Team: Barnet’s Early Help Service

Partners: Resources for Autism (commissioned third sector organisation)

Main Submission:

The EH Project with Resources for Autism arose due to a gap in resource for children with ASD, where there was risk of family breakdown, often due to deregulated behaviour at home & parents needing specialist parenting intervention in the home. These children did not meet the continuum of need for the CWD Team or Duty & Assessment Teams. The support also needed to be more tailored than either the mainstream parenting programmes offered by EH Hubs or the SEND parenting group run by MENCAP could provide.

This Project developed from a bottom-up approach led by me and my peer, using data to highlight the unmet need. We then worked in partnership with our FS Commissioning Team, Children with Disability Team & Voluntary Sector Partner, RfA. A steering group was set up in 2020 to scope the commissioned service & it was piloted for a year. The Project was deemed so successful, that it has been recommissioned & is now in its 4th year.

• Innovation – From discussions within our respective regional practice groups, Jack, FS Commissioner & I are aware that this project is an innovative response to a gap in services & doesn’t exist in this form, in other London boroughs.
• Activity: The referral pathway is specifically via the EH Service, as we do not have access to S17 budget to spot purchase these support packages, given we operate below the statutory framework. We use our multi-agency EH Panel to identify the referrals, so we can prioritise those most in need. As part of the contract RfA, attend the weekly EH Panel, to provide expert advice.

The criteria for the Programme, is for families with children with ASD where children are displaying high levels of dysregulation at home & where specialist group parenting programmes have already been tried. Interventions provided can be at high, medium or low intensity (with high being, weekly home visits/virtual follow-ups for 3 months). The package of support includes modelling strategies in the home, to help parents better understand their children’s SEN Needs and adapt their parenting approaches accordingly. RFA also liaise with the School, to ensure a consistent approach between home & school. The Programme can hold up to 7 open cases (depending on levels of intensity) at any one time. RfA has a dedicated EH practitioner & she has been trained to use our EH Case Management system, so these interventions can be viewed by the MASH/other practitioners, & are led externally, on the EH Hub’s behalf. The EH Coordinators, quality assure these care packages and provide the link to the Team, if there are any safeguarding issues, or there is a need for joint work.

The funding for this commissioned service is from the CWD budget, & the programme is reviewed quarterly, by the FS Commissioner, CWD Manager & EH Managers.

The provision of ASD training/awareness workshops is included in this contract, some aimed at EH Practitioners & some for parents. These workshops have been co-produced/co-delivered with one of our parent champions & will eventually be delivered as part of Barnet’s new ASD Hub.

Impact:
The project has evidenced minimal repeat referrals to Early Help with very few cases stepping up to statutory teams (both Duty & Assessment or Specialist ASD Team). Feedback from parents has been positive (RfA use baseline, midterm & exit surveys) & we receive helpful case studies. Since the start of the Project- 100 families have been referred, 90 of whom have accepted the service. Out of this 90, only 8 cases have escalated to statutory teams-most stepping up to CWD Team, on the basis that the child’s SEND needs are now better understood. None of the cases have resulted in children coming into care & the number of repeat referrals into Early Help has also reduced (just 2 in the last 6 months).

A Family’s voice:
‘’I learnt more about autism in these past three months than D’s whole life. I know I need to work to be consistent, but I have the tools and confidence to do this now”.

Supporting Materials:

Team: Intervention First Team

Partners: Local primary schools in the Harlesden area

Main Submission:

Brent like most local authorities has seen a growing number of children assessed as requiring an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP). As a result of a growing High Needs Block deficit the Local Authority joined the DfE’s Delivering Better Value programme (DBV) in 2021 and through funding from this was able to design an early intervention offer aimed at responding to children’s needs at an earlier stage. The intention of meeting needs earlier was also to reduce the number of EHCPs.

The IFT offer was designed as an intensive 12-week multi-disciplinary programme to children aged between 4 – 7 years old in the Harlesden locality. The service is targeted for children with emotional wellbeing and learning needs who do not have an Education Health Care Plan. The IFT was created as part of the DBV to offer earlier, targeted intervention for children with the aim of achieving more positive impact on outcomes for children rather than implementing an Education Health Care Plan. The IFT clinicians provide evidence-based interventions as part of a peripatetic delivery model.

Last academic year (23/24), 39 referrals were accepted by IFT for 34 males (83%) and 7 (17%) females. The highest number of referrals were received for Year 2 children (39%). In terms of ethnicity, the highest proportion of referred groups were Black British / Caribbean (20%) Black British / African (17%) and Any other white background (15%).

On referral, each child and family are offered a two-week assessment period in which the team meet with the parents, observe the child and meet with the child’s school and other services involved in their care. Following this assessment, the panel agree an intervention plan designed around each child and family’s needs. The intervention may include individual therapy with the child, parent work or work with the school to support their learning and understanding of the child’s needs. The team also offer one off consultations to schools around referrals that do not go on to have a full intervention, whole class interventions when a number of children are referred from a particular class and training for groups of staff in schools.

During this term, a total of 421 sessions were delivered. Of these, 166 were assessment sessions and 255 were intervention sessions. A total of 12 children and families completed the planned intervention.

The service has noted improvements in the symptoms reported on referral according to the SDQ and the Thinking about you Child Questionnaire. Parents report an improvement in their own parenting skills and in their parent-child relationships. Parents and teachers report high levels of satisfaction with the service.

From the work carried out to date, only 1 child out of 30 whom schools thought may need an EHCNA, has subsequently required an EHC needs assessment (which all parties fully supported)

The team have so far collected 6 ESQ’s following completed interventions. All parents surveyed rated the intervention as helpful. The average total score was 26 out of a possible 27 points. Some comments made by parents include:

“I want to say thank you so much for your help, thank you for teaching me and for all the help for my son. It has helped a lot. I was really nerves before meeting you, but you were so welcoming and helpful.”

“The practitioner prompted me to talk to my child about their feelings and her suggestions and support worked so well. Suggested that I create timetables, so my child is prepared for what is coming – school noted an improvement in my child towards the end of the last year. She also told me to make sure that I had confidence in myself and taught me how to know that what I was doing was good enough – she gave me the confidence. We will really miss the support.”

“My child found the Direct sessions in school helpful and really enjoyed them. The parenting support sessions were extremely insightful for me, and it was so helpful to have someone to listen to my concerns and who understood me.”

The team have collected 7 ECQ’s from schools following completed consultations. All teachers surveyed rated their consultation helpful.100% said they left the consultation with ideas of what they could do next regarding their concerns. 100% felt heard and understood by the person who delivered their consultation. 100% said they would recommend the service to another professional. Some comments made by teaching staff were:

“We are extremely satisfied with the exceptional services delivered by the Intervention First Team. The referral process was impressively simple and efficient, enabling us to swiftly obtain the necessary support for my students. The team’s communication with our school has been outstanding, consistently offering timely updates and clear guidance. Their understanding of each child’s needs has been invaluable, and the professional discussions we’ve had have greatly improved our ability to support our students effectively. Moreover, the support provided to the school and staff has been excellent, further enhancing our teaching abilities and overall school environment.”

Supporting Materials:

Main Submission:

Introduction:

In Sutton, the delivery of parenting programmes across the borough has historically sat within children’s social care. In 2020, Extensive engagement with staff and local parents undertaken for the local Children’s Review highlighted three key themes: the need for more bespoke support around parenting, better access to universal services through children’s centres and earlier support and intervention for families with emerging complex needs. The development of a Helping Early Strategy that encouraged a more active and broader partnership for early intervention, there was a joint commitment to invest together in parenting programmes and to enhance the existing offer in Sutton. A new parenting model was jointly invested in by Public Health, South West London ICP and Children’s Social Care, which started in December 2021, when roles were fully established.

The primary evidence-based parenting programmes chosen to deliver in Sutton were; Empowering Parents, Empowering Communities (EPEC), and Circle of Security Parenting (COSP). Both programmes have an evidence base that has been independently verified by the Early Intervention Foundation.

In 2022 Training of Parent Group Leaders (PGL’s) took place, under supervision they delivered the programmes across the borough as well as supporting regular drop-ins for parents to grow peer support networks. The service offers a range of programmes from universal programmes to more specialist services around managing anger in the home and reducing parental conflict. In the second year additional funding was sought to expand the service so that additional support could be offered for families with children with Autism. This has resulted in 149 Parents completing an Autism Parenting programme to date with a further 57 on the waiting list.

The stigma of asking for support has been reduced, as parents can now access the course through self-referral rather than having to ask a professional, as was the case previously. The service has now become an integral part of the wider Family Hub and Children’s Centre offer. The service has received excellent feedback and is co-delivered with local parents which significantly builds community resilience. The success of the service means that the Council now intends to secure funding and mainstream the service going forward.

The parenting service has been in operation for over 2 years in Sutton and is on track in 2024/25 to support 400 parents with an in-person parenting course, with another 500 parents accessing an online offer. The core team currently comprises a parenting Coordinator, a parenting worker and a part-time administrator who are supported by volunteer Parent Group Leaders who are trained and supervised by the Coordinator. Further Volunteers have been recruited and will start training in September 2024.

The service is flexible and responds to the needs of families and chooses the location of where the courses are offered, based upon the demand of residents. This has seen higher engagement for families living in lower socio economic groups. The majority of trained Parent Group Leaders also come from those same areas. The courses are offered at different times, including in the evening, which has led to a 21% increase in the number of fathers and male carers attending. In 2023/24, 46% of attendees came from a non-white British background.

This has also led to the service running a Dad’s Parenting Programme in HMP Highdown. Three Programmes have been facilitated in the prison with positive outcomes reported by the prisoners and their families. Fathers have reported being able to better maintain their relationships with their children and understand the impact of them being a positive role model in their children’s lives.

A critical part of the parenting programme model in Sutton is the additional support that parents can access through the support of the parenting team and Family Hub Connectors at the Coffee Advice and Information Sessions. These run regularly alongside parenting programmes, running once a fortnight in Carshalton, Central Sutton and Wallington, plus additional groups and a specific Male Carers evening group. Guest speakers are regularly invited to attend and speak to parents and carers from a range of public and voluntary sector agencies. These Advice and information sessions have seen over 470 referrals to other agencies, prior to statutory support being required. Referrals have been made to welfare reform teams, Foodbanks, Sutton Information, Advice and Support Service (SIASS), Cognus, Baby Banks, and others.

The strength of the Programmes is that most are facilitated by parent group leaders who have been trained to facilitate the programme. Parents report they like the peer-to-peer support and the value of lived experience being shared as part of the programmes. This has also created a pathway to employment for parents. One volunteer has already been employed as a Parent support worker and continued training and support is developing the skills of other parent volunteers. We have recently secured further funding with a view to employing more of the volunteers to help continue to grow the capacity of the programmes and demand increases. This approach has also helped build community resilience, with parent volunteers leading on organising community events and fun days to help raise the profile of services and improve community engagement.

