 Louise Goldsmith, Leader of West Sussex County Council
Ensuring children in West Sussex gain the best possible start in life is one of the County Council’s highest priorities.
But we need your support to help us achieve this.
Together we are working towards a new approach which will ensure Early Help is provided to families. Thank you to those who contributed to the recent partnership events across the county. Your feedback is vital.
The West Sussex Think Family programme has been recognised at national level, and we have recently taken the decision to become an ‘early adopter’ for the next phase. With your help I hope this scheme will continue to go from strength to strength.
Children’s Social Care Services are undergoing a review and redesign that will deliver better services and help move the Authority towards an improved Ofsted rating.
All of this progress is dependent on the commitment of our staff and partners to work together to deliver the vision that we jointly share.
We have made a really good start. Peter Evans (Cabinet Member for Children - Start of Life - Lead Member for Children), Jeremy Hunt (Cabinet Member for Education and Skills) and I look forward to sharing more good news with you in the future.
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My job is to ensure that we deliver the objectives and outcomes for Start of Life that have been agreed with elected members and partners. This newsletter will provide more information about how we are doing this, and how everything fits together.
We want to share our progress, and encourage you to find out more about what is happening. We will be working closely with our partners to co-design improved services for our residents. A new Start of Life Partnership Board (starting In January) will build on the success of the Think Family Partnership, and become the overarching forum to bring together all key internal and external partners who have a joint interest in delivering the Start of Life vision.
Our staff are critical to our success, so we will work closely with Learning & Development to ensure they have the necessary skills and learning opportunities to deliver this programme.
Partnership working is key, and we will be saying more about this in future editions. In the meantime, please let me know if there is any way in which we can improve the work we are doing.
Kevin.Peers@westsussex.gov.uk
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One of the Council’s top priorities is to give every child in West Sussex the best start in life in order to achieve their full potential.
West Sussex’s Early Help vision is to intervene as soon as possible and to tackle problems in families so that all members of the household, especially children, are able to achieve their potential. With help from our partners, the Council is currently working on the specification for the Early Help model. To help us understand how Early Help will work best in each of the District and Boroughs we held six partnership events across West Sussex in October and a specification event in November. The sessions provided valuable feedback about how people see Early Help working in their areas, and the specification event enabled participants to feedback on operational aspects of the proposed Early Help services.
The Early Help model proposes that each District and Borough will have a Family Support Network (FSN) that will consist of multi-agency teams (e.g. representatives from schools, health services, voluntary sector) to provide a targeted and co-ordinated early help response to children and families within that geographical area. This will enable statutory and non-statutory services to work together in a more joined up way by helping families sooner, before issues escalate and become more complex. Early Help has a strong focus on helping families to help themselves, with the support of wider family and community networks or through the voluntary sector.
There will also be a Family Support Point (FSP) that brings together the staff and functions of the existing Children’s Access Point (CAP) and the new Early Help Resource Centre (EHRC) into one geographical location (County Hall North), in order to provide a single front door into statutory social care and early help for families and professionals. The Family Support Point will be in operation from April 2015.
Further information about the roll out of Early Help across West Sussex will be available at the beginning of next year. For more information please visit our Early Help in West Sussex blog or email earlyhelp@westsussex.gov.uk
 There have and will be many significant and positive changes to the way the Council supports education in West Sussex. The Learning Service will in future form part of the new Directorate of Care, Wellbeing and Education. As part of this change, we are actively recruiting for a Director of Education and Skills to lead the Learning Service.
Following a Peer Review requested by the County Council's Cabinet, Phil Norrey, Chief Executive from Devon County Council presented a series of recommendations to Cabinet in October. These included several areas that have already been identified in advance of the appointment of the Director, including working more collaboratively with Headteachers and other stakeholders in order to review our vision for education; define what the Council will provide for schools and academies, and a focussed set of measures to which we can be held to account. The service has already started to strengthen its plans in light of this review in order to ensure that we have the capacity to meet our ambitions.
Cabinet are determined that we will raise attainment for all pupils, especially those that are vulnerable and deprived, and to ensure that schools those pupils attend are either good or outstanding. This work has started with a meeting of the Council and Headteachers taking place in early December, and is due to conclude around April.
