Agenda item

Young People, Barnardos, Hannah Peake/Jane Hylton/Marcus Devaney (LCC)

To receive feedback on the work our young people have been doing including:

Performance Report

Young Inspectors Update

Rights and Entitlements Guide for Care Leavers

What LINX have been doing

LINX gave a detailed account of what they had been doing since 8 September 2016.  Details can be found on the PowerPoint attached.

The Board congratulated the young people on all the amazing work they had carried out and the awards they had won.  The Board are very grateful and the young people are a credit to Lancashire.

National Leaving Care Benchmark

Kieran then spoke about the National Leaving Care Benchmark that he and Natasha attended in Chelsea where they met with other care leavers from around the Country to work on a project called "Show Me That I Matter".  They discussed what Lancashire had been doing and created a poster.  They have now been invited to another National event in York with Social Work Managers.

Kieran has also been working on the preparation for independence pack.

Performance Report

LINX provided the Board with feedback from the Performance Report.  Their comments are attached on the Powerpoint included with these minutes.  They were impressed with the work the Virtual Head and her team had done on raising educational targets and the change in Key Stage 4 stats especially as these are changing and schools are measured on progress not just results now.

Mental Health

LINX have been looking at mental health in their groups and the Board engaged in a quiz as attached to these minutes.

Main points raised were that LINX would like a leaflet for LINX and Foster Carers to include information on topics such as:

Self-esteem

Self-harm

Stress

Trust issues

Depression

Also details on where help can be accessed from.

Takeover November

Concerns were raised with regards obtaining permissions for young people to come out of school to take part on takeover events – Barnardo's are having to try to overcome numerous barriers which has been really frustrating and upsetting for some young people as they have not been able to get involved. 

Kirsty Clarke from The Children's Society echoed the same challenges with regards contacting social workers.

Action:  Tony Morrissey to discuss the issues further with Barnardo's and The Children's Society outside the meeting.

Rights and Entitlements for CLA and Care Leavers

Marcus Devaney and Jane Hilton gave a demonstration on a new work in progress website which will benefit CLA and Care Leavers in knowing what their rights and entitlements are.

The Board felt that this was the way forward instead of having to search around Lancashire County Council and other external websites to try and find information out.  A simple completion of an e-form will take them directly to the information they require and because it is electronic it will be easier to update and ensure correct information is available real time.

The next stage in the process is to discuss this further with ICT and Communication to develop it further.

Marcus agreed to attend a LINX meeting and talk further with them about what they want from the website.

Marcus and Jane agreed to come back to the Board at a later date when the website is in operation.