Supporting information:

Team: Staying Together Team

Partners: Act for Change

Main Submission:

Introduction:

Our Staying Together team within Children’s Social Care provides an Edge of Care/crisis intervention service for children/young people from 5-18 years old. The team comprising of Social Workers, Social Work Assistants, Family Workers, and a Family Therapist, work in partnership with Act for Change and the Local Care Partnership (NHS) to promote early support for communities across Bexley. They support families with complex difficulties both in the home and local community to help improve family relationships, reduce risks to children and to mitigate the risk of family breakdown and care proceedings.

Details of actions, activities and initiatives:

Staying Together provide a wide range of support and work in creative ways to promote engagement. The team work with a significant number of families experiencing crisis. They offer intense intervention during the day, evening and at weekends, when necessary, to support children remaining at home and prevent a breakdown in relationships. The team also offer accessible therapeutic support in partnership with Act for Change. Sessions are offered on a flexible basis recognizing that many parents and carers have dual responsibilities of work and childcare.

In addition to work with families, Staying Together provide consultations to social care teams on a one-to-one basis or through group clinical supervision. This promotes exploration of individual family experiences – envisioning alternative possibilities and providing creative support. This could result in referral to Staying Together or help with linking to community-based services. Staying Together support transforms outcomes for children, young people and families.

Impact

Their offer of parent and child mediation enables positive relationships to be built and difficult situations to be addressed in an effective manner. Their wide range of group work, programmes and workshops support parents and carers to gain greater confidence and self-control – clearly evidenced in the regular feedback from parents and carers. This is proven to reduce the risk of family breakdown and children coming into Local Authority care.

Group facilitators create a positive learning environment and promote active participation in the sessions to enhance parent and carers learning. Participants are encouraged to offer each other mutual support once the programme ends. To offer reassurance and optimism, voluntary parent graduates are recruited to attend coffee mornings/evenings – sharing their lived experience and the learning and support they received through their participation. Recently the team have been successful in securing funding for a part-time post to employ a parent graduate to co-facilitate programmes and visit parent/carers in their homes. Twelve parents from the current groups have expressed an interest in becoming parent graduates.

The team received 601 referrals in 2023/2024, with approximately 66% of the interventions provided aimed at preventing situations from escalating to the point where children and young people came into local authority care. In 2023/2024 77% of children/young people remained in the care of their own families or wider network. For those who temporarily became Looked After, 4% were successfully reunited with their families. Only 3% of children remain in Bexley’s care where ongoing challenges and complex needs remain. The remaining 16% of families are progressing towards positive outcomes with continued engagement in intervention with children remaining in the family home.

A total of 81% of young people deemed at risk of being on the edge of care engaged successfully and remained at home.

Staying Together work creatively with partners to deliver innovative support for children, young people and families in accessible and imaginative ways. For example, in partnership with Act for Change, Staying Together offer parent workshops on neurodivergence.

They work with London Innovation & Improvement Alliance to offer the Your Choice programme utilizing Cognitive Behavioural Therapy tools and techniques with vulnerable young people. The Community Voice forum was formed to provide the opportunity for the sharing of the most up-to-date information on issues that are most affecting communities. Acknowledging the financial challenges faced by statutory, voluntary, and charitable organizations, Community Voice encourages and supports collaborative working, meeting the identified needs of specific communities. To raise community awareness of support available across Bexley, the organizations are invited annually to participate in the Community Voice “marketplace”. One of the proud moments has been when the community group “Men Matters” received this years’ Bexley’s Mayoral Civic Recognition Award 2024, for Voluntary Services.

The team believes that getting the right support when a family are in the early stages of experiencing difficulties is key for setting them on the right path for a happy, calm, and positive future. Recognizing the Local Authority budget constraints, the Team Manager is relentlessly proactive in researching and securing outside funding to help fulfil the vision of growth. For example, securing funding from the London Councils for Community Engagement which has
allowed partnership work with Act for Change and other community partners. This involves going out into the community, particularly focusing on vulnerable and global majority residents to advocate and build on resilience, up-skilling communities to strengthen their own wellbeing.

Team: Camden Integrated Early Years Service

Main Submission:

Best Start for Baby (IEYS London Borough of Camden)

Overview
BSfB offers families an enhanced health visiting offer through the delivery of the Enhanced Health Child Programme (EHCP). The EHCP is an evidence-based framework for the delivery of public health services to families with a child (conception-5). Families are offered 8 contacts (three additional contacts in addition to the statutory health visiting offer), as well as a range of additional support and interventions (i.e. parent-infant/child relationships, perinatal mental health and family relationships).

Rationale
A growing body of evidence has shown that early childhood interventions can generate significant and long-lasting benefits for the health of their participants (e.g. Conti, Mason and Poupakis, 2019; D’Onise, McDermott and Lynch, 2010). Existing evidence in the field therefore remains limited in its ability to inform whether similar programs would work if offered to less disadvantaged populations and in contexts with a stronger safety net (Cattan et al., 2022). Filling this evidence gap remains a key priory in terms of policy design and service development.

Geographical location(s) of the intervention:
London Borough of Camden: universal offer delivered in the 6 Children’s Centres & Family Hubs

Current status and timescale(s) of the intervention:
Previously tested in smaller areas, with gradual roll-out across the borough. Borough-wide universal offer since March 2024- ongoing commitment to enhanced universal offer and sustainability.

Funding
Best start for life funding has been secured to deliver the intervention. Additional contribution through LBC direct grant (early years budget) & public health budget. Health Visitors and Community Nursery Nurses deliver a significant portion of the programme.

The service is integrated via a s.75 agreement between LBC and CNWL NHS Trust. New contract will begin in April 2025 for 3 years &there is a joint commitment to delivering the EHCP, ensuring BSfB is a sustainable component of the Health Visiting contract and service delivery.

Intervention Start Date:
Pilot from January 2021- BSFB launch March 2024.

Intervention End Date:
Ongoing commitment to developing sustainable service offer.

Impacts:

• Short, medium & longer term outcomes for universal population, then broken down by protected characteristics to allow examination of inequalities.
• Short term (established quantitative & quantitative measures for service activity, engagement and experience).
• Medium to longer term (population level outcomes through routinely collected data, active data, & service outcomes)

Anticipated Impacts:

• Healthy pregnancy (low birth weight, infant mortality, maternal smoking)
• Postnatal (breastfeeding, PMH prevalence, Healthy start uptake, developmental outcomes).
• ROMS EBIs
• Up to 5 (immunisation coverage, dental decay, school readiness; FSM percentage of
  children at expected level, WellComm screening etc)
• A&E attendance
• PMH service usage
• Housing support
• Welfare support
• Early help usage

Public/community involvement or engagement:

• Public health undertook an engagement exercise with families post pilot and prior to the
  start of the recommissioning process.
• We have significant longitudinal quantitative and qualitative feedback measures (i.e.
  ESQ) from March 2024-current day. Families are encouraged to provide feedback when families come into
  BSfB. -Established community of practice for all staff in May 2024. Ongoing co-design of the
  programme and families to be involved in this.
• Inclusion of family representative at BSfB Delivery Group (Autumn 2024).
• Start for Life Parent & Carer panel (ongoing feedback and co-design from March 2024)
• Best Start for Baby parent forum (ongoing feedback and co-design from May 2024) -Information and Engagement Team (trial September 2024 to support families who are DNA)

Additional information:
We currently have an Impact and Reach Project in place (as described above).

Team: People Directorate – Children and Family Services

Main Submission:

Enfield has the 4th highest youth population and pre and post pandemic has continued to face the challenge of having one of the highest volume of victims of serious youth violence in London. As a partnership, we have recognised we could not arrest our way out of the problem, and we needed to be more systematic to address the root causes, rather than responding to the symptoms of the serious youth violence. We have had a plethora of various early interventions in place that evolved over time. We have adopted a public health approach to the prevention of serious youth violence, which required a whole system change. This involved:

• Developing deeper understanding of local needs and drivers of serious youth violence;
• Building on our partnership prevention work efforts;
• Changing our relationship with community safety;
• Reviewing how our early interventions are delivered, commissioned and funded in the context of challenging financial position;
• Re-focusing where we invest our resources to make the biggest impact to intervene
  early;
• Prioritising funding coming via Community Safety through the LCPF via MOPAC and VRU to fund early intervention and prevention to reduce drivers of all forms of violence and ASB alongside of the use of our public health grant;
• Aligning commissioning priorities and seeking new external funding; and
• Providing interventions that reduce risk factors of children to become involved or impacted by violence and building on protective factors, using evidence-based interventions.

We have:

• Adopted a public health approach across the partnership, with public health undertaking detailed needs analysis of SYV problem. See a copy of the assessment uploaded separately. The needs assessment has improved our understanding of risk factors of SYV and protective factors that can help to mitigate those risks. Consequently, we have adopted a philosophy that SYV is everyone’s business, prevention is the best approach and early intervention is key.

• We have identified indicators of risk that have the strongest correlation with SYV in Enfield. Note: Using a range of public health indicators, an analysis of correlation between each indicator and serious youth violence levels was performed at ward level. The indicators showing the strongest association with serious youth violence in Enfield are reflected in the table below The bracketed number indicates the strength of association, where 0.4-0.7 shows a moderate to strong association between the indicator and serious youth violence, with higher values representing a stronger association.

• We have created a clear strategic coherence to enable a strong focus on early intervention and prevention of serious youth violence through coordinated partnership approach.

• We have structurally aligned the Community Safety Team with Children and Families services to strengthen joint working, information sharing and our collective endeavor to tackle serious youth violence. This has bolstered joint working and enabled alignment of funding that comes via Community Safety from VRU and MOPAC to focus on the right interventions to reduce risks to children and young people. This has also strengthened focus on ‘Child First’ approach in all areas of Community Safety initiatives. This is our USP as not many Children Services have Community Safety integrated with them.
• We have reviewed all prevention and intervention programmes in place in the context of impact, value for money, evidence best practice, using the Youth Endowment SYV toolkit and have continued to re-balance our investments in the context of the public health approach to tiers of intervention and prevention, see table 3.

Table 3:

• We have invested into new innovative and evidence-based initiatives through attracting new funding and re-focusing existing funding across partnership to reduce risk to serious youth violence. Securing sufficient funding remains a challenge to deliver sustainable impact due to the fact that external fundings is often too short term, thus making it challenging to make long terms strategic plans. A summary of Public Health Approach Action Plan to prevention of Youth Violence, highlighting in yellow the examples of referenced projects in our submission is submitted as a separate document.

We are piloting a Clear, Hold, Build approach to tackle drivers of violence in Enfield. This is a joint Police and Council lead initiative called Operation Pisces and involves all partners and every Council department. The programme is focused on tackling organised criminality that impacts on the daily lives of the local community and businesses including the criminal exploitation of children and young people. Operation Pisces is focused on the hyper local area of Upper Edmonton and Edmonton Green, which accounts for over 20% of the borough’s total crime.

