Agenda item

The Committee considered the report of the Corporate Director of Children and Young People’s Services which provided Members with an overview of the support available for Children and Families on the Edge of Care, the programmes and projects to help families, an understanding of the referral process and any opportunities, successes and future plans (for copy of report, see file of minutes).

The Practice Lead Safeguarding and Strategic Manager were in attendance to deliver the report.

Councillor Walton indicated that there were a lot of services on offer and asked how they were ensuring that there was no duplication. She then referred to the acronym ‘ERASE’ that was a negative term and asked that the service maybe think about changing this.

The Practice Lead Safeguarding responded that in terms of the groups these were specifically designed to meet the individual family’s needs and she took the point with regard to the similarities between the groups. She continued that the groups delivered by the one-point service were regularly reviewed and indicated that she could take this back to the service if more information was required.

Councillor Walton asked if there was a lot of overlap between groups and was there an opportunity to carry out efficiency streaming but still ensuring that the support was still available for children and families.

The Practice Lead Safeguarding responded that the groups that were delivered were regularly under review in terms of efficiency and meeting family needs, if there was any potential for duplication this would be reviewed by the service. In terms of the ‘ERASE’ service this was co-developed with families and young people and it was their idea to call the service ‘ERASE.’

Councillor Varty indicated that her former colleagues who worked for the service were incredibly positive about their work, in particular the support from managers and she wanted to thank officers on their behalf.

Councillor Hunt referred to the fun with food programme and how the eligibility criteria had changed and asked how this had impacted on those families on low incomes who were still struggling.

The Practice Lead Safeguarding advised that she would take this back to the service and provide Councillor Hunt with a response.

Resolved: That the contents of the report be noted.