Welcome to the latest edition of Shropshire’s Covid-19 SEND newsletter, co-produced by Shropshire Council, Shropshire Clinical Commissioning Group and PACC. 

The newsletter aims to provide easy access to key information for SEND families during the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as an opportunity for parent carers to hear from each other about their experiences.

Please do continue to provide feedback on this newsletter, we want this to work for you and we are keen to hear what you think of it. You can email us at local.offer@shropshire.gov.uk

Did you know that if you are a parent carer of a child with a disability and have parental responsibility, you have the right to request a parent carer needs assessment under the Children and Families Act 2014?

The assessment will consider:

• Your individual needs as a parent carer
• Things that could make looking after your child easier for you
• Your well-being as a parent carer
• The need to safeguard and promote the welfare of your disabled child
• The need to safeguard and promote the welfare of any other children that you care for

 To find out more about the parent carer needs assessment please click below 

Following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in January 2020, Shropshire Council, the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and Parent and Carer Council (PACC) have co-produced a Written Statement of Action (WSoA). This WSoA identifies the actions that will be taken by all partners to secure timely improvement, as well as providing an indication of what difference we expect these actions to make to our children and young people with SEND and their families.

Over the last 12 months progress has been made in addressing some of the concerns raised in the inspection.

• We have reviewed our governance structure so that SEND is prioritised at all levels.
• We have refreshed our SEND strategy (look out for the podcast that will be published later this year).
• We have started to work on developing the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment which will inform commissioning decisions.
• Waiting times to access assessment for speech and language have been reduced
• we are developing our neuro developmental pathway so that there is clear information and a joined-up approach to supporting children and young people who are being considered for an assessment for ASD or ADHD.
• We are working with our schools to take positive action to reduce the number of children with SEN who are being excluded from school.

You can find out more about the WSoA and look out for updates in future newsletters.

PACC has recently established a relationship with senior managers from The Midlands Foundation Partnership Trust (MPFT), following discussions about the BeeU Autism pathway at Scrutiny Committee meetings, hosted jointly by Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin Councils.  Regular meetings will now be held including representation from PACC and PODS (Telford) with Cath Riley, Managing Director MPFT and other members of the BEEU team, which will discuss service development and co-production on an ongoing basis.  At the first meeting we discussed the need for improved communication and clarity around current plans and BeeU has provided an update on waiting times for autism assessment and future plans for the service.  The article can be read below

Cathy Riley, Managing Director, Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (MPFT), was invited to give an update on the waiting times for autism assessments.

MPFT is the lead partner in BeeU and works with The Children’s Society, Healios and Kooth.

Cathy told us “For those children and young people who have been referred to specialist mental health services because of suspected autism spectrum disorder, the wait has been long and unacceptable. For this I would like to apologise.”  

Following investment from the clinical commissioning group at the end of last year, BeeU has recruited an ASD assessment team who will assess those children and young people who have been waiting over 12 months.

The team started to undertake ASD assessments in September of last year and started with 294 children and young people.  

By January, this had reduced to 220 young people on the waiting list. 117 of those have been waiting over a year and 103 have been waiting under a year.

BeeU is working in partnership with another organisation who is going to assess the 40 children and young people who have waited the longest and will contact the families direct.

By the end of April 2021, BeeU plans to have started the assessments of all 220 children and young people still waiting.

BeeU continues to accept new referrals and their aim is to get within the NICE guidance of good practice that all children and young people wait for a maximum of 12 weeks from referral to the start their assessment. And to maintain, or reduce, that over time.

BeeU is developing their website and would really find your support, knowledge and feedback to make this happen. If you are interested in supporting this please visit https://camhs.mpft.nhs.uk/beeu and click on the ‘getting involved and giving feedback’ section or email any comments to communications@mpft.nhs.uk.

The local health and social care system have put a bid into NHS England to be an early implementer of a keyworker service.

The service locally will respond to the needs of families of children and young people with learning disabilities and or autism, providing stability and clear plans when they are struggling and at key transition points. All families can face challenges and disruption, but such times are particularly difficult for those living with learning disabilities and or autism.  Periods of change can easily escalate to crisis and key working will enable a proactive approach to supporting families at such times.

All areas have to have this service in place by 2023/24 but we are hoping that we will be able to start this work early. Find out more about the Keyworker support.

Greenacres Farm in Walford Heath, Shrewsbury, already provides a range of day service opportunities to adults with learning disabilities in Shropshire, and following approval by Shropshire Council, will soon also provide specialist accommodation for adults with learning or physical disabilities to live in a community setting.

The development will be built on land that is currently part of Greenacres Farm in Walford Heath, and will comprise of eight standard, single-storey supported living apartments, a communal shared area for tenants and staff, internal courtyard and outdoor spaces. Designed to help people to develop their independent living skills, each self-contained apartment will have its own lounge, bedroom, bathroom and kitchen area.

Actio is a new consortium established by PACC, Energize and Ignition, creating a partnership that is committed to delivering a quality programme of activities for young people with SEND.  At the heart of this is the Shropshire All In programme, which the consortium now commissions and manages on behalf of Shropshire Council. 

Parent carers are encouraged to register, or renew, their children for All In so they can access a range of activities - and receive their free welcome pack from Actio 

GP practices in Shropshire have adapted to continue the availability of learning disability annual health checks during this latest lockdown.  

Changes will vary from practice to practice, some appointments may now take place over the phone or virtually, via online consultations, and patients will only be called in to practice when necessary. This has been put in place to prevent both patients and staff being put at risk of coronavirus.

Your GP practice will call you to have a chat and decide the safest way to complete the learning disability annual health check.

This information tells you more about the arrangements during lockdown and what to expect to happen during an annual health check.

Across Shropshire Telford and Wrekin health and social care systems are working together to support their staff to have a better understanding of Positive Behavioural Support (PBS).

The key element of this work is to understand that all behaviours are a method of communication- so even those behaviour’s we find concerning or difficult are communicating how that child is feeling. Through the work we are doing we want to ensure that we can really understand what children are telling us by their behaviour and will be recruiting staff who have experience and skills in this area

PBS practice includes a functional assessment of the possible relationships between what is happening in the environment surrounding the child and the By understanding the individual’s needs, the function of the behaviour and what reinforces it, practitioners can develop a plan to support that individual. Other supporters of that individual (whether that be family, paid carers or NHS staff) need to understand how to implement that plan to support the individual. PACC are producing some resources to help families understand this approach and developing a peer support offer, to help parent carers when there is a plan in place

Also the new flexible care contract that the council are developing, to find providers who will provide care for children, has a focus on care providers being able to follow PBS plans

We have already started training senior leaders across Shropshire to understand the importance of this work and will let you know more as it develops