We continue to achieve low school exclusions and suspensions as a result of the investment into Nexus Project in secondary schools alongside of the work of our schools. School exclusions of children, significantly increases the risks of children becoming involved in risky behaviors that leads to offending. We are very proud of the work of Nexus and our schools.

We have seen reductions of First Time Entrants, suggesting positive impact of the wider partnership and benefits through investment in primary interventions.

We have seen a reduction in Youth Violence. The latest data for youth violence victims volume for twelve months highlight Enfield as the 5/th highest in London, which is a reduction from being the 1st highest. This shows encouraging positive shift in our performance trend trajectory, however, there is a way to go as public health approach is not a quick fix.

There has been positive impact of the Operation Pisces. The multi-agency project started in June 2024 and up to the end of September the crime levels in the area was reduced by 35%. The current crime analysis of the impact of Operation Pisces since it commenced in June
2024, is as follows:

• There has been a 35% reduction in all reported crime across the wards which makes up the Operation Pisces footprint.
• Priority offences including robbery and theft from person has reduced by 50% for the Upper Edmonton area.
• Enfield Borough has recorded a 25% reduction in all reported crime between June 2024 – end of September 2024.

Some examples of how we involve children in co-production and review of our approaches to prevention of SYV:

• Children and families have been involved and consulted in the co-production of the Public Health Needs assessment.
• High levels of satisfaction of children with support provided by the Youth Justice Services, including specific support through YouthXtra personalising interventions to children’s needs and interest.
• Involving children in Operation Sharda, obtaining feedback about safe spaces and places and context where they feel less safe, resulting in increase of detached and outreach youth work, installation of cameras in park where concerns were identified.
• Stop and Search Youth Group.
• Safeguarding Youth Ambassadors.
• Youth Offer consultation.
• Parental surveys within Youth Justice, Early Help.
• Enfield talks, listening to parents supported by children social care.
• Youth Council/Members of Youth Parliament, KRATOS.

Supporting information:

Public Health approach to SYV – partnership action plan 24 summary

Team: SEND and Curriculum Inclusion, The ECASS Team- (Enfield Communication Advisory Support Service)

Partners: Caroline McCallum, Speech and Language Therapist – Founder of NHSVerbo, Henrietta McLachlan, Speech and Language Therapist – Founder of ELKLAN

Main Submission:

The Enfield Communication Advisory Support Service (ECASS) is a Local Authority (LA) speech and language initiative that has successfully addressed the provision gap for Children and Young People (CYP) with speech, language, and communication needs (SLCN) who were unable to have their needs met by the existing Health offer which only provided speech and language provision for those with an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP). This gap in the local offer has led to the high number of Education Health and Care Needs Assessment (EHCNA) requests for CYP with SLCN which makes up approximately 37% of all Enfield EHCPs. The ECASS initiative is effectively narrowing this gap, providing much-needed support to these CYP at SEN support.

The ECASS initiative has fostered a spirit of collaboration within the LA, enabling flexibility in commissioning health and in-house multi-agency colleagues. The service includes Speech and Language Therapists, Occupational Therapists, Educational Psychologists, and Specialist Advisory Teachers. Together, this multidisciplinary team delivers a flexible service to meet the community’s needs while utilising assistive technology to enhance their capacity, making ECASS a cost-efficient SEN Support model. This collaborative approach is key to the success of the initiative.

Fundamental to Enfield’s Local Area key improvement priority, the ECASS approach aims to provide an equitable universal, targeted, and specialist offer which empowers the education workforce with the confidence, knowledge, and self-sufficiency to deliver high-quality teaching to all children and young people. The positive impact of the ECASS initiative on the education workforce is inspiring and has motivated local area partnerships to further collaborate their efforts in this direction.
Enfield’s SEND Partnership are striving to overcome the following exceptional challenges:

• A significant increase in demand for EHCNA, compared to statistical neighbouring boroughs

• A national shortage of speech and language therapists

• A gap in the universal and statutory offer

• An increase in the high-needs financial deficit

• Over-commissioning outside the health contract to meet needs with private therapists

• A lack of both rigor and a coordinated approach in the range of private therapists attempting to meet the needs of Enfield’s children.

A record-high number of CYP (1.9 million) are recorded to have speech and language challenges nationally. If left unsupported, they may face a lifetime of struggle and exclusion. Research led by Speech and Language UK indicates that, without the proper support, these children with SLCN are up to 11 times more likely to be behind in key subjects at school and twice as likely to be unemployed as young adults. This community of CYP in Enfield makes up more than half of mental health service referrals and two-thirds of the young offender population.

Enfield’s ambition is to make every school a communication-friendly school with the skills and resources available to meet the needs of CYP with various speech, language, and communication differences. This includes utilising technological initiatives such as NHSVerbo, a virtual speech and language toolkit which has added capacity to the ECASS team. This has enabled school staff who are already well-placed in settings to continue accessing speech and language strategies through a virtual toolkit, freeing up therapists to focus on providing specialist support which only a therapist can provide; thereby extending the range of specialist resources and provision available. This has enabled the ECASS team to hold a higher caseload and target more direct therapy support to more specialist cases.

To achieve the Enfield ambition, the ECASS team has worked in close partnership with Elklan and NHSVerbo. This collaboration has brought schools an offer that focuses on education workforce development and offers parent/carer-focused training and support to build on strategies taught in school with confidence. Elklan, is a nationally recognised training programme designed to support children’s communication, language, and speech in the classroom which is being delivered as a programme of study to every Enfield school. This partnership ensures that all CYP with SLCN receive the high-quality education they deserve. Members of the ECASS team have also been involved in the national review and coproduction of Elklan training materials for the courses they hold licenses to deliver.

Before investing in Verbo, the Enfield offer did not include speech and language screening or assessment for CYP without an EHCP. Verbo, on average, reaches 48 SEN Support children in each target school, now totalling 580 CYP across 12 Enfield pilot schools. As a result, this has enabled therapists to offer statutory provision to 388 additional pupils across these schools, narrowing the growing statutory provision gap and further reducing the need for commissioning private therapists to meet the needs of these children and young people. This has resulted in a significant cost saving of £556,743 this year. Schools supported by the ECASS team have also seen a 60% decrease in EHCNA requests, as children’s needs are being better met through high quality teaching strategies. This has avoided premature escalation to more specialist pathways, resulting in a further cost savings of £487,500 per academic year. This makes ECASS’ cost saving to Enfield’s high need’s deficit a total of £1,044,243.21 for the academic year 2023-2024.

In addition to the positive impact the service has made on Enfield’s high needs deficit, the service has also had an impact on Enfield’s educational outcomes. 95% of schools supported by ECASS achieved the national average score in the KS1 phonics screening, compared to 66% of non-ECASS-supported schools, and 74% of ECASS-supported schools achieved the London average score, compared to 53% of non-ECASS-supported schools. Further to this, the impact ECASS in Enfield has summoned interest both nationally and internationally. Three neighbouring London boroughs have expressed an interest in learning more about the ECASS offer and how this can be modelled within their respective communities. Nationally, ECASS have extended their reach in sharing their practice with the University of Ghana, as part of the university’s speech and language therapy training programme for therapy students.

ECASS is utilising current resources through innovative delivery to meet demand now and in the future. Every Enfield school will have access to a speech and language therapist to support them in delivering targeted provision to those with the greatest need. In contrast, using VERBO and a multidisciplinary SEN support team such as ECASS, can help schools implement universal support effectively, appropriately streamlining the Assess Plan Do Review (APDR) process. In this way, children who experience speech and language challenges will have the best opportunity to overcome learning barriers, progress towards their educational outcomes and achieve their aspirations and goals.

The service has developed a whole-school communication approach, which is enabling schools and settings to identify speech, language, and communication differences early to provide the proper support in the right place at the right time. The 2023 Local Area SEND inspection recognised the service for maximising the communication and education outcomes for CYP with SLCN. As quoted by Ofsted:

“The needs of CYP with SEND are typically identified promptly. For example, the Enfield Communication Advisory Support Service (ECASS) provides school settings with a whole-school communication approach to aid early intervention and train education staff. This ensures that children’s speech, language, and communication needs are identified and met promptly.”

CYP are at the heart of the speech and language offered in school and at home. CYP have made significant progress in their targets, and families have informed us that they feel more confident meeting their children’s and young people’s needs. Our schools are highly supportive of the offer. They have found that their staff are more skilled in identifying needs and feel confident supporting children without escalating to statutory support.

Feedback from an ECASS setting:

“The input we have had from ECASS has been relevant and personalised to our setting. Staff have received training on areas of SEN that are often forgotten, and this has allowed the school to upskill staff whilst gaining a broad understanding of the varied presentations of speech, language and communication difficulties. Erin has been a great sounding board and has provided excellent advice. She has taken the time to get to know our school and understand the needs of our students. The Latymer has hugely benefited from being an ECASS target school and the input we have received has been far-reaching, impacting students, curriculum, and environment.”

Supporting Information:

For direct quotes from schools, children, young people and families we have worked with, please see our ECASS Annual Report.

Page 17-22- Feedback from Education Workforce
Page 26 – Parent feedback
Page 28- Child/Young Person feedback

Team: Stop and Search Safeguarding Project

Partners: Metropolitan Police Service North Area BCU, London Innovation and Improvement Alliance (LIIA)

Main Submission:

Stop and Search through a Safeguarding Lens

Collaboration is the bedrock of effective child safeguarding. The London Borough of Haringey Children’s Services and the Metropolitan Police Service in North Area BCU have, since 2020, been working on a phased project to improve the safeguarding response to children who are stopped and searched. The project aims to consider the information obtained by the police in using their power of stop and search and, where there are wider safeguarding concerns, how these young people can benefit from timely support and interventions.

The learning from this project has been invaluable and has informed changes to systems and processes in Haringey including adjusting the screening within the Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub and requesting individualised child stop and search data to enhance risk prevention plans via Multi Agency Child Exploitation meetings.

Together with London Innovation and Improvement Alliance (LIIA) we are delivering this pan London project phase and have 29 Local Authorities and 12 BCUs participating. Galvanising the safeguarding body of professionals, we are working to strengthen the mechanism by which children at risk are identified through stop and search, how information is shared, and to ensure children are provided with better safeguarding support interventions. Our project builds on a child centred approach, serves to create safer communities and reduce trauma to children where this could occur. It aligns with the commitments made in a New Met for London and delivers on the priority set by the Association of London Directors of Children’s Services to build safety for young Londoners

Team: Prevention and Diversion Service, Early Help and Prevention

Main Submission:

Improving youth voice and the understanding of the lived experience of young people coming into contact with the Police and Youth Justice system

Hackney’s Youth Justice Board Good Practice Grant funds the Prevention and Diversion Team within Young Hackney. This team provides Out-of-Court Diversionary interventions (OoCD) for young people aged 10-18, working with various agencies to address the complex needs of these children.

Over 80% of the children in the cohort are Black and Global Majority, often facing complex, traumatic family situations like domestic violence, parental mental health issues, substance misuse, SEND needs, and school exclusion, frequently in the context of
systemic racism.