For further information contact Brin Martin, Strategic Commissioner for Learning brin.martin@westsussex.gov.uk
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 The Children & Families Act 2014 (part 3) covering services for children & young people with special educational needs or disabilities and their families was implemented on 1 September 2014. Some elements of the reforms have to be in place immediately, but others will take time to fully implement. This is being managed by the SEND Board, in co-production with parent carers. The Children’s Minister, Edward Timpson MP, has used the phrase ‘evolution not revolution’.
Key changes include:
An internal launch of the Local Offer services website took place recently. A launch to all stakeholders is planned for the New Year.
A more streamlined assessment process, co-ordinated across education, health and care, is now being used for all new referrals/requests and increases the involvement of children and families. The existing 3500 Statements and Learning Difficulty Assessments are being transferred to 0-25 Education, Health and Care Plans, which reflect the child or young person’s aspirations, as well as their needs. Because of the numbers, this process will not be completed until April 2018.
Families can now request a personal budget (PB) for children and young people with a Plan, extending choice and control over their support. Over 110 families, mostly with social care needs, have a personal budget but work is underway to further develop education and health PBs.
The stronger focus on preparing for adulthood is being taken forward through a post-16 group. This has recently been re-launched with a workshop mapping where we want to be in 3-5 years and how we plan to get there.
For further information contact Jon Philpot, Principal Manager (SEN & Inclusion) jon.philpot@westsussex.gov.uk
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We want to make sure that every child growing up in West Sussex has the best possible start in life. We know the impact of a child’s early life experience, the quality of their primary attachments and the home environment in which they grow up influences their later life outcomes.
We are looking at what we currently provide as an organisation and, as part of this, we are modernising our Children’s Social Care Services.
To modernise Children’s Social Care we will:-
- review and design (as necessary) our roles, responsibilities and structures with input from children, families, staff and managers
- examine the processes and procedures we have in West Sussex County Council across our departments and aim to reduce bureaucracy and duplication
- produce new ways of working underpinned by the Signs of Safety approach that will be sustainable, forward thinking and more child and family-centred
- develop a single front door that provides an effective Early Help offer for children and families
- develop a Think Family, targeted family support offer to prevent escalation of cases to Children’s Social Care and to allow for effective step down of cases to targeted services when appropriate
We are working on all of the above. Some of these activities will be delivered within three months, whilst others will not be fully completed until Summer 2015. This will result in children and families with West Sussex being clear about who can help ,and how to get help from the right person at the right time.
For further information on the redesign of Children's Social Care contact Annie MacIver, Head of Children's Social Care annie.maciver@westsussex.gov.uk
Think Family is the local expression in West Sussex of the government’s national ‘Troubled Families’ initiative. As a Start of Life service, it aims to target intensive support on those families with multiple and complex needs, whose circumstances make them and their children vulnerable, leading to high reactive costs for the public sector. The national programme is reaching the end of its initial three-year period, but government has announced an extension for a further five years to 2020. In West Sussex, the County Council has built a strong partnership (the Start of Life Partnership) with public, private and third sector organisations, to oversee this work.
The government’s initial criteria focused on youth crime, children missing school, and adult unemployment. The new programme will expand to include families affected by domestic violence, children who need help, and parents and children with physical and mental health problems. In practice, vulnerable families face a range of related challenges, including debt, substance misuse, risk of eviction, and parenting and lifestyle issues.
Think Family is ground-breaking in that it uses a Keyworker model: a care professional works intensively and persistently with a small number of families over many months, acting as a single point of contact and building trust. The family is treated as a whole, and its members agree targets expressed in a family plan. Further support is given through local community initiatives.
Government gave West Sussex an initial target of ‘turning around’ 1,165 families by March 2015: we have over 900 successes to date, and are the most successful area for helping adults return to work. A further 4,000 families will be worked with through to 2020.
The overall vision is to break generational cycles of disadvantage, offering children better life chances, while using scarce public resources to best effect.
