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Strengthening Families in Sunderland

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Today’s Event in ContextToday’s Event in Context

• LSCB/LSAB• Whole Family• Learning not Mimicking• Maximising efficiency• Statutory Changes

Sunderland Safeguarding Adults Board Sunderland Safeguarding Adults Board Serious Case ReviewSerious Case Review

First Undertaken in SunderlandLessons Learned

Personalisation/VulnerabilityCommunication

New Ways of WorkingNew Ways of Working

•A new model for Adult Safeguarding in Sunderland•Thresholds/Workloads•Organisational Changes•Everybody’s Business

Whole Family Conference

Strengthening Families in Sunderland

13th November 2012

Introduction to the Strengthening Families Strategy and Family Focus Project in Sunderland

An inclusive definition of family• A broad and inclusive definition of family to

reflect the complexity and vibrancy of family life in Sunderland

• Refers to the bond between people brought together through birth, legally recognised relationships, kinship or an otherwise close connection. This includes families of all ages, those with or without children, and those with connections across more than one household, in more than one community.

Context• Families matter

– Provide for family members’ basic needs; socialise children and young people; offer a key source of financial, social and emotional support to majority of population; help build strong communities

• Financial pressures and the need to do things differently– Prevention and early intervention throughout the life course– Better coordination and integration between partners– Holistic ‘whole family’ / ‘whole community’ responses– Building capacity and reducing dependence

• Move towards more asset based approaches– Nurturing the strengths and resources of people and communities– Empowering individuals, families and communities to control their

own future and take ownership of change

Context (continued)• Personalisation

– Greater involvement, choice and control– Flexible and tailored support that responds to needs, preferences

and aspirations of each individual

• Responsive local services– Moving towards integrated services at a locality level– Flexible and tailored services that respond to local needs,

conditions and priorities

Challenges faced by some families

• Neighbourhood and community• Drugs and alcohol• Employment• Family relationships and friendships• Health and wellbeing• Housing• Learning and education• Life skills• Money and finances• Offending behaviour• Parenting

Factors that can have a positive or negative influence on family circumstances and wellbeing:

Organisational challenges• Moving from a focus on the individual to a focus on the

whole family

• Moving from crisis-led support to prevention and early intervention

• Moving from a deficit model to an asset-based approach

• Moving from fragmented services to seamless provision of support

• Moving from inaccessible to flexible and accessible services

Emerging Strengthening Families Strategy

Sunderland is a city where families recognise and fulfil their ambitions and potential

• Families have the aspiration and confidence to take up opportunities to achieve a better future for themselves and their community

• Organisations provide the right support, at the right time, and in the right way so that families can meet their own needs and realise their aspirations.

Proposed principles of our approachOur approach to working with families will be:

• Asset based, recognising and building on the strengths within each family and their community

• Capacity building, reducing dependence on services in the longer term• Family-focused, taking a whole family approach to improving outcomes • Personalised and responsive, tailoring support to family needs and

circumstances, and adapting as these change• Pro-active and pre-emptive, seeking to identify and appropriately address

issues at the earliest opportunity, and prevent problems developing in the first place

• Integrated, working together across services and organisations to achieve more for families

• Locally responsive, planning and delivering services at a locality level where appropriate

• Intelligence-led, based on insight and evidence of what works

Draft Strategic Objectives• Empowering families to help themselves,

increasing their independence and resilience

• Encouraging the community to do more for families

• Intervening early and as soon as possible to improve outcomes and prevent problems from developing or getting worse

• Developing responsive family-focused services that are easily accessible

Family Focus Project• ‘Troubled Families’ programme launched by the Prime Minister in

December 2011

– Estimate that £9bn per year is spent on 120,000 families nationally, with only £1bn on preventative services

• 120,000 families met 5 out of 7 criteria such as living in poor or overcrowded housing; no parent has any qualifications; mother has mental health problems

• Using these criteria Sunderland was identified as having 805 ‘troubled’ families

• Four new criteria for identifying families locally

DCLG Criteria• Criteria 1 - Young people involved in crime

and families involved in anti-social behaviour • Criteria 2 - Households affected by truancy

or exclusion from school• Criteria 3 - Households which also have an

adult on DWP out of work benefits • Criteria 4 - Local Discretion – can be used

to add other families who meet any 2 of the 3 criteria above and are a cause for concern

Family Focus Project

• Sunderland Local Discretion Criteria - families where there are substance misuse (young people and adults), domestic violence and child protection issues

• Renamed Family Focus Project in Sunderland

• Targeted support to ‘turn around’ the lives of 805 families

• What does ‘turn around’ mean?