The team’s child-first, systemic, anti-racist, restorative, and trauma-informed approach has been successful in engaging children and building strong relationships. Additionally, the involvement of residents aged 19-25 in Out of Court Joint Decision (OoCD) Making Panels has helped build trust within the community. The P&D team’s commitment to anti-racist and anti-oppressive practices is evident in their assessment process, which allows for open discussion of experiences of racism and discrimination from children and families’ perspectives and enables practitioners to advocate alongside and on their behalf. The collaboration with Speech and Language Therapists and the establishment of a Youth Justice Health Huddle have further improved the support provided to young people. If the SaLT therapist identifies any potential communication triggers, they immediately inform the judge, which has proven to be a significant asset to the YJS. Additionally, when a young person known to the YJS has communication needs, SaLT makes themselves available in court. Their presence, along with their engagement with parents, is making a marked difference in young people’s experience and outcomes. The HMiP Joint Inspection Report (May 2023) highlighted this approach as an area of outstanding practice.

Outcomes show that diversion from the formal YJS is effective, over the last 7 years we have had fewer than 1 in 5 children go on to enter the formal Youth Justice System after receiving our diversion support. Over 80% do not go on to become First Time Entrants within the following 18 months (82%-86% of children receiving a Triage Disposal). Importantly, despite what the Lammy Review found in 2017, Black and Global Majority children are volunteering to engage in Hackney’s offer (this cohort is over-represented in the makeup of our work) and there is strong evidence that they achieve the same positive outcomes as their White counterparts. Research from Middlesex University (2023) also indicates that ethnic background does not affect outcomes once children are referred to P&D.

Feedback from children and parents.
Parent: “(Worker), where do I begin? You worked with us once and I was happy. You worked with us for a second time and I was even more happy. You have changed our lives. The biggest thing was our home, we lived there (hostel) since we moved to the UK and never thought it would happen for us, but you always make it happen. Then (Child) and his education. I am speechless, thank you for everything”. Parent: ‘’I was very pleased with the level of support offered to my daughter, stating that, though it is a shame something bad had to happen, (child) was able to work with a department that was able to help her in ways I could not, your communication with both schools and with other workers and to then report back to me was helpful to knowing (child) progress, so thank you for that”

Child: “It was needed, as if this didn’t, who knows what further trouble I could have got into. I would have never done the victim stuff, which has really helped me to be a better person. So, yeah, I think more people should do this. I am definitely not as distracted as I was before, I feel like I have grown, doing that stuff with the email (restorative justice), I know I did wrong, but I have done something positive from it. You gave me feedback, printed the document for my Mum and you sent screenshots to my Mum, telling her about my hard work and then today, (victim worker) joined to tell me how positive and impactful my efforts were in giving the victim something. All this stuff has helped me realise and focus on what’s important, ME”.

Child: “I’m so much calmer now, I actually felt like I might be going crazy before so it was a big relief just to talk to someone about it. Do you know that I never mentioned those things to a single person before? You guys came at the right time for me – regardless of getting in trouble for the knife, I just needed to talk to someone. Yeah I’m calm now and I won’t get in trouble again. I know that things are normal and it happens to everyone, and I know how to relax my brain now! I do need a job though and I’ll keep applying and I’ll talk to the lady from Prospects, and I’ll have another try with Supporting Families if you tell them to contact me again as well. Thank you for helping me, I definitely won’t pick up anything like that again, it’s not worth it. Thank you to the guy (clinician) as well.”

Next Steps

We have a project pending approval within our CE police locally to reduce the numbers of Black and Global Majority and White children who appear in court for low level offences following a ‘no comment’ interview. This proposes using a Deferred Prosecution offer (or Outcome 22 on the police record) made by Hackney YJS to the child, their family and their defence team.

Main Submission:

About two years ago Hammersmith and Fulham introduced the in Virtual Reality (VR) technology to enhance the educational experiences of children, young people, and their caregivers. This innovative approach addresses several exceptional challenges, including childhood trauma, substance abuse, and extra-familial harm such as criminality, youth crime, gang involvement, child sexual exploitation, and peer-on-peer abuse.

Motivated by the need to tackle these issues, the program aims to create immersive learning experiences that allow participants to understand the consequences of their decisions in a safe environment. By simulating various dilemmas and their outcomes, the VR experience helps improve decision-making skills and fosters empathy and resilience among children and young people.

The objectives of the initiative include providing early intervention and preventative measures to reduce risks such as youth violence and exploitation. The program is a collaborative effort involving Early Help Practitioners, school staff, probation services, and youth justice services, with the ultimate goal of creating a supportive and informed community that can effectively address the challenges faced by children and young people. The program also focuses on building empathy and fostering resilience among children and young people through immersive and reflective learning experiences.

To deliver on this commitment, several actions and activities have been implemented. The VR education program, in partnership with Virtual Decisions, uses VR headsets to simulate multiple dilemmas, allowing participants to experience the consequences of their decisions in a 360° interactive environment.

Training and workshops are conducted in both group and individual sessions. The VR training is included in the existing Traded offer package for local primary and secondary schools to support stakeholders as an intervention and preventative tool.

Best practices implemented include experiential learning through interactive scenarios and feedback mechanisms to facilitate rich discussions and reflections.

Securing buy-in and overcoming obstacles involved strong leadership, clear structures, and training practitioners in the delivery of VR. Budget and resources were allocated to support the program, addressing capacity challenges by training more practitioners and integrating services between Early Help and Youth Justice Service.

By implementing these actions, activities, and best practices, the initiative aims to create a supportive and informed community that can effectively address the
challenges faced by children and young people.

The implementation of the Virtual Reality (VR) education program has shown significant positive impacts, demonstrating that the best practices are making a meaningful difference. Here is the evidence and description of the outcomes:

1,Enhanced Understanding and Decision-Making:

• Participants, including children, young people, and caregivers, have reported a better understanding of the consequences of their decisions.
  The immersive VR scenarios have helped them recognise dangerous situations and think critically about their choices.

2. Improved Emotional Well-being:

• The VR program has contributed to reducing the emotional impact on children by helping them form positive friendships and report inappropriate information. This has led to a decrease in the risk of exploitation and grooming.

3. Reduction in Youth Violence:

• Group workshops involving VR have been effective in reducing youth violence. Young people who participated in these sessions were able to understand and learn from each other, leading to a reduction in their involvement in community violence.

4. Positive Feedback from Participants:

• Participants have strongly agreed that VR is an effective way to teach PSHE topics. They found the program engaging and realistic, which made the learning experience more impactful.

5. Rich Discussions and Reflections:

• Observations of VR sessions have shown that the scenarios prompted rich discussions between staff. These discussions helped children articulate why they made certain choices and understand the consequences of their actions.

6. Increased Confidence and Risk Awareness:

• Some participants became more confident and willing to take calculated risks after experiencing the VR scenarios. They were able to recognise and
  avoid dangerous situations, demonstrating increased awareness and better decision-making skills.

7. Broader Reach and Engagement:

• The VR program has been successfully delivered to a wide range of stakeholders, including Early Help Practitioners, school staff, probation services, and youth justice services. This broad engagement has helped in creating a more informed and supportive community.

8. Feedback from Children and Caregivers:

• Children have expressed that the VR sessions helped them understand peer pressure and develop resilience. Caregivers, including foster carers, have learned valuable lessons on how to support their children better.

Broader Relevance and Lessons for Other Local Authorities
The success of the VR education program offers several lessons that other Local Authorities can learn from:

1.Innovative Approaches:

• Embracing technology like VR can create immersive and impactful learning experiences that traditional methods may not achieve. This approach can be adapted to various educational and social contexts.

2. Collaborative Efforts:

• Building strong partnerships with different stakeholders, including schools, probation services, and youth justice services, is crucial.
  Collaboration ensures a comprehensive support system for children and young people.

3, Early Intervention and Prevention:

• Focusing on early intervention and preventative measures can significantly reduce risks such as youth violence and exploitation. Programs that raise awareness and educate about these issues are essential.

4. Empathy and Resilience Building:

• Programs that foster empathy and resilience help children and young people navigate challenges more effectively. These qualities are vital for their personal development and well-being.

5. Feedback and Continuous Improvement:

• Regular feedback from participants helps refine and improve the program. Listening to the voices of children, families, and staff ensures that the initiative remains relevant and effective.

By considering these broader themes and lessons, other Local Authorities can implement similar initiatives to address shared challenges and improve outcomes for children and young people in their communities.

Team: Family Hub Transformation team.

Partners: Merton Connected, Keystone Marketing, KidsFirst (parent/carer forum)

Main Submission:

In late 2021, Merton applied for transformation funding to support borough wide implementation of the DfE Family Hub programme. Since November 2022 Merton has, alongside 12 other successful LA’s worked diligently to initiate and embed widescale change in the way that Early Help services are accessed and experienced by babies, children, young people and their families.

Moving to a place-based delivery model with strong focus on ‘Access, Connections and Relationships’ has been achieved with careful planning, navigation and engagement across a wide stakeholder landscape. The need to talk with, hear and respond to the views of local families has remained front and centre of early development work.

Embedding the ‘Family Hub’ brand and a shared understanding of the concept has taken time. The evolution of ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ was driven by a need to develop simple language and messaging about how Family Hub services would be experienced by those who use and deliver them.

The development of ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ (or visual pledge as it is often referred) was an iterative process, drawing initially, from insights and feedback gained through engagement and consultation activity. This included:

1) Discussions with parents who had joined ‘Merton Family Voice’ (a parent/carer forum where feedback on various aspects of transformation has been sought).

2) Conversations with young people and families who attended the Family Hub launch event in August 2023.

3) Feedback shared by VCFSE partners in a series of workshops aimed to build relationships with third sector organisations (many of whom represent the views/experiences of lesser groups within our local communities).

4) Structured activity held during a Partner Engagement Day (19.01.24) where views were sought on the shaping of a visual pledge.

A visual illustrator was drafted in to translate words into pictures. This was considered important to ensure that the messaging about Merton Family Hubs is understood and accessible to a diverse audience, including younger children, families with SEND, people with learning needs and those with English as an additional language. Young people also told us that any information needed to be easy to both read and understand.

Five versions of ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ were drafted before landing a final product. Each draft was consulted on, and feedback drawn from several sources (including the audiences has allowed Merton to be fully assured that the inception of ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ is truly informed by co-production and collaborative working, supporting a sense of borough wide ‘ownership’ regarding the programme and its aspirations.

This mode of engagement and consultative approach has enabled families and delivery partners to contribute to the shaping of Merton’s Early Help/Family Hub offer. We recognise that for many families, the support provided through Our Merton Family Hub has made a huge difference when managing very challenging circumstances and whilst waiting for specialist health interventions. This has been of particular significance to parents of children with SEND, who have told us how Family Hub services have really helped them to better care for their children when they become dysregulated. The interface with ‘Kids First’ has helpfully shaped the framing of Merton’s approach to better reflect and respond to the lived experience of families with SEND and work towards improving outcomes through an effective support offer.

