Present: Maggie Hepburn (ACVO) Sarah Elliot (Barnardos) Vicky McKenzie (Action for Children) Beverley Hart (Aberlour) Emma Cameron (The Spark) Tom Starrs (Archway) Gette Cobban (Home Start) Linzi Harrow (Transition Extreme)
Apologies: Laurence Alfred (Camphill School) Brian Webb (Shmu) Lindsey Jessiman (Families Outside) Gillian Laird (Aberlour) Anna Garden (VSA) Amy Anderson (Pamis)
Scribe: Maggie Hepburn ACVO
Agenda Point / Minute / Action Point / Who/When
1. Welcome / · Maggie welcomes everyone to the meeting, and asked for a Chair as Laurence was on holiday. Gette agreed to Chair and Maggie would take a Minute as Claire Conroy was not present.
2. Apologies / · Apologies were read out and are noted above.
3. Minutes of Previous Meeting / · Minutes from the previous meeting were not available and will be sent out as soon as possible.
4. Matters Arising / · Matters arising:
Feedback from previous meeting. The Named Person training took place in the Beach Ballroom and was well attended. Maggie represented the views received from the CYPVSPF, and also shared information in the form of contact details and case studies. We discussed the fact that there was going to be a “mop up” session for more Named People in September. The group present suggested that it might be a good idea to have several stalls with a selection of Third Sector people available to chat to the Named People about their services and how they can support the NP role. / Get in touch with the GIRFEC lead for the City, Eleanor Sheppard and ask about having more third sector reps and stalls available for NP to talk to during breaks in the training session. / Maggie to get in touch with Eleanor.
5. Reclaiming Social Work PSP progress report / · The most recent meeting looked at 3 options for designing and delivering this work. A tender option, with co-production around the design for the specification has been agreed going forward. A timeline has been set and outlined by CSW (Children’s Social Work). CSW want the sector to co-produce the specification that will form the tender. The group expressed frustration at the way this has been handled and raised the possibility of escalating their views on this in a formal way. The group stated that there still remain a lot of questions about how this is going to work (co-production).
· At a meeting on the 21st June (Third Sector only) a series of questions were raised which have been sent to Dave Bliss (ACC Lead on this). To date there has been no feedback on this and the group stressed that there was no point in the third sector continuing to meet without more feedback on the work that has already been done on the needs analysis, and some clarification of the questions raised by the group. / Raise these concerns with Joyce Duncan CEO of ACVO.
Follow up request for clarification email sent out on the 30th June to Dave Bliss. / Maggie to follow up both of these points.
6. Introduce Vicky Wan from the national Third sector GIRFEC Project
Additional GIRFEC related requests for information / consultation / · Vicky Wan from the National Third Sector GIRFEC Project http://www.barnardos.org.uk/thirdsectorproject.htm attended the meeting to talk to the Forum about what help and support the project can offer, and to see the work of the Aberdeen CYP Forum in action. We had a couple of requests for feedback / information from City Council colleagues in the Educational Psychology service and from the GIRFEC group.
· Emma Powell from the Educational Psychology Service (EPS) is asking partner colleagues for information about wellbeing tools that they might be using to “gain the voice of the child”. Maggie Hepburn shared the table that Emma has created and this will also be shared with the papers from the meeting. Suggestions from the group that weren’t represented on the plan were: the GIRFEC app that is used by Lanarkshire council around the wellbeing indicators; Barnardos Outcomes Star and the section of the Asset assessment tool called “What do you think?” (this is a tool used in Youth Justice / Offending). This information will be shared round the Forum again and Maggie will feedback to Emma Powell.
· The GIRFEC Group have asked the Third Sector to consult on The Aberdeen Practice Model. This was handed out. Some present had seen the Model and commented that it did not align with Aberdeen City’s SW services 1-5 tiered system, and felt it was potentially confusion causing between professionals in Education, Social Work and their corresponding partners.
Vicky Wan
· Vicky asked the group about commissioning and how it works in Aberdeen. We were able to show Vicky the draft commissioning framework which has been written to support the new way of working around the new Reclaiming Social Work Model in Aberdeen.
· Vicky also let the group know that at a meeting of Scottish Government last week GIRFEC communication materials were discussed and they will be put into hard copy later on in the year after the decision of the Supreme Court around the Named Person legislation. In the meantime the copies are on the Knowledge Hub.
· The group asked Vicky about whether there was evidence of best practice around GIRFEC processes and commissioning working really well in other local authority areas. Vicky agreed to share information about how Fife are working on an information sharing. / Share info from the Forum with Emma Powell
Feed this back at the next GIRFEC group
Share information about best practice examples / MH
MH and other attendees from the Third Sector
MH link in with the National Third sector GIRFEC Project and Vicky Wan.
7. Updates from the integrated Children’s Services Outcome Groups / James Simpson, ACC is currently Acting Integrated Children’s Services Principle Planning Officer Policy and Performance coordinated an ICS evaluation session on Friday 15 July, which started the planning cycle for the next finalised in 2017.
· Child Protection committee/Safe OG – Beverley Hart (Aberlour) Sarah Elliot (Barnardos) report and papers pending.
· Responsible OG
No report available, no meeting held since last meeting.
· Nurtured OG Notes from Anna Garden (VSA) Minutes not yet released.
The main focus of the discussion was the increase in pre-school hours and ACC capacity to deliver on this. Sheila Sansbury advised that she has undertaken a review of resource and this falls short so may mean new build. We then had a TED talk on a nursery provision which included lots of free play, outdoors merging within etc and a discussion.
Also update on Centre of Excellence and progress. Currently ACC facilitating meetings with stakeholders to plan use of building as a community resource and not just school provision for children with complex needs. There are 3rd sector reps on this group, CHAS, Elaine Michael to represent commissioned services for children with ASN (out of school provision) I’m sure if there are questions for this group Elaine could feed them back.
Elaine to date has been ensuring that all stakeholders who use the space will have adequate storage, access to facilities etc. The group have also been in touch with The Yard to help look at design for outdoor play
Hilary Young retiring from her post as Lead Health Visitor.
· Achieving OG
Vicky Mackenzie (Action for Children) reported that there had been no Achieving Outcome group meeting since the workshop meeting to determine priorities earlier this year. The Achieving group did report