UPDATE NO 477 29 October 2021

Implementing Family Hubs – free online conference 2 November 2021 9:30-15:00

The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families is hosting a virtual conference on Implementing Family Hubs on 2 November 2021. 

The event will launch the pilot of the Family Hubs Implementation Toolkit: a collection of coproduced resources aimed to support Local Authorities, Health, Education and VCS teams to implement Family Hubs in their local area. 

The event is suitable for Leaders, commissioners, or managers from Local Authorities, Health/CCGs, Education, or Voluntary and Community Sector.

Opening address by the new Minister for Children and Families, Will Quince MP

Tutors will be Dr Camilla Rosan; Kate Dalzell; Professor Peter Fonagy; Donna Molloy; Ben Lewing

You can register here

Characteristics of Children in Need 2021

On 28 October 2021, DfE published the Characteristics of Children in Need analysis for the reporting year 2021.

These statistics, derived from the annual Children in Need Census, provide data on children in England referred to children’s social care services, assessments carried out relating to those children and whether a child became the subject of a child protection plan.

Alistair Herbert 07761 328665 ( Data to Insight Manager) has updated the Benchmarking and CHaT tools to include the new data release.

Data to Insight is also recruiting to two posts, but hurry, the closing date is 31/10/2021

• Data Analyst £29,594 – £31,968 https://bit.ly/3iX71AU
• Data Manager £37,127 – £38,612 https://bit.ly/3oRTezu

Black and Asian Leadership Initiative (BALI) January 2022

As part of the Take Your Place future leadership programme, we are promoting The Staff College’s Black and Asian Leadership Initiative course being offered virtually on 27, 28 January and 4 May 2022. Places for staff from SESLIP members are funded via the SESLI Programme.

More information on this link.

To book your place, or for further discussion, please contact Mark Evans (details below) by the 12 November.

PAC report on impact of NFF changes

On 22 October 2021, Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee published its report on school funding.

• Read the full Report (PDF 224 KB)
• Read the report summary
• Find all publications related to this inquiry, including oral and written evidence

The report says the DfE “failed to take enough account of the impact of its decisions on individual schools and their pupils” when it announced changes to the school funding system, with the adverse impacts falling “disproportionately on deprived local areas and schools”. 

Special Guardianship Financial Support Virtual Roundtable – Tuesday 2 November, 3pm – 4.30pm

Krish Kandiah (Chair of the Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board) and Lucy Peake (CEO Kinship) are hosting a virtual roundtable event on Tuesday 2 November, 3pm – 4:30pm

The event will focus on exploring opportunities to improve financial support for special guardianship families and promote good outcomes for children who would often otherwise be in the care system.  The audience will hear from a number of local authorities who have each been on a journey to transform the support they provide to their SGO families, sharing the lessons learnt and how outcomes for children and families have been improved. Information from a recent survey of local authorities and ‘deep dive’ research (commissioned by the ASGLB) exploring emerging good practice will also be covered.

The event will focus on:

• Exploring what we know about current provision of financial support for special guardians, drawing on recent surveys of local authorities and special guardians.
• Sharing case studies from local authorities who are increasing financial support for special guardians: why are they doing this, how did they do it, what is the impact for families and the local authority.

Please register here

Independent Review of Children’s Social Care

The Independent Review of Children’s Social Care has published a summary of the more than 300 submissions received in response to its Case for Change, which set out the Review’s early thinking about what needs to change in the children’s social care system in England. The feedback summary shares the messages from answers to questions in each chapter of the Case for Change highlighting where there is agreement and where views differ.

Read the news story

Read the full report

Future dates for network meetings

Lead Members Group: Friday 3 December – Joint meeting with DCSs. More information from Alison Michalska (contact details below)

Data Benchmarking: Thursday 9 December 2021. More information from Alastair Lee (contact details below)

Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board: More information from Rebecca Eligon (contact details below)

AD Education: Friday 12 November – 10.00am. More information from Chris Owen (contact details below)

AD Safeguarding: Friday 10 December 2021. More information from Mark Evans (contact details below)

QA Network: Friday 10 December 2021. 2pm – 5pm. More information from Amanda Meadows (contact details below)

Fostering Network: More information from Rebecca Eligon (contact details below)

SEND SE19: LA and Health SEND Conversation 30 November 2021 More information from Tracey Maytas (contact details below)

Political leadership of effective Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) systems. 10 Nov 2021 1.30pm to 4.00pm.

LGA online workshop for Lead Members of Children’s Services, Scrutiny Chairs and other political influencers who shape the leadership of SEND.

This session will build on and complement the Leadership Essentials course for Children’s Services and provides an opportunity to focus in more depth on political leadership of the SEND agenda.

The event will explore a range of challenges in relation to improving outcomes for children and young people with SEND and their families including strategic leadership, effective partnerships and understanding what makes a SEND system effective. There will be opportunities to hear from councils that have demonstrated good practice, and a chance for delegates to network and share their own experiences.

Speakers have now been confirmed for the first workshop in our thematic series, we are very excited to have:

• Councillor Anntoinette Bramble, Deputy Mayor and Cabinet Member for education, young people and children’s social care, London Borough of Hackney and Chair, LGA Children and Young People Board, chairing the afternoon
• Tony McArdle, Chair of SEND Systems Leadership Board and independent adviser to the current SEND Review, who will be sharing his thoughts on the SEND delivery landscape, giving an overview of the national perspective.
• Edwina Grant OBE, Chair of the ADCS Health, Care and Additional Needs Policy Committee and Executive Director of Education and Children’s Services, Lancashire County Council and, will speak from the ADCS perspective in relation to the SEND improvement journey for Local Authorities.
• Dame Christine Lenehan, Director, Council for Disabled Children, will speak from the partnership perspective in relation to embedding a whole systems approach to SEND

This workshop is free to members and will be delivered via Zoom, book a place on Eventbrite. If you have any queries please contact Sangeeta.Bowman-York@local.gov.uk.