Using the strapline ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ and displaying this widely across buildings, promotional material, websites, presentations and communications has also promoted a sense of collection and belonging. Families told us that they wanted Family Hubs to be somewhere with more opportunities to ‘drop in to’ and meet other parents when the opportunity arises. This is reflected in various ways within both the visual pledge and through the developing Family Hub service offer. As a direct result of feedback, we have increased drop-in sessions across our Family Information and Support Hubs, Open Garden Sessions, MIASS and delivered more open access ‘on off’ events for Families to attend. This has been well received with over 100 family members attending a recent open garden session at one of our Family Hub network delivery locations.

Children young people and parents each contributed to the shaping of this work. Parents of children with SEND shared helpful feedback on use of colours and imaging to support greater full accessibility. Whilst efforts were made to reduce the amount of text within the visual for ‘Our Merton Family Hub’ some parents shared that the visual had too many images and not enough information. Based on this feedback, a decision was taken to develop a separate booklet for parents which explains Family Hub services and the support available. These have been shared at various engagement events with parents reporting that the information contained within these booklets has been a useful source of reference.

We are planning to revisit the effectiveness of our FH brand (including our visual pledge) as part of ongoing review and evaluation activity. This will involve the development of a practitioner resource tool kit which partners will be invited to use in their engagement with families and young people to gauge feedback on perception and experience of support through Merton Family Hub.

Supporting Information:

Team: Edge of Care Team

Main Submission:

The challenge of recurring removals of infants from their parents is a particular issue for Tower Hamlets where 40% of care order applications involve parents who have previously lost custody of at least one infant.

These parents face complex and interwoven challenges. Their histories are often marked by childhood trauma, neglect, and repeated interactions with the care system, leaving them distrustful of professional services and hesitant to engage. Because their children are removed, these parents often become ineligible or untrusting of long-term support. The cycle of infant removal perpetuates their exclusion from essential services, reinforcing patterns of crisis and instability. The Diamond Project was designed to break this cycle by providing the support necessary for parents to improve their lives and future parenting prospects.

Consideration was given to using the Pause Programme, but this is a costly option and imposes some conditions upon the mothers. Tower Hamlets aimed to create a similar, cost-effective project within an established service, ensuring sustainability and innovation at a smaller scale. The Diamond Project was integrated into the existing multi-disciplinary Edge of Care Team which allowed the project to leverage pre-existing relationships and networks within Children’s Services.

The name of the project was chosen because diamonds are strong and unbreakable, qualities we wanted parents to see within themselves so that they felt empowered to make changes in their lives.

The project aims to help referred parents to achieve the following four objectives:

1. Being a parent -Staying in contact with their children and contributing to their lives.
2. Staying healthy – Improving their health, including mental health, self-regard, and safer sexual practices.
3. Staying safe – Avoiding abusive relationships and building safer ones.
4. Being in control – Building security, accommodation, income, employment, and self-confidence.

The project was developed from the ground up as an innovative initiative funded by Tower Hamlets Council (LBTH) and the London Innovation and Improvement Alliance (LIIA). This was in consultation with the East London Family Court and with support from local stakeholders (RESET/CGL, The East London NHS Foundation Trust, OCEAN Mental Health Service and Perinatal MH Service, EAFC Positive Change, Adult Services Community Learning Disability Service, Adoption London East, and Tower Hamlets Housing. Parents who themselves experienced the repeat removal of their children have been consulted to be active partners in the development of the offer.

The Manager for the Edge of Care Team led the project, which was integrated into her team. This setup facilitated trust and effective working relationships, ensuring that referrals were appropriate and timely. This allowed the practitioner to be part of the multi-disciplinary team, providing support and containment.

In the first year, the project faced challenges with limited capacity of one practitioner, but we resolved this by increasing staff and leveraging partnerships. The Better Together Framework provided a consistent language and approach, fostering collaboration and resource-sharing among diverse stakeholders and allowing the project to build a robust network of partner agencies, facilitating the development of our offer.

To date the project has received 23 referrals for support for parents, and we have worked with 16 of those mothers. Some referrals were not accepted as parent was living outside the borough, or they had older children living in their care, or were already pregnant and did not meet the criteria. Where we could, we sign posted them to other services.

In light of a positive evaluation, the project has been extended for a second year, with two workers. This extension provides enhanced stability, enabling more parents to benefit from the program. Additionally, the group offer has been implemented to support as requested by parents from gathered feedback. The group will provide peer support to parents, specifically focusing on addressing the loss they have experienced. This is planned to be a tri-borough initiative, coordinated with Ocean Mental Health NHS service, supported by a clinical psychologist.

Due to our project’s small scale and capacity, our support has primarily focused on mothers, though we recognise that fathers also face recurrent care proceedings. While some joint support has been extended to fathers, it has mostly involved activities like writing letters to their children or referrals to relevant services. Recently, we decided to trial working with a father who has agreed to receive support. This approach is not yet tested, but we hope that with a larger project in the future, we will be able to expand this support

In Year 1, the project worked with 10 parents who had a total of 39 children removed from their care. None of those has had any further care proceeding at this point two years on.

The pilot service achieved several positive outcomes for the 10 parents in the 12 months of the project. Some examples of our first-year impact taken from the evaluation are:

• All 10 women are now registered with a GP
• 2 women facing homelessness are now moved to permanent housing
• 3 women were supported to rebuild family relationships
• 4 women have received counselling or advice around drug and alcohol use
• 7 women have had some advice and support intervention around partner violence

One woman was assisted in accessing the Adult Community Learning Disability Service (CLDS), where she was diagnosed with previously undetected learning difficulties. She now receives support from this service and has been working effectively with its staff, enabling us to conclude our involvement. One partner of a woman was referred for Autism assessment.

Feedback from parents was positive:

“The worker is lovely. She listens to me, and she visits me at home and gives me time. I wanted to understand why my children were taken away. I looked at my papers with her, she helped me to understand it better.”

“She helped me write letters to my children and attends appointments with me as I have learning difficulties.”

“She helped me to be in contact with my children. I didn’t have the letterbox contact but now with support I have the contact and up to date information.”

“If it wasn’t for the worker, I’d be on the streets now”

“My confidence was very low when my children were taken, I didn’t take very good care of myself. She just picked me up and helped me to get on with things.”

Partners have said:

“I cannot over emphasise the importance of having a social worker who is alongside and working for the mothers. She understands her clients’ needs and is able to advocate for them to access the right support.” – Clinical Lead

“This is a service that has been needed for a long time” – CLDS

Team: Universal Plus

Main Submission:

Universal Plus was originally launched as a pilot with two schools in a geographical locality within the Borough where the Head Teachers had shared they were identifying similar themes for pupils and families who were presenting with needs that were above the level of support the School support system was able to offer. Due to the success of the pilot, it was then agreed this would be rolled out across all Localities. The Universal Plus Service was then developed as part of the wider Early Help service offer, establishing a Universal Plus Multi-Disciplinary Team with representatives from various services to coordinate support for families. This light-touch intervention involved a remote offer of support to swiftly link families with the right services. The Early Help Partnership Board oversaw the introduction of the Universal Plus model, which has been continuously reviewed and refined to meet the changing needs of children, families, and young people in the Borough.

The Universal Plus model uses a key-worker system, with cases allocated to a lead practitioner deemed most appropriate to support the family’s needs, supported by the completion of an outcome star assessment. This assessment tool is used to understand the families’ strengths and needs, establish actions, and record the work undertaken by the practitioners in partnership with the family before and after the intervention has been completed to measure the change that has occurred. The Early Help Partnership Board conducted a consultation process to secure buy-in from relevant partners and services, highlighting the effectiveness of Early Help when delivered in collaboration to provide early support to vulnerable children and families. One of the main aims of the Universal Plus service is to break down barriers to communication between service users and services, to ensure the family receive the right support and help they require in a timely way. This requires the presence of key partners at the MDT meetings.

Initially, the Universal Plus Service involved light-touch intervention without direct face-to-face contact. This has evolved to now include some face-to-face contacts, often taking place in a children’s centre, to complete practical tasks and link families in with the Best Start for Life offer so sustained support remains in place upon case closure. Cases are allocated to practitioners based in the Early Help Service including to parenting and early years’
practitioners. This has enabled targeted parenting interventions being offered and support for expectant parents and parents with very young children to deliver innovative interventions to ensure positive and sustainable changes are made and offered at the right time. The Universal Plus Service aligns with the Supporting Families programme and the continued commitment for the service to strengthen support for the most vulnerable families by intervening at an early stage.

Referrals to the Universal Plus Service for April 2023 to March 2024 have increased compared to the previous financial year by 4.2%. This is consistent with previous years but we have seen larger increases over the past 2 quarters in comparison to the beginning of the year. Recent data shows an increase in referrals for housing needs (risk of eviction, poor housing, and homelessness), followed by domestic abuse and violence, and families new to the borough who are experiencing social isolation. Families in temporary accommodation often need to be linked with universal services (GP/Health) and have access to legal support and advice.

A comprehensive directory of resources has been collated to support signposting and onward referrals to assist Lead practitioners in locating the most appropriate service. The MDT also enables issues to be shared and escalated where necessary regarding housing and health for example, so this can be followed up promptly.

Supporting information:

Summary of the Early Help MASH Social Worker’s Observations and Outcomes of the Universal Plus MDT

The Early Help MASH Social Worker has identified a wide range of recurring themes. The majority of referrals originate from schools, particularly primary schools. Within the MASH, it has also been noted that most early help support requests are linked to schools.

The Universal plus MDT addresses a diverse array of family support needs; however, the most common reasons for referral include housing challenges and low school attendance. The ongoing housing crisis in Havering continues to pose significant challenges for families engaged with the MDT. Many families report being unaware of the housing options and support services available to them.

The Universal Plus allocated worker has played a critical role in supporting families by facilitating appropriate referrals and connecting them with local services such as Peabody, Housing Solutions, and the YMCA One Stop Shop. Families are also provided with information about local estate agents that accept Universal Credit. This has been particularly beneficial, as many families face difficulties securing private rentals due to the absence of guarantors or the inability to pay deposits required by some agencies. Additionally, the lead worker has obtained and disseminated up-to-date information about Havering’s Rent Deposit Scheme, equipping families with the resources needed to access housing options.

While some families close to Universal Plus without their housing issues fully resolved, they are better informed about their options and the services available to them. Through these efforts, the Universal plus MDT continues to deliver targeted, practical support to families in need, particularly with the assistance of information shared by housing representatives.

The team provides support across a variety of areas, with a particular focus on managing health-related needs, such as facilitating referrals to CAMHS or Speech and Language Therapy (SLT). We also assist families who have recently relocated to the area and may be unfamiliar with local services and resources. Additionally, we address concerns related to ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages), anti-social behaviour, and parenting support.