For further information contact: think.familyqueries@westsussex.gov.uk or tel: 01243 642142. For Think Family HolistiX support contact Holistix.enquiries@westsussex.gov.uk
The Early Childhood Service is undergoing a service redesign to:
- respond to changes at national level regarding the role of local authorities and to address key local priorities for West Sussex;
- strengthen delivery of services for children and families through local integrated teams around groups of Children and Family Centres, with clear lines of responsibility and accountability for service delivery;
- make best use of expertise and target support where it is most needed;
- align work with Early Help developments;
- work smarter, efficiently and effectively, thereby contributing to the £2.5m savings required by the service, by March 2016.
Progress
The redesign of the service seeks to transform the way the service works in partnership in local communities. Staff consultation commenced in May 2014 and has been undertaken in three phases. The final phase was completed at the end of October 2014. There remains a very small number of staff for whom future arrangements within the service or suitable alternative employment are yet to be confirmed.
The service is now in a transition period, working towards full implementation from April 2015. Professional discussions have been held with all staff groups to support implementation of new ways of working across the service. The next step is to share changes and key contacts with colleagues and partners such as midwives, health visitors, early years and childcare settings/schools and community organisations.
For further details contact: CYPSECSCentral@westsussex.gov.uk
West Sussex Young People’s Service (YPS) provides a wide range of targeted and specialist interventions to vulnerable young people with high/multiple levels of need. These services will help them gain the resilience and skills they need to progress into adult life, and take a positive role in their communities. YPS aims to engage young people at the earliest sign of difficulty, by providing tailored services which reduce vulnerability and provide positive outcomes.
Who do we work with?
The YPS understands that the majority of young people will make their way through their teenage years with support from parents, carers and local services such as schools and leisure activities. There are, however, vulnerable groups and individuals who will require extra support during this time.
YPS work with young people in the following groups:-
- Vulnerable young people in need
- Young people on the edge of statutory interventions
- Young people in care/leaving care and/or involved in statutory intervention (ie they are looked after by the local authority or involved in the youth justice system)
These young people will have complex or acute vulnerabilities that put them at risk of a range of issues, in particular:-
- Crime and Antisocial Behaviour
- Disengagement from Education, Employment or Training (NEET)
- Disengagement from their communities
What are our intended outcomes?
Young people who receive support from YPS should develop and progress in the following areas:
- Raised aspirations
- Improved health and wellbeing
- Higher attainment
- Positive citizenship
- Reduced risk taking
- Reduction in harmful behaviours
For Further information please email youth.change@westsussex.gov.uk
It is clear that children’s emotional wellbeing and mental health services have been high profile for a while now, and there is a strong wish to see change. The commissioning team at WSCC share this view, and it has worked hard to improve the practice for current service provision. In the short term, we are continuing to performance manage current contracts through robust contracting arrangements and measures. We have decommissioned some services and are currently developing services to ensure equitable coverage across the county, whilst evaluating current pilots. We recognise that it is a great opportunity to make significant system change through the redesign process.
Testing out what works
In the short term, it has been important to pilot and evaluate services to feed into the service redesign:-
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Worthing and Crawley Emotional Wellbeing Pilots – Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT), WSCC Young People’s Service and YMCA have been commissioned through Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCG’s) and Think Family to offer a single point of access for young people to access counselling through Find It Out Shops. The top presenting issues include self-harm, anxiety and low mood. Evaluation of the pilots suggest only eight percent of young people were referred to CAMHS specialist services following assessment within the Find it Out Shop.
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On-line Counselling Services in Schools – A web-based service for young people offering access 24hrs a day, seven days a week started in three schools in Mid Sussex in June 2014. It provides counselling support by email, instant messaging or video conference. This has been extended to five schools in Crawley. Evaluation states that 81 percent of users are female and the peak age use is 13, 14 and 16. The highest use has been during school holidays and 75 percent of usage is out of school hours. The key presenting issues are anxiety, stress and relationships.
Other Service Developments
- Counselling for young people at Find it Out Shops through YMCA trained counsellors has been extended across the county and now includes services in Chichester and Bognor.
- Developing a clear autistic spectrum pathway in consultation with key partners.
- Self-help resources for children, young people and families promoting wellbeing, reducing self-harming behaviours and supporting parent carers are being purchased and distributed.
- An emotional wellbeing information website is being developed – this online directory will be accessible via smartphones and tablets and will provide information and local/national services to ensure parents and young people know where to get advice and support.
- Mapping emotional wellbeing and mental health services provided within secondary and primary schools identifies current services and good practice across the county.