Family Focus Project (continued)

• Sunderland has to meet stated outcomes with at least 805 eligible families over the lifetime of the project (by May 2015)

• Success measured by achieving stated outcomes around:– Getting children back into school– Reducing criminal and anti-social behaviour– Getting parents on the road back into work– Reducing the costs to the taxpayer and local

authorities

Family Focus OutcomesTurn around =

• Each child in the family has had fewer than 3 fixed exclusions and less than 15% unauthorised absences in the last 3 terms

• 60% reduction in ASB across the family in the last 6 months

• 33% reduction in offending by all minors in the family in the last 6 months

• One adult in the family has moved off out-of work benefits into continuous employment in the last 6 months

Family Focus Payment by Results

• Payment by results based on 40% of the cost of intervention - £4,000 per family

• Initiative seen as an opportunity to review and improve the way partners work with the most challenging and vulnerable families across the city

• Not extra resources but development of a new way of working with families with multiple and complex needs

Delivery model – October 1st 2012

• Integrated Multi-Disciplinary Teams based in each locality • A multi-agency Information System to pool information

from different agencies and monitor outcomes• A single point of contact with the family through a key

worker • A single assessment/family snapshot• A single Family Agreement developed with the family• Flexible packages of support for each family based on the

Family Agreement• Regular progress review and monitoring with the family

recorded and each family’s outcomes tracked

Family Focus Delivery Model Key Stages

• Stage 1: Identification of the family• Stage 2: Multi-Agency Family Locality Teams and Multi-

Agency Family Assessment Panels• Stage 3: Family engagement and assessment by the

key worker• Stage 4: Development of the Family Agreement• Stage 5: Delivery of a flexible package of targeted, co-

ordinated support for the family• Stage 6: Family case management: family review,

tracking and monitoring arrangements

Opportunities

• Family Focus Project provides an opportunity to accelerate wider strengthening families approach

• Transforming relationships with individuals, families and communities in ways that build resilience and reduce dependence

• More effective and efficient use of resources through better coordination across services and partners

• Developing new models to support known and ‘hidden’ families • Tailoring support to each family’s needs and strengths • Achieving a better balance between responding/reacting and

preventing/intervening early• Delivering outcomes valued by families and communities

Where does Strengthening Families fit with safeguarding children and vulnerable adults?

Family Focus:• Includes families with children/young people subject to child

protection/domestic violence and substance abuse in the 4 local criteria

• Increases the range of issues addressed, and the resources that can be mobilised, as part of intervention

Strengthening Families:• Builds upon current CAF process and locality multi agency

working and extends the range of issues tackled through interventions

• Increases information sharing/earlier identification/earlier intervention

Sunderland Safeguarding Children Board & Sunderland Safeguarding Adults Board

SSCB & SSAB both recognise that safeguarding and promotion of the

welfare of vulnerable members of the community, whatever their age, is a

shared responsibility and that commitment to a ‘whole family’ approach

is essential in ensuring the safety and wellbeing of both adults and children.

Interface Protocol between Safeguarding Children & Safeguarding Adults

SSCB & SSAB have agreed an Interface Protocol between Safeguarding Children and Safeguarding Adults to ensure:

• commitment to the ‘Whole Family’ approach.

• when working with families, regardless of role, all staff need to be aware that they may identify vulnerable children, vulnerable adults or both.

The interface protocol aims to:• Reiterate the duty of care on staff to raise concerns regarding vulnerable

adults, vulnerable children or both.

• Develop and improve joint working practices where the are both vulnerable adults and vulnerable children within a family.

• Ensure that any vulnerable member of a family, whether adult or child, is safeguarded from abuse and harm.

Whole Family ConferenceWhole Family Conference

Strengthening Families in Sunderland

Some Observations

• Punctuating from all points of view•Don’t lose focus•Quality Risk Assessment•Information Sharing•Remember Fathers, working with men

New Ways of Working Part 2New Ways of Working Part 2

• Munro Changes• Ever closer multi-agency working• Skill Development and Training• Supervision• Everybody’s Business