials and guidance for support to children and young people has been provided by the Department for Education – Educate Against Hate.

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Public Health update

publichealth

Overall our ambition is to ensure that the services we commission form part of a whole system and citywide approach to improving outcomes for children. The emphasis is very much on early intervention and prevention as part of the overall Early Help offer in the city.

This means commissioning and delivering services in a different way. Our main vehicle for this work has been our Acting Early model.

We have recently successfully rolled out our 0- 5 years strand city wide. Work has already started on developing the Acting Early model for primary and secondary aged children in partnership with schools and other stakeholders.  We are working in partnership with 4 secondary schools in the North East of the City (Lyng Hall, Cardinal Wiseman, Grace Academy and Foxford) in developing this model and testing out new ways of working including place based integrated teams.

The vision is to have a fully integrated 0-19yrs+ model for the city in place over the next few years.

Commissioning of services for children and young people

The responsibility for commissioning a number of services for children and young people has now transferred to the Local Authority. As of 1 October 2015 these now include Health Visiting and the Family Nurse Partnership programme.

Health Visiting has seen a significant growth of the work force over the past 4 years.  The Prime Minister’s ‘Call to Action’ has seen Coventry increase from 25wte to 82wte.  We are working with our provider CWPT to ensure that this resource makes a measurable impact in terms of improving the outcomes for children.

We are supporting Grapevine in developing a Parent Leadership programme, that we hope will be a valuable resource for early years services in hearing the parent’s voice and engaging them to help shape service provision.

We recently, successfully re-tendered the School Nursing service with a new specification. The new service starts on 1 April 2016 and will be delivered by the South Warwickshire NHS Foundation Trust

Public Health is now part of the People Directorate in the City Council and we are working hard with colleagues in Childrens and Education in supporting and developing the Early Help offer in collaboration with wider stakeholders.

John Forde

Consultant in Public Health

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Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO)

LADO
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Sherbourne Fields

sherbourne

We would like to thank Sherbourne Fields School for recently hosting our board meeting. In addition to having a tour of the school, three members of the Student Council presented their views and concerns to the board and shared the following video:

Student Voice at Sherbourne Fields

 

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Latest LSCB Updates

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For all the latest Coventry LSCB updates follow us on our Twitter account @coventryLSCB.

Please also visit our website www.coventry.gov.uk/lscb.

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