Example of Best Practice and Positive Impact on Families.

Case study:

A mother with two young children, aged three and five, fled domestic violence and left the marital home. The police provided temporary accommodation in a caravan, located in an unfamiliar area, which lacked heating. The mother experienced isolation and limited access to support.

The Universal plus coordinator collaborated with Local Area Coordinators to connect the mother to essential services. This included directing her to warm spaces in Havering, where the family received hot meals and takeaway food. The mother was also informed about a free Christmas party for her children and was encouraged to attend local children’s centre for “stay and play” sessions, which on this occasion did not require prior booking. These activities helped alleviate her isolation while providing her children with a safe and engaging environment.

Additionally, the lead worker assisted another family by supporting the mother in securing a school placement for her child. The mother, overwhelmed by her circumstances, expressed gratitude for the reassurance and guidance she received. She stated, “At times, my mind gets very overwhelmed with everything going on. The phone calls and support made things much easier to understand and navigate.”

Through collaborative efforts and tailored support, the Universal plus MDT has demonstrated its ability to make a meaningful impact on families in Havering. By addressing immediate needs and equipping families with knowledge and resources, the team continues to foster resilience and improve outcomes for those facing challenging circumstances.

Team: Housing Specialist

Main Submission:

1. Introduction to the initiative and motivations for action; description of exceptional challenges, ambitions and objectives for undertaking the work.

The UK’s housing crisis, with increasing shortage of housing, has been at the focus of many news reports. As from 2020, England has had the highest proportion of inadequate housing in Europe.

The impact of this housing crisis has, unsurprisingly, continually compounded the issues our vulnerable families face. Housing issues both indirectly and directly impact on the safeguarding of children. It is not just the issues that impact on parental mental health, substance misuse, and domestic abuse, but also the situational impact from children living in temporary accommodation, the physical impact of damp, mould and other disrepair, the challenge of social and emotional development with overcrowding and the impact of eviction and homelessness to name a few.

With housing issues having such a profound impact on the work we undertake, just over a year ago we adopted a new and innovative approach to this tsunami of need. Achieving for Children has a Housing and Outreach team, which includes a dedicated housing specialist.

Our housing specialist has offered over 185 consultations to teams within children’s services. They work with social workers as well as external agencies including housing departments to offer advice and support with cases where housing issues are an additional concern.

The housing specialist provides strategies around empowering colleagues to understand legislation and processes, and to promote effective networking with housing departments and other social housing and private sector landlords. Effectively the role is one of bridging the field of housing and social care, rather than these areas being separate entities.

2. Details of actions, activities and initiatives designed to deliver on this commitment; or description of the best practice implemented and delivered; securing buy-in across relevant teams, obstacles overcome, leadership, structures and budget to achieve the objectives, being sure to emphasise the relevant common themes referenced above

With social care colleagues having the opportunity to upskill their knowledge around housing issues, we are continually looking at strategies to provide early help. This includes highlighting housing issues as part of our initial assessment when families access social care services, such as around disrepair. Colleagues are being equipped to recognize the initial stages of concern that lead to homelessness, such as being aware of court action and issues around rent arrears. Using data from the individual consultations we regularly examine themes where wider strategies need to be developed. This has included issues around overcrowding, disrepair and the impact on housing need on domestic abuse.

3. Evidence that the best practice is having an impact; o description of the effect on outcomes and how the best practice has made/is making a difference

After five years of persistently asking for support with damp and mould without any progress, the housing specialist intervened with the social landlord. The family in this case were acutely vulnerable and mum had recently passed away. After the intervention, a full scale renovation of the property was organised and the family placed in suitable accommodation close by to the children’s school to allow them to continue engaging with services while the renovation was underway. Dad said, “Thank you, for the first time in ages we have something to look forward to.”

4. Voice of the child; o wherever possible, please include the voice of children, families and staff to provide testimony on the work being submitted.

We have found that often in housing issues, the voice and experience of the child is often overlooked. We are working on strategies to capture the voice of children on their experience of living with housing issues including living in unsuitable accommodation, being in temporary accommodation, and the impact of damp and mould.

We are currently working on a project capturing the voice of the child in anti-social behaviour cases where the impact on children is often neglected. This includes detailed interviews with children about how they perceive the anti-social behaviour and the unique worries and impacts that they experience.

Team: Flourish Team

Partners: Children’s Social Care colleagues, SLAM, Lambeth housing department, GAIA,
Camberwell Sexual health clinic, DASL.

Main Submission:

National research over the last decade highlights the alarming rates in which mothers who have had a child removed from their care, re-appear in the family courts facing the same difficulties as at the point of the previous removal (Alrouh et al. 2022). They themselves have faced their own adverse childhood experiences and a considerable number are care experienced. They are dealing with complex and unresolved trauma as adults and the loss of their own children through the family courts only compounds this. The support for parents after child removal is sparse and hard to access leaving them stuck in a cycle of abuse, trauma, and child removal.

Recognising the unmet need of these birth parents as well as the long-term impact on their children (who themselves are subsequently at risk of recurrent care proceedings), Lambeth Children’s Services developed a targeted service that could meet the needs of this marginalised community. The aim being working alongside women to break the cycle of repeat proceedings, reduce the number of children coming into care and the unsustainable high costs that are associated with this and take control of their wide-ranging support needs.

Lambeth’s Flourish service was formed in March 2021 after an initial scoping exercise completed by the organisation PAUSE, highlighting the local need for a service to tackle recurrent care proceedings. Whilst inspired by PAUSE, the Flourish model does not have a contraception element to their eligibility criteria and developing the service locally allowed for a model that meets the unique needs of Lambeth’s community.

Flourish’s primary offer is an eighteen-month intensive programme for birth mothers where a final court order is made that their child could not remain in their care. Flourish’s comprehensive approach, which includes intensive support, relational practice, and assertive outreach, is designed to help these women navigate their grief, access hard to reach services, reduce their isolation and rebuild their lives. Most recently, Flourish have developed a peer support group for women in this pathway to tackle their isolation and support their well-being.

The development of a separate pathway to provide emotional support to women currently going through care proceedings was a proactive step to address feedback from birth parents that they needed hep earlier in the process. This also lays the foundations for them to access our long-term support if final separation is ordered.

Flourish recognises there is a limitation to how much impact a small team (two practitioners and one manager) with limited resources can have supporting women with such complex support needs. We therefore built partnerships with our colleagues internally and externally to promote a whole-system approach to the issue of recurrent care proceedings. We have done this through fast track, trauma informed, pathways with partner agencies such as with sexual health and advocacy services.

We also run well attended monthly reflective workshops with our colleagues to discuss key themes in our work with this group of women. These sessions are informed by research, best practice guidance and most importantly, the lived experience of the women we support. In addition, we are an active member of the national ‘Supporting Parents Community of Practice’ (facilitated by the Centre for Child and Family Justice Research) to learn through peers delivering services across the country and support national research aiming to influence policy around recurrent care proceedings.

A small-scale evaluation of Flourish was conducted at 18 months and considered the impact for eight women who consented to participate. The quantitative evidence demonstrated women improved; engagement with services, access to contraception and contact with their children. The qualitative results revealed women’s experiences of safe relationships, self-worth, and quality of life.

Our internal analysis of the data for the 62 women Flourish have been able to support directly since March 2021 also evidences improved relationships with their children through child contact, access to health services, ETE opportunities and safe housing.

Flourish focuses on supporting women with their individual needs, recognizing the importance of their maternal identity but not setting goals for reuniting them with their children. However, when it is deemed safe and in the best interest of the child, reunification is celebrated. Several women working with Flourish have successfully reunited with or retained care of their children since starting the program.

OFSTED and the Centre for Justice Innovation have recognized Flourish’s impactful work. OFSTED’s 2022 inspection highlighted the compassionate and comprehensive support provided by Flourish, noting improved outcomes for mothers and their children. Additionally, being finalists for the Nick Crichton Award for Family Justice in 2023 underscores the innovative efforts in creating a fairer, more effective justice system and improving outcomes.

Flourish actively seeks to learn from the women we support. They are invited to share their insights with senior leaders in strategic forums to help shape practice. They also share feedback about their Flourish experience, and this provides a powerful insight into the impact of this work:

“J reflects on her progress during our work; being alcohol free for over a year, experiencing life as worth living and looking forward to the future. She believes she has been offered the perspective that she still has a life without her children in her care and she can continue her role as a mother in a different way.” – birth parent

“I was lost, broken, angry every time I see their little faces was like my heart got ripped out and put back in again. I am not able to tell you that pain gets better as it don’t but I can tell you that having Flourish has really helped me over the last 18 months to process and make sense of it so I can be at my best for my children.” – birth parent

“We met on the Monday and by Friday I already had a roof, somewhere to go, my mental health was getting sorted out. She made me get a blood test done, we went to the sexual health clinic, she helped me with the GP, she helped with a lot of things”- birth parent.

Supporting information:

Recurrent care proceedings: five key areas for reflection from the research – Nuffield Family Justice Observatory

Flourish | Centre for Justice Innovation

Team: Detached Youth Detached Youth Work Team, London Borough of Merton Community Placed Based Universal Youth Service

Partners: Mitcham Salvation Army, London Borough of Merton: Family Hub Team; Youth Offending Service; Early Help Team; Public Health Team; UTURN Contextual Safeguarding Team; Phipps Bridge Youth Centre, Partnership for Young Merton, St Giles Trust, Met Police Youth & School Engagement and Safer Neighbourhood Teams

Main Submission:

As Merton’s Detached Youth Work Team, we work as part of a whole systems approach to situational awareness and contextual safeguarding with vulnerable children and young people (CYP) from a multi-dimensional approach underpinned by youth mentoring. We contribute to several meetings including: Safer Merton partnership; Mapping Intelligence; MACE; Pollards Hill Community & Working Groups; East Merton Primary Care Network; Partnership for Young Merton; HAF Steering Group; Family Hub Locality and Youth Service Team meetings. Over the years, Mitcham Town Centre has had significant crime and anti-social behaviour issues many of which are related to adults, but it is also a place where lots of CYP either congregate or travel through. Because of this we recognise the inequalities in East Merton and have engaged directly with CYP to help bring about long-term positive changes that reduce the likelihood of them being involved in criminal activity either as victims or perpetrators. This network and knowledge has enabled us to track groups and map any issues arising and thus understand the local environment, their families and CYP’s friends as highly influential system in their life’s.