Future Service
We are currently developing an early intervention and recovery based model in West Sussex. This will be through an outcome-focussed approach and is being developed in partnership with key stakeholders, young people and parents/carers. The service model across tiers 1-3 (tier 4 is commissioned by NHS England) will be finalised by December 2014 and consulted on in January. Re-tendering of some/all of the services is part of the implementation process, but is not the only way forward. The intention is to have a newly designed service model in place in Autumn 2015 which also lines up with other initiatives such as Early Help, implementation of the Local Offer, Think Family and Social Care Service redesign.
For further information contact: Alison Nuttall,
Head of Children and Families Commissioning
Tel 03302 225936 Alison.nuttall@westsussex.gov.uk
Signs of Safety
Signs of Safety is a ground-breaking new approach to children’s social work which focuses on the strengths of a family whilst at the same time exploring any danger and risk. It’s a different way of working which encourages professionals and families to work together to find solutions and is being used successfully across the world in North America, Canada, Europe and Australasia.
What are we doing in West Sussex?
Signs of Safety was first introduced in certain areas of Children’s Services in West Sussex in 2013.
Last month it was announced that the County Council was one of just a handful of local authorities selected to fully implement the practice across all of its children’s services over the next 18 months. The County Council will receive a £350,000 share of a Department for Education Innovations Project grant and support and training from the international Signs of Safety team.
The introduction of Signs of Safety fundamentally underpins our plan to improve the quality and effectiveness of our social work practice, and supports our aim of moving from an Ofsted rating of ‘Adequate’ to ‘Good’.
The initiative is being headed nationally by Professor Eileen Munro who led the Munro Review of Child Protection, published in 2011.
What we hope to achieve?
Research from around the world has shown that Signs of Safety can lead to:
- improved quality of social work delivered to families;
- improved engagement and participation of families;
- improved engagement of children and young people and an understanding of their lived experience through the use of the direct work tools
- improved risk management of vulnerable children as a result of rigorous assessment and safety planning
- improved staff confidence and job satisfaction which contributes to improved retention of social workers
Further information about Signs of Safety is available on the West Sussex website and here: http://www.signsofsafety.net/
http://munroturnellmurphy.com/englandinnovations/
Key contact: Wendy Hill, Service Manager – Practice Development (Principal Social Worker) wendy.hill@westsussex.gov.uk
Work is under way to improve the experience of people making contact with the County Council. The Customer Experience Programme aims to ensure the Council delivers a good experience to all its customers - providing a service which is consistent, connected and easy to use. We’re already working on a new website which will support this.
Between now and March, the programme is working with key services to review the journeys that our customers and partners take when they make contact.
A group from Children’s Services is engaged to ensure the Customer Experience Programme helps in the creation of the new Family Support Point. The group comprises representatives from Early Help Resource Centre, Early Childhood Service including Family Information Service, Think Family and Young People's Service. This group is developing and enhancing the customer journey by building on the excellent work already undertaken within Children’s Services. The group will call upon the skills and knowledge of others to ensure the new service will be on track to go live in March, once approved by Cabinet.
Further detail please contact roger.hubert@westsussex.gov.uk Customer Experience – Project/Change Manager,
or Marius.Kynaston@westsussex.gov.uk Customer Experience Programme Manager
On Wednesday 10th September 2014, WSCC "went live" with a new and innovative case management system called HolistiX. This has been implemented to support the replacement of eCAF with Early Help Plans and the delivery of Think Family. The system will enable WSCC and its partners to document and monitor support for families who need a multi-agency response delivered in a more effective way. We now have over 2,000 users of the system and a total of 139 Early Help Plans set up. If you would like to find out more about HolistiX and how it can support you in your work with children, young people and families, please contact Daniel Temelkov on 07715 417644, or email holistix.enquiries@westsussex.gov.uk.
Note to system users:
If you have received an email giving you a user id for HolistiX but haven’t yet logged onto the system, please be aware that your id may become deactivated soon. If you choose not to log in to HolistiX at this time, but need to use the system in the future, you will then need to contact your Early Help Administrator to re-activate your user ID. See contact details below.
Adur & Worthing
Arun & Chichester
Crawley, Horsham & Mid Sussex
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