Minutes of Integrated Children's Services
Responsible Theme Group Meeting
20/01/2015
Members Present
Michael Thompson (MT) - Chief Inspector Partnerships, Police Scotland
Nicola Jones (NJ) - Sergeant Partnerships, Police Scotland
Sandy Kelman (SK) - ADP Team Lead, ADP
Tracy Mackie (TM) - Service Manager, Sacro
Gail Walker (GW) - YJMU Manager, Police Scotland
Anne Donaldson (AD) - Children's Services Manager, ACC
Elizabeth Templeton (ET) - Locality Reporter Manager, SCRA
Roslyn Clark (RC) - Children's Services Manager, ACC
Sarah Elliot (SE) - Barnardos
Claire Wilson (Claire W) - Criminal Justice, ACC
Sheila Sansbury (SS)- Service Manager, ACC ECS
Malcolm MacBean (MM) - Victim Support
Louise Beaton (LB)- Principle Planning Officer, ACC ECS
Moyra Clark (MC)- PPU Inspector, Police Scotland
Leona McDermid (LM)- Aberdeen Foyer
Apologies received
Craig Singer - Development Manager, Young People, ACC
Mary Annal - Aberdeen Foyer
Lesley Simpson - Service Manager, Criminal Justice, ACC
Mark Flemming - Custody Inspector, Police Scotland
Carrie Trew - Aberdeen City Council
Fiona Hendry - Sheriff Clerk
Andrew Hanton - COPFS
Isabel Scorgie - Childrens Panel
Chris Wright - Scottish Government
Neil Carnegie - Service Manager Community Safety HUB, ACC
Wendy Carle - Housing Manager, ACC
1. Introduction and Apologies
Chief Inspector Thompson introduced himself and welcomed all members present.
2. Custody Division - overview of Juvenile custodies
Sergeant David McLean provided an input to the group on the current Police Scotland Policy and Procedures when dealing with juvenile custodies and/or those on Compulsory Supervision Orders and highlighted some of the issues they can pose.
SS - stated that Social Work may be able to share 'up to date' guidance on the criteria for Secure Accommodation, RC to send this to NJ for forwarding to Custody. TASK 12
AD stated that she has the new Assessment Framework for High Risk Young People she will send this to NJ for sharing with the group. TASK 13
CW stated that she had a list of Appropriate Adults so will send this information to NJ for sharing with Custody Division. TASK 14
TM stated that Sacro can act as an Appropriate Adult for some Young People, TM is to send the list of children and the 24hour phone number on which Police Scotland can contact Sacro to NJ. TASK 15
MT - Legacy Grampian and Legacy L&B previously (2007/2009) had a 'Detention of Children Protocol', this is possibly something which can be re-visited.
3. Minute and Matters Arising
Minutes from 05/11/2014 - accepted without change.
No new matters arising.
4. Task Updates - (see task sheet for all updates and completed tasks)
Task 1
Update on PRS provided by MC:-
Process is called Multi Agency Screening (MAS)
A list is compiled of all children on VPD in previous 24 hours
List is then sent to SW
Social Work update whether children are open to SW or not
If no SW report is sent to the named person
If there are concerns and there is no SW it is sent to the 'MAS'
MAS - gathers all relevant information from partners and decides who the report should go to
This is done on a daily basis so it is quicker than the previous process.
Task 3
RC there has been a lack of consistency since the removal of the SW Youth Justice Co-ordinator post which has led to the group losing a clear purpose and role.
MT - There is an opportunity for this group to take ownership of some of the identified actions in the ICS Responsible Group Action Plan.
AD - chairs the VYWG and TM chairs the Victim and Community Confidence Group.
MT to meet with RC and AD to look at how best to take these groups forward. (TASK 17)
Task 6
RC to contact Andrew Hanton to ensure he is receiving all the information he requires.
All other tasks are now COMPLETE.
5. Action Plan
The Action Plan has now been updated to incorporate all the replies received from members following TASK 7 from the last meeting.
SS - stated that it should be Outcome focussed as opposed to Task focussed. This can be a front cover page with an 'all-encompassing' one line outcome.
MT will liaise with LB regarding the wording of this. TASK 18
Action Plan now accepted by the members.
6. Youth Justice Workshop - Beach Ballroom - August 2014
The group discussed this document and agreed that much of the content is now incorporated within the ICS Responsible Group Action Plan 2015 and that some of the items mentioned were 'wish list'. The group was satisfied that no further action requires to be taken regarding this document.
7. Performance Statistics
At the meeting the group were provided with copies of pages 5,6,7,8,14,15 of the following report:- Comparative Report on Juvenile Offenders - Aberdeen City (September 2014). The future plan would be to try to provide stats in advance of the meeting.
On page 5 it was noted that there had been a slight increase in 16/17 year olds committing offences, this bucks the recent downward trend and although it was agreed that this could just be a 'blip' it was agreed it was worth monitoring.
CW - stated that 16/17 year olds on Community Payback Orders (CPO) are different to others, because they do not get Bail Supervision so if they do not do the requested work they often end up remanded for Breach of Order. Perhaps more multi-agency assistance in getting them to their CPO work might prevent this happening and ensure they get intensive work done at the right time.
TM - stated that this should link with the ISS work.
AD - stated that she thought this was worth having a further discussion about. TASK 19
LM - stated that the Foyer would be interested in being involved in discussions regarding this.
CW - stated that it is the ones that are not that well known who are falling through the net.
LM - stated that additional support is available through the Foyer to help people work towards employment, a new post for a Youth Job Parent is soon to be filled.
AD - stated that there is no-one from Criminal Justice at ISS meetings and that this issue should be taken forward.
On page 6 both tables show slight increases.
On page 14 in relation to Children's Homes, MT has a meeting arranged with Shona Manson regarding the increase in issues occurring at the SW Children's Homes in the City, with a view to establishing why this is occurring.
SS - stated that due to the SW policy of 'keeping more children in the city' there are more difficult children being held in the city so this increases the number of issues which are being recorded.
AD - stated that these types of issues often have 'peaks and troughs' but there have also been issues with recruitment and retention of good staff.
SS - Young people are also more connected with each other through Social Media now which can cause issues.
AD - work needs to be done to change the family dynamics.
MT - Neil Carnegie at ACC is undertaking work on identifying Priority Families, this is a long term project.
AD - some of the work of the VYWG group is around early attachment in adolescence.
The group agreed that these statistics are beneficial to the group.
8. Commissioner Meeting regarding Children's Services
The last meeting was held on 15th December 2014 and involved 3rd Sector partners.
ACVO then collected 13 questions and undertook to arrange the meetings for 2015 - there are none arranged to date.
There has been no published response to these 13 questions yet - Maggie Hepburn has this task. Maggie Hepburn, Integrated Children's Services Third Sector Liaison Officer, ACVO TSI, 38 Castle Street, AB11 5YU, Tel: 01224 686070.
9. Partner Updates
Police
MT - Missing Persons - there is work ongoing regarding young people who are on Compulsory Supervision Orders as we are experiencing some of them being reported missing on a nightly basis. This is being looked at nationally.
Police have someone looking at this and the risks, outcomes, sexual exploitation and crime etc which affect these children.
Criminal Justice
CW - Meeting to see how Criminal Justice fits with Children's and Adults services within the reclaiming social work model. Don't want specialist knowledge to be lost regarding Youth Justice, how to compile reports etc. Require better communication for EEI etc.
There are currently only 10 under 18's on CPO's.
HMP Grampian - CW has an upcoming meeting with the prison regarding the Young Offenders, they want to adopt the Whole Systems Approach (WSA) so want to meet up to talk through how this would work.
GW - asked what aspects of the WSA they intended to adopt?
CW - stated that it was the multi-agency working, linking with Health, Housing, SW etc
Currently some young people leave prison with no support - they want to look at how this can change.
Young Offenders are not expected to move into the prison until the end of 2015, they are seen as the most challenging prison group.
The prison only has 200 inmates at the moment, for various reasons.
The prison service has recently changed their thinking regarding re-integration, support in the community and Scottish Prison Service through care.
Barnardos
SE - They have now filled their Children's Services Manager Post with a very experienced manager from the 3rd sector and Sarah will arrange meetings for all partners with this person once they are in post.
They have set up their Car Crime Group, leaflets for this service were distributed to members at the meeting. They will group the participants appropriately for age and criminality - Melanie Duncan is the link for this project.
CW - thought it might be useful for young people on Community Pay Back orders.
LM - reminded the group about the Foyer's 'Roadwise Group' for driver training and to improve road safety, it is aimed at getting people their driving licence, they also have a 'skid master' car and they are based in Alford.
ACC Integrated Children's Services
LB - The draft report from the inspection was provided on 6th January 2015. The Care Inspectorate have asked for comments by Tuesday 27th January. On 28th January there will be a Professional discussion with the Care Inspectorate and then the final document should be made available to the group members.
LB - undertook to contact NHS to ask if they could nominate someone from NHS Grampian who would be able to sit on the Vulnerable Young Women and Girls sub-group. TASK 16
Alcohol and Drug Partnership
SK - they are keen to receive any statistics in relation to Alcohol and Drugs.
Aberdeen in Recovery (Air) - promote people in recovery and have weekly meetings in the Aberdeen Foyer Café, it is open for anyone to go along and any Young People who are involved in or thinking of becoming involved in drug/alcohol abuse.
Drugs Action has launched a new Alcohol service in the city which is available 7 days a week.
NPS - Drugs Action will be undertaking training sessions throughout the year and any partner is welcome to attend this training. They should get in touch directly with Drugs Action regarding this. CW - thought this would be good for their staff.
HMP Grampian - there are still substance misuse issues in prison, there are multi-agency discussions ongoing regarding an Action Plan around this.
Foyer
LD - They have funding for a new post for a Youth Job Parent - they will work with 16-19 year olds in the community to get them into employment.
Date of next meeting - 1pm on 20 March 2015 in the 5th Floor Conference Room at Queen Street Police Office.