The need for this project has been identified through several channels, including our own Detached Youth Work and reconnaissance in East Merton as well as research conducted by the local authority and other social partners. In addition to this we looked at the findings of ‘The impact of Covid-19 on CYP who live in Merton’ report and ‘Merton CYP’s Plan 2024/28’. Both documents flagged that CYP don’t think they have enough said in the decision making and planning of their own services. We therefore adopted a participatory approach to ensure equal power with CYP; us as practitioners; and other social partners as well. We pioneered
this by developing relationships with four young people in the area who formed a small steering group to help us shape this youth offer. They undertook the role of peer consultants and worked with the Mitcham Town Centre and Detached Youth Work Managers to identify the gaps in youth provision in the area. We also worked with the Safer Merton Analyst and the Serious Youth Violence Lead to conduct further community and stakeholder engagement. What we identified instead of constantly ‘hot spotting’ and ‘firefighting’ issues, we had to have a placed based offer to nurture equitable relationships between vulnerable CYP and us, the trusted adults. By recognising this duality and bringing together all this intel at an Acacia Family Hub Locality Meeting in May this year, our Detached Youth Work Team launched a ground breaking initiative in partnership with the Salvation Army and created the Mobile Youth Hub.

Our biggest challenge initially was that there was no youth provision in Mitcham Town Centre. We had no funding allocated for the project so we had to approach various agencies in the area to see if we could get free access to a space. After getting local buy in, our next challenge was where to park the double decker bus safely and securely for four hours. Other challenges included limited resources to support parents who came onto the bus during the youth sessions. To counteract this, we approached Early Help FISH to work with the Salvation Army earlier in the day so that they could deal with some of the parental themes that came up.

Our Mobile Youth Hub offers a welcoming atmosphere and has comfortable seating; games consoles; food and a friendly team of youth work practitioners. Our activities are diverse and include drop-in sessions; workshops; activities; 121 Mentoring; and signposting. We know this engagement only works through a complex interplay of individual and system relationships from several stakeholders, therefore the other agencies that have joined us on the bus have included: the Met Police; London Fire Brigade; Catch 22; and LBM’s Health & Wellbeing Network, Enforcement and Towards Employment Teams. We’ve also worked with LBM’s Violence Against Women and Girls Team as part of the White Ribbon campaign and Allyship programme.

We know that street-based youth work interventions work, because it allows CYP to develop trusted adult relationship in the communities where they live. In a recent LBM Joint Targeted Area Inspection (Dec 2023) the inspectors said, “the Detached Youth Work teams’ work is excellent”.

All our interventions are inputted onto the IYSS database and currently we’re working with other colleagues in the local authority to develop a Merton Family Hub data driven programme.

The Detached Youth Work Team contributes to economic sustainability through creating a pipeline and progression routes for future workforces, i.e. as a significant local employer recruiting people we draw upon our track record of employing an ethnically diverse team of which 42% of paid staff are from the borough. Currently in our team we have three staff and two volunteers that are local residents, all of which contribute to creating street social and
human capital.

Since July 2024 our mobile youth offer has engaged over 350 CYP, of which:

● 276 said that they feel safer when the Detached Youth Work Team and the mobile
youth hub are present
● 25 have become young mentees on the Motivate Merton Mentoring Youth Programme
● 13 young men have attended a residential at Woodrow High House
● 10 young women have been referred to EmpowerHer Girls and Young Women Detached
Youth Work project based at Phipps Bridge Youth Centre.

Below is some of the feedback received from participants and parents:

“Without this bus I would be causing trouble around Mitcham, but seeing the detached team here every week helps me to stay focused” Young person.

“The Detached Youth Bus has made a real difference in my son’s life. He used to hang around on the streets, getting into trouble. Now, he goes to the bus regularly, and he’s more confident and happier.” Parent of a young person.

“The Youth Bus is a valuable asset to our community. t’s a proactive approach to tackling youth issues, and it’s making a real difference.” Local police officer”

Supporting information:

Please refer to page 31 and 35

Please refer to page 13

Please refer to pages 24 and 28

Please refer to pages 5 and page 6

Team: Early Help Support Coordinator team

Main Submission:

Early Help Support Coordinators (EHSC) run Family Information Support Hub (FISH) sessions to ensure families within Merton can access information, advice and guidance when required. It’s important that all families can access the support and following feedback, sessions now take place every day with a mixture of in-person and virtual appointments and drop-ins available. Families find these sessions beneficial, and feedback is positive – ‘practitioner was welcoming and passionate, I’m relieved and assured that everything will be ok and managed well’. Last year, Apr 23 – Mar 24, 748 FISH contacts took place, helping parents/carers to think about what support they need and empowering them to access the information or help they need within their communities.

The team also offer targeted outreach support to ensure that services and support are accessible and inclusive. Some amazing partnership working across the borough has taken place, with health colleagues, the refuge, foodbanks, temporary housing accommodation and children centres. ‘It’s been one of our strongest partnerships at Wimbledon Foodbank. The early help coordinators are brilliant. I feel confident that when a family with children attends our foodbank, that one of the lovely coordinators will assist that family, helping them find pathways to get back on their feet. Many of our users are now working with Family Hubs and I’ve only heard good feedback on this’.

Alongside the targeted outreach, the EHSC offer support and guidance to professionals across the children’s workforce, helping them to safely and effectively assess families’ needs and ensure families can access the right support at the right time. Last year, April 23 – March 24, there were 465 requests from practitioners within the children’s workforce with primary schools being the main partners requesting support, and 77 TAF meetings chaired by the team

Feedback from partners and in particular primary schools, has been that it’s becoming challenging to always offer support to families due to capacity and the level of need that they are now required to hold. In addition, the EHSC’s have experienced that partners do not routinely use Early Help tools to support identifying needs, and many families being supported at Early Help do not have whole family Plans.

In response to this, a pilot was undertaken with 8 primary schools who were allocated an EHSC that visited weekly over a 12 week period. The EHSC supported with the undertaking of Early Help Assessments, convening Team Around the Family networks, developing SMART whole family plans, and working with family members to consider, identify and broker access to relevant services/ provisions based on identified needs. The pilot was impactful and school staff found the support provided by the team invaluable. ‘This model – where you have a concentrated series of afternoons to work through individual cases has loads of benefits: it has helped us proactively look for families who need early help, see how the EHSC offer support and build our knowledge of services and contacts we can refer on to. I think it has been really successful.’ As the pilot was a success, we increased resourcing to provide an offer of support to all primary schools from Sept 2024 to support the embedding of effective early help. Our secondary schools receive support from the social workers in schools who have aligned their
model to support early help practice. Getting buy-in from all primary schools has been a challenge but through persistence, showcasing the support/benefits it can have on their children and families and attending regular forums (cluster meetings, DSL forums, primary head meetings), we have managed to get nearly all primary schools (40 out of 46) onboard. The support has also enabled the team to promote and embed other agendas including, family hubs, Start for Life, the supporting families outcomes and reducing parental conflict.

We also noted a gap in provision for some families sitting at levels 2 and 3 (early help and targeted) of Merton’s Effective Support Model. These families require more support than a FISH appointment or EHA/TAF, however, do not meet the criteria for our targeted early help provision. This meant that the EHSC, in some instances, were providing more support to families and exceeding the maximum of 3 FISH appointments. To support this, we began an Early Help casework pilot in August 24, where the EHSC would provide a 4-6 week intervention to families to prevent escalation and ensure families are accessing the right support at the right time. The pilot also aimed to positively impact the Supporting Families Programme by evidencing improved family outcomes. The pilot has only been running for just over 3 months with 25 families so far receiving preventative support. ‘After the support, I felt more positive and relaxed. I am very glad that such support was offered to me and my daughter. Before I had the support, I felt annoyed with how to deal with simple tasks with my daughter’. The majority of these families have had a child under the age of 5 years which has enabled some focus around good early years development. We have also had high engagement from families, with only one family so far declining support at the initial contact. An early hypothesis is that families are more willing to engage with services at that lower level before needs escalate and intervention is required from our targeted early help team and services.

Team: The Body Image Project

Main Submission:

Introduction, Aims and Current Context
REWT’s Body Image Project aims to support young people and school staff to feel confident having conversations around body image. Body Image can be a sensitive topic to talk about and we therefore aim to provide a safe environment where young people can share their thoughts, views and ideas with trusted adults.

The Body Image Project was developed in response to a gap in support for children and young people (CYP) with body image concerns. A Body Image survey was sent to all Redbridge schools to ascertain the level of support needed across schools. The survey highlighted a clear need for further body image support within schools. Results showed that 56.5% of schools expressed that a vast majority of their students have body image concerns. All schools also stated that extra support around body image concerns would be very helpful, with 91.3% of schools stating that they would benefit from student workshops on the topic.

Our results emphasise the current societal context, with the Parliamentary Body Image Survey (September 2020), highlighting that 70% of under 18s said they hadn’t learned about positive body image at school and 78% of all under-18s said they would like to learn more about body image in school.

Collaboration
REWT have collaborated with Be Body Positive (https://bebodypositive.org.uk/) and CB Plus (CB Plus Home – CB Plus) in order to create engaging and insightful workshops on topics such as body image and the impact of social media, with the hope to create something that young people will find useful and engaging.

The Body Image Project – Support to Schools
The thinking around our project has evolved. We began with the aim of co-producing a body image workshop with young people in the Local Authority (LA) that could be used widely with other schools and LA’s.

However, we realised that one type of workshop may not work for all students. Therefore, we are now running bespoke workshops for each school by employing a participatory approach. The process is the same for each school, but the outcomes may be different based on the needs of the young people in the school and will therefore be more meaningful. The focus is on empowering the students, as well as the Emotional Support Literacy Assistant (ELSA), with the hope that the ELSA will be empowered to run further groups within the school.

Outline of REWT offer of Support to Schools:
Initial Consultation: with a member of the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) and an Emotional Support Literacy Assistant (ELSA) at the school. This will be a chance to discuss hopes for the project, including logistics and dates.

Workshop Sessions (KS2,3,4):

• Up to 5 weekly sessions with two members of the REWT team and the schools ELSA. 1-2 hours per session.
• A chance for young people to co-produce the body image workshops through trialling out activities to see what works best for the young people of the school.
• Young people will gain confidence to co-produce a piece of work that could benefit others within the school.
• Young people will also benefit from the learning and experience of therapeutic activities to help improve concerns around body image.

To note: We are not a clinical intervention for pupils with more significant difficulties with eating/body image and therefore should not be in replacement of a referral to other services.

We focus on raising awareness of this topic and ensure to keep in mind the wellbeing of our young people during sessions. We do this through group contracting and offer signposting to students (see below flyer)

Outcomes and Feedback

Focus Group and Workshop Sessions (Pilot School 1)

We asked young people to rate how they found the different activities, what they thought of the project and one thing they have learned as a result of taking part.

Please see the below sample of comments from students who took part:

• “The art session helped get out how I feel. It made the pain go away. Everyone was so
  creative.”
• “It lets ur emotions get out without feeling embarrassed or shy”;
• One thing I’ve learned: “to respect your body”.

Assembly Feedback – Year 10 Students (Pilot School 2)

We asked young people to record any comments they wished to make about the assembly, as well as rate how much they enjoyed it on a scale of 0-10 (with 0 being not at all enjoyable and 10 as very enjoyable).

With a total of 91 responses, we received a mean score of 8/10.

Please see the below sample of comments from students who took part:

• “It helped me improve my view on body image”
• “This was really helpful and opened my eyes to know that more people struggle with body
  image”
• “I liked the varying activities which took place and the fact we could have discussions with
  our friends/people we’re comfortable with!!”
• “Super empowering and the tasks were a fun way to learn”

Assembly Feedback – Year 6 Students (Pilot school 3)

We gathered the following qualitative feedback from school staff:

• We had lots of volunteers, so many that the children had to write application forms of why they wanted to be in it
• The group class brought everyone together, sharing positives.
• The pupils were really engaged and overall it went really well.

Next Steps

We are still in the Pilot Phase of the project, with Pilot Schools 2 and 3 taking part in further workshop sessions in January 2025.

Further to this, we have received a high level of interest from other schools in the borough and therefore aim to continue working with schools to deliver this project.

Team: Reach Out Domestic Abuse Service

Main Submission:

The London Borough of Redbridge’s Reach Out service provides holistic support to victims/survivors of domestic abuse and their children, as well as behaviour change interventions for perpetrators. Reach Out is co-located with Redbridge Children’s Services, providing a domestic abuse-informed approach from the earliest opportunity, carrying out joint visits and providing case consultations.

Reach Out was launched rapidly in 2020 in anticipation of an increase in domestic abuse during the Covid-19 pandemic. Initially, the service provided an enhanced screening to ensure that survivors and children were signposted to relevant support at the earliest opportunity. In September 2023, Reach Out transformed into a case-holding, wrap-around safety and support service for the whole family. This was in direct response to a review from Safe Lives, as well as Redbridge’s largest public consultation, with the aim to prevent victims/survivors from having to repeatedly recount their stories and re-live their trauma.

Previously, practice had not been domestic abuse-informed; it was essential to overcome the systemic challenge of ‘failure to protect’, victim-blaming language to achieve the best outcomes for families experiencing domestic abuse. The Safe & Together Model highlights the importance of partnering with non-offending parents and holding perpetrators of abuse to account to protect children. Reach Out has shifted the practice within Children’s Service to align with this model.

The ultimate aim of the Reach Out service is to improve safety and well-being of survivors and children. By intervening early, using a domestic abuse-informed approach, the victim/survivor feels supported resulting in improved engagement and better outcomes for family.

Reach Out provides holistic, practical help and emotional support to victims/survivors. Frontline practitioners demonstrate leadership by championing areas of specialism, such as honour-based abuse. Redbridge has one of the lowest housing stocks, so Reach Out has addressed this obstacle by securing a Specialist Housing Officer to address complex cases. The service has also forged relationships with culturally appropriate refuges, such as the Hiba Foundation which supports clients with no recourse to public funds (NRPF). Reach Out’s ‘shop’ provides free items for families who are struggling financially including food, toiletries, and mobile phones. This practical help builds trust from the outset.

Reach Out commissions Free Your Mind to provide therapeutic support to those aged 6-25 with the aim to break the cycle of abuse; all practitioners have lived experience of domestic abuse within their own childhood. Perpetrators of abuse can access help with addressing their abusive behaviours through Open Up, the service’s accredited behaviour change programme.

It has been vital for Reach Out to establish buy-in from partners, as multi-agency working is pivotal to keeping survivors and children safe. Reach Out’s Head of Service is the Strategic Lead for VAWG and co-chair of the MARAC, meaning that the service is well positioned to influence wider practice. Reach Out has delivered 50 training sessions and presentations to over 1160 professionals since the beginning of 2024, organises regular VAWG practitioners’ forums, and delivers outreach work within the community.

The service reports into the Children’s Performance Board, VAWG Strategic Group and Community Safety Partnership Board. Referrals, demographic and outcome data is also reviewed by a subgroup set up under the local One Panel. The service has a core budget but has expanded its model through grant funding.

Following a full inspection in June 2024, OFSTED described Reach Out as ‘exceptional’ and ‘innovative with ‘proactive, skilled and tenacious workers’; their feedback also recognised the ‘strategic interface’ as a strength which enabled ‘good multi agency working’ and described the service as being ‘empowering to parents’. Reach Out’s service model has also been recognised as ‘best practice’ by the Department for Levelling Up.

The following case study demonstrates the outcomes achieved by Reach Out:

TK endured years of abuse from her husband, including physical, emotional, sexual, spiritual, technological and financial control. He forced her to re-direct her Universal Credit payments, created debts in her name totalling almost £60,000, and isolated her and their children in a house monitored by cameras. The children were removed from school for three years. TK had fled three times previously but returned due to high levels of control and financial hardship. Reach Out supported by:

• Coordinating a joint operation with three Police teams to safely relocate TK and her children.
• Advocating for TK to retain her secure tenancy, despite significant rent arrears, and be moved out of borough to a new property.
• Securing her bank account and devices to block the perpetrator from tracking their movements.
• Providing financial aid for essentials.
• Arranging school placements for all children, including the youngest child with special educational needs who was initially refused a placement.
• Successfully lobbying for TK to be exempted from prosecution by the Education Welfare service.
• Clearing almost £60,000 of debt, including rent and council tax arrears, and securing compensation
  from the CCJ.
• Empowering TK to provide evidence for prosecution after uncovering the perpetrator’s history of abuse against others.
• Relentlessly pursuing a criminal justice outcome, which resulted in the police re-opening their investigation and the perpetrator being arrested – he is now facing multiple rape charges.

This intervention has had a significant impact on TK and her children, who have been free from the perpetrator for 16 months. The children, free from abuse, are beginning to heal and disclose their experiences. The family have shared:

“A big thank you to the team who were amazingly supportive during our dramatic and emotional move. Their support has been an all-rounder from dealing with my accommodation issues, debt solutions, financial support, and our welfare in general. We were made to feel comfortable, welcome, appreciated and never the sense of being judged, which is always everyone’s fear. The kids would like to specifically thank you for remembering their birthdays, the presents, and just how they felt cared for”.

Redbridge’s response to domestic abuse is relevant to other local authorities. Domestic abuse cases form the majority of referral into children’s social care, and it is vital that we shift our approach to achieve the best outcomes for families.

Team: Family Hubs and Therapy Clinics in Bi-borough Children’s Services

Main Submission:

Family Hubs and Therapy Clinics in Bi-borough Children’s Services

At the heart of our family hubs is providing children, young people and their families with a great start to life. We provide a central access point for integrated services to access early help provision, early identification of need and we are grounded in local communities. We are working to maximise opportunities for localising delivery and enabling closer integration and alignment with statutory and voluntary children and family services within our boroughs. Our goal is that any contact with a practitioner in the network will lead to the right intervention at the right time, with greater accountability across all agencies for identifying need earlier; leading to families understanding and making effective changes that ultimately improve their health and wellbeing.

Our Early Help services in Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster are part of a national trailblazer programme that aims to join up and enhance services delivered through transformed family hubs in local authority areas, ensuring all families can access the support they need. The programme’s objective is to join up and enhance services delivered through transformed family hubs in local authority areas, ensuring all parents and carers can access the support they need when they need it from birth to 19 or up to 25 with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

The services we provide in our Family Hubs across both boroughs show the extensive nature of co-located services within our Family Hubs. Our services include our Early Help Support / Universal Family Offer, which has: Information and advice on accessing local networks and activities, School Link Partitioners, support with education and school attendance, post 16 education/training support, Parent/Carer panel, under 5’s services, parenting support, young carers support and more. We also offer welfare services, such as support with debt, cost of living, housing, food and domestic abuse. Along with health and wellbeing services, including mental health support for families at all stages, Child Health Clubs, WellComm Screening assessing speech & language skills and health visiting.

Family Hub Support in Westminster

Our Family Hubs in Westminster include five Family Navigators and work closely with the five Youth Hubs. We have an integrated leadership team, family hub panel, wider family hub partnership and under 5’s parent and child drop-in play. We also have Family Navigators who are dedicated to supporting families who are seeking asylum, placed in hotel accommodation by the Home Office. These practitioners work directly from the hotels and with wider partners to support some of our most vulnerable families.

Our integrated leadership teams lead and drive forward strategic development and effectiveness, ensuring that each Family Hub undertakes an annual plan based on local need, lead a ‘one team’ approach to supporting children and families across the locality, and promote a culture of positive learning and sharing. Our Family Hub Panel oversee consultation and resource allocation for families where Targeted Early Help and Social Work is not proportionate. The monthly panels in each of three localities form part of Westminster’s collaborative approach to delivering Early Help across the borough. The wider Family Hub Partnership is made up of all the services that work with families across Westminster.

Family Therapy Clinics in Westminster Family Hubs
Westminster Early Help service uniquely offers 4 different Family Therapy Clinics (FTCs) located in family hubs across the borough. Each FTC team comprises of 4 qualified systemic practitioners, working with a Reflecting Team approach. We take referrals from colleagues across Early Help as well as self-referrals. A new family will initially meet the FTC supervisor and together we establish a focus for the work and who will attend sessions. We utilise the Reflecting Team approach, where three colleagues listen quietly and carefully to the family’s conversation with their lead therapist and later take a turn to share their ideas, while the family takes a turn to listen.

We work flexibly and collaboratively, establishing creative ways of working to best suit each unique family situation and support a range of issues. This work also offers a training and development opportunity for the Early Help practitioners involved. Families have told us about the clinics:

• “It helps to hear different viewpoints”
• “The team comments helped me see my situation differently”
• “We felt reassured… the team gave me confidence”

Family Hub Support in Kensington & Chelsea
We recognise that parents are pivotal in the positive outcomes of their children and so we work to support each parent with their individual needs using a Systemic Assessment Tool. Practitioners are trained in at least one Evidence-Based Programme which they will use in a range of ways within their role either in group settings or as part of their direct work. Our programmes and workshops are strengths-based and work to build on the parent/child relationship, positive communication, self-esteem and selfcare, including behaviour-management-strategies and resilience-building. We also have dedicated Early Help practitioners supporting families seeking asylum. These practitioners are part of a multi-disciplinary team who support refugees and new
arrivals in the Borough.

Impact
We regularly seek feedback from our children and families about our services and they have expressed to us:

• Gratitude for tailored support, particularly therapeutic interventions and practical strategies.
• An observed improvement in children’s behaviour, emotional regulation, and social skills
• Feeling more empowered and informed about their child’s needs, valuing psychoeducation and practical tools provided.
• Positive feedback on practitioners’ ability to coordinate with schools and other professionals, enhancing support effectiveness
• Appreciation of the empathy, support, and advocacy provided by practitioners, validating their efforts and fostering trust.
• Feedback we have received from parents on their Early Help Practitioners include: ‘She has come as such a blessing! She is so kind and supportive with such a genuine kind soul that wants the very best for me and my family I’m very appreciative. Thank you for everything.’
• ‘To put it lightly she’s been a saviour, in all seriousness she’s made such a positive impact on myself and my son. She’s created such an inclusive and open environment to share freely the difficulties and celebrations of parenthood.’

All this feedback exemplifies the excellent work of our Early Help services and of our Family Therapy Clinic in Westminster.