Agenda item

Chris Coyle, Front Door, Assessment and Adolescent Services (FAAS)

To receive a presentation about the work undertaken in Front Door, Assessment and Adolescent Services (FAAS).

Chris Coyle, Front Door Assessment and Adolescent Services (FAAS), Lancashire County Council provided an overview of the service to the Board.  A presentation had been circulated with the agenda where further information can be found.

The Board were informed that Corporate Parenting was not something that happens in one part of Children's Services, it should start at the "Front Door".  It was noted that there are approximately 8,000-10,000 requests for support a year via the "Front Door" in Lancashire, which is people asking for support in all sorts of different areas.  From those requests, approximately 2,000-3,000, convert to a child/family requiring a social work assessment.  There is a real focus that is driven by the Leadership Team within Lancashire County Council to make sure that children and families are treated in the same way and that there are high regards to care and high levels of aspirations for those children and families who are requesting support.

The Board were informed that a Peer Review had recently been undertaken by Manchester City Council on the Front Door Service around the culture and language and reported that there was some really good collaborative work with colleagues from the Police and Health etc, however it was raised that the language used around children and families could be better and this will now be developed across all Children's Services in Lancashire.

The Board were informed that social care assessments are carried out by the Duty Assessment Teams who are based across Lancashire and their aim is to work 'with' children and families, not 'at', to look at what support is best for them and how their needs can be best met, either within Children's Social Care or with a partner agency.  The Authority is developing a "warm hands approach" in how children and families are warmly handed over to those who are best placed to support them.

Another area of work is around Adolescent Services of which there are two elements:

i)  Child and Youth Justice Services (formerly Youth Offending Team), again, language has been changed as the former name had implications that youths offended, and discussions had been held with young people currently in that service, around renaming it from the Youth Offending Team and they chose the new service title of Child and Youth Justice. 

The aim of the service is to prevent and divert young people from being known to the service in the first place.  If young people do end up being known to the service, then it is how they are supported and ensure they are not repeat contacts.  The In Care and Out of Trouble workstream, that has been set up in Lancashire following Lord Laming's review of children looked after within the Youth Justice Services has seen significant progress since its' introduction, in terms of reducing the number of children that have come into contact with the service.

ii)  Contextual Safeguarding Teams included the Exploitation Team who support children at risk of criminal and/or sexual exploitation or with issues around modern slavery and the Extra Familial Harm Team who support children where the risks or issues are not linked to how they are supported by their parents, eg mental health issues.

It was noted that from the Peer Review, that within the Exploitation Team, positive work highlighted which was being done across the partnership in respect of children that are subject to sexual exploitation, and it was commented that there was a consistently high and impactful intervention with those children.  It was also reported that the service was not as developed in terms of children who are at risk of criminal exploitation, and this is an area which is being developed and there is constant thinking about the approach around that.

In terms of the Extra Familial Harm Team, this is a new team, where constant learning and developing happens on a daily basis, on how best to support the children who are often those with the most complexed needs and issues and whose parents are doing everything they can to keep the child safe, however, for whatever reason, there are still significant issues with that child, ie mental health issues, emotional and behavioural issues, Autistic Spectrum Conditions or other elements that means support to them has to be really tailored and individualised.  It was also reported that Covid has changed the dynamic around young people and how they express their response to the level of issues that they face and that this has changed dramatically since the pandemic.

Resolved:  That the Board noted the update received on the Front Door, Assessment and Adolescent Service (FAAS).