Stannington Gas - A Big Thank You!
We would like to thank you all for your immense efforts going above and beyond in extraordinary circumstances to ensure the people of Stannington are safe and well. Staff resilience has been amazing, we understand how intense the past week has been and thank all involved during this extremely busy period. Recovery arrangements are being considered from today onwards.
We would also like to say a big thank you to our teams who responded and supported people affected by Stannington Gas.
“A big thank you to Linda Holmes who worked with Red Cross and Cadent as part of the emergency response centre, and one day going back 3 times after already arriving home. Always with a smile on her face, nothing was ever too much trouble. Her sound practical judgment and way of getting other agencies to work with her and finding people we only had names for has been nothing short of amazing! I don't know what we would have done without her.
Also, a big thank you to Jude Bissell for picking up all other safe and well checks across Sheffield while staff have been off, and a thank you to Matthew Wainwright for coordinating and supporting all this work. A great demonstration of our Value; Together we get things done!
Thank you to Business Support and everyone who have been involved or volunteered to be involved in our response the Stannington incident much appreciated!
Thank you to First Contact and Localities - there was another amazing response from First Contact, 5 staff were straight on to this on Monday with another 32 visits made, and 4 visits by Localities. Localities also made many phone calls to check on the safety of people.
Finally a big thanks to colleagues on out of hours and the Short-Term Intervention Team who continued to work through the list and liaised with staff on the ground and made visits when necessary over the weekend."
Learning
We have learnt a lot over the past couple of weeks as a team and with partners and its our plan to work with partners to debrief and collectively take the learning into the future ways of working.
 Department for Health & Social Care COVID-19 Update
Please see the email below from the Department for Health and Social Care regarding the changes to the use of face masks in adult social care.
You might have seen the Express and Guardian articles this morning around changes to face masks (and outbreak handling) in ASC COVID-19 guidance, we appreciate the need to get the announcement and guidance out as soon as possible. A more detailed press notice will go out this afternoon alongside a letter to the sector outlining the changes in detail and linking to updated guidance.
Once the guidance is published services can begin to implement the new guidance straight away but in order to provide an opportunity to adapt to the changes services do not need to move to the changes until 22 December 2022.
The key updates are:
- changes to the use of face masks (for source control) in adult social care, recognising the challenges this policy has created for the sector – universal masking will cease and be replaced by a risk-based approach
- increased autonomy for care homes to assess and manage COVID-19 outbreaks to enable providers to determine and implement proportionate measures relevant for their settings.
- small care homes – changes to COVID-19 case management and changes to COVID-19 outbreak testing to streamline this in line with the latest evidence.
Many thanks,
Alex
Alex Barton (he/him)
Head of Social Care Infection Prevention and Control Strategy and Guidance
Social Care Operational Resilience Division
Social Care Delivery Directorate
T: 0785 3399633
Achieving Change 555a – Social Worker and Care Manager Team Allocation
We’ve finally made it! The last phase of preferencing has now been completed and everyone included has been allocated to a Team Manager. Individual emails have been sent to confirm. If you’re part of preferencing but haven’t received the email, please contact AHSCComms@sheffield.gov.uk
The full team list will be shared on ELMA by Wednesday, 21 December.
We’d like to thank everyone for their support, understanding and patience as we’ve worked through this big and complicated exercise. As we move into the New Year there will be opportunities to get to know your new manager and teammates, and the service area you’ll be working in. This will include service events which are being planned in the run up to implementation.
 Analysis of social work preferencing results
As part of the social work achieving change, we commissioned HR to do analysis of the preferencing results against the equality data that you have shared as part of the employee census. We did this to ensure there weren’t any inequitable outcomes from the process. The analysis covers the 3 protected characteristics for which we hold sufficient data on – race, disability and sexual orientation. It was important we thoroughly analysed and looked into the results before sharing them with you. We’re glad to say they didn’t highlight any concerns from an equality perspective.
We want to be open and transparent and to show you the mean average preferences. Lower figures indicate more favourable results – i.e. an average of 1 would mean everyone got their top choice.
Race: Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic 1.24, White British 1.24
The results showed that Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic employees were just as likely to get their preferences as White British employees.
Disability: Disabled 1.11, Non-disabled 1.26
The results showed that disabled employees were positively more likely to get their preferences than non-disabled employees. This difference is positive and is as expected, as reasonable adjustments for disability was one of the considerations for preferencing.
Sexual orientation: LGBTQ+ 1.18, Heterosexual 1.24
The results showed that LGBTQ+ employees were positively more likely to get their preferences than heterosexual employees.
If you would like more detailed anonymised data we are happy to make this available if we can – just email ahsccomms@sheffield.gov.uk. (Sometimes data relating to very low numbers of employees can’t be shared if it would risk identifying any individuals).
Review Requests
We also want to share the results of review requests from the preferencing results. Over the two rounds of preferencing we received 18 requests to review our decision so far, and we are glad to have been able to accommodate 11 of these.
 Team Manager Opportunities
Coming out of the achieving change there are some temporary opportunities current members of staff to act up as Grade 9 team managers, covering for act up and secondments.
We are really grateful to those who have been doing a great job acting up in Localities. The reason we are asking for new expressions of interest is that firstly there is a different number of posts available, and secondly that they are of a significantly different teams therefore other people may be interested (or not) in the opportunities.
These team manager posts are:
 How to apply
You can find the job description here
To apply, you should write an expression of interest of no more than 2 sides of A4, setting out your suitability to the role. These should be sent to ahsccomms@sheffield.gov.uk by Sunday 15 January 2023, stating clearly which of the posts you wish to be considered for.
Permanant Recruitment
We will also be advertising for a permanent Team Manager (up to half time) in Living & Ageing Well Community North Team (City Centre) along with Social Worker and Care Manager vacancies that remain following the restructure. These will be advertised externally on the Council website.
 Reminder on commenting on progression route and transfer request proposals
Reminder: Last week we sent out the below draft documents available on our ELMA Change Programme page and linked individually below for ease of access and for any comments you may have.
Please send any feedback to AHSCComms@sheffield.gov.uk by the end of Monday 19 December.
 Service Events
We are hosting service events in the New Year for everyone in each service to talk about the vision and objectives of the service and the years ahead, plus you will get sometime to spend in person with your team.
- Wednesday 25 January 2022, 1-5pm, Adults with a Disability, Townhall Reception Rooms A & B - Andrew Wheawall
- Friday 27 January 2022, 9:30am -1:30pm, Living & Ageing Well North & South, Townhall Reception Rooms A & B - Nicola Afzal & Jo Pass
- We will be hosting an additional Living & Ageing Well North & South event, the date will be confirmed soon.
Look out for an invite coming to your Outlook calendars soon.
 "I’m delighted to let you know that Rebecca Dixon is joining the Care Governance and Financial Inclusion service.
Rebecca, who has been leading on CQC Assurance and Discharge Performance, will move across from Living and Ageing Well at the start of the New Year to support the implementation of the Directorate’s Performance and Outcomes Framework including CQC assurance.
I’m thrilled to have Rebecca join my team and bring her expertise, knowledge and skills to bear on this vitally important area."
Liam Duggan
Assistant Director of Business Planning Strategy & Improvement
 What is a Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH)?
- A group of people from different agencies working together to protect vulnerable adults from potential harm.
- Usually Social Worker led and can involve partners such as Health, Police, Housing, Probation, and Mental Health.
- The main aim of introducing a MASH for adults in Sheffield is to improve joint working and information sharing, which will help partners to identify risk and make decisions in a timely way with a more system-wide picture.
Progress with Sheffield Adults MASH
Work is progressing well with our partners to develop a MASH and an Operational Group has been established who will start to meet weekly in January to develop more detailed plans. Reps from a range of services are involved including First Contact, Adults with a Disability, Living and ageing well, Business Support, DACT and Practice Development along with reps from partners including Council Housing, South Yorkshire Police, Sheffield Health and Social Care Trust, NHS ICB and South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue.
Some of the types of things the operational group will be working on together to prepare for MASH to start are:
- Developing a clear remit and detailed processes
- Planning, monitoring and evaluating MASH tests of change
- Identifying and arranging any required training
- Operational detail
- Establishing links with other services and teams
- How MASH can support and advise other teams, services or providers completing safeguarding episodes & enquiries
- How MASH can provide advice and support to any professional with a query about safeguarding
- Creating a process for People in Positions Of Trust (PiPoT)
Test of change
There is already a test of change underway with First Contact colleagues having discussions with a Police Officer several times each week, and we’re receiving lots of positive feedback from those involved.
We will share more detail about how the MASH will work in the new year as the Operational Group develop plans and we’re aiming for the MASH to be up and running on 1 March 2023.
If you have any questions in the meantime, please contact jenna.tait@sheffield.gov.uk
 Department for Health & Social Care COVID-19 Update
Please see the email below from the Department for Health and Social Care regarding the changes to the use of face masks in adult social care.
You might have seen the Express and Guardian articles this morning around changes to face masks (and outbreak handling) in ASC COVID-19 guidance, we appreciate the need to get the announcement and guidance out as soon as possible. A more detailed press notice will go out this afternoon alongside a letter to the sector outlining the changes in detail and linking to updated guidance.
Once the guidance is published services can begin to implement the new guidance straight away but in order to provide an opportunity to adapt to the changes services do not need to move to the changes until 22 December 2022.
The key updates are:
- changes to the use of face masks (for source control) in adult social care, recognising the challenges this policy has created for the sector – universal masking will cease and be replaced by a risk-based approach
- increased autonomy for care homes to assess and manage COVID-19 outbreaks to enable providers to determine and implement proportionate measures relevant for their settings.
- small care homes – changes to COVID-19 case management and changes to COVID-19 outbreak testing to streamline this in line with the latest evidence.
Many thanks,
Alex
Alex Barton (he/him)
Head of Social Care Infection Prevention and Control Strategy and Guidance
Social Care Operational Resilience Division
Social Care Delivery Directorate
T: 0785 3399633
 Social Work Registration
The requirement for registration with Social Work England closed on the 30 November.
If you are working within a job role that contains social worker within the title could you please provide evidence that Social Work England has accepted your application and you are registered for 2022/2023 to your line manager
If for any reason you have not successfully completed your registration your registration status will be recorded as ‘removed - failure to renew’. You will not be able to use the protected title ‘social worker’ and you will not be able to do any task which requires a social worker. If you do continue to use the title ‘social worker’, or do any task requiring a social worker, after you have been removed from the register, you will be committing a criminal offence.
Anyone who is concerned about their registration please discuss with your immediate line manager and respective service manager
Thank you
Regards
Karen
Interim Service Manager Practice Development
Sheffield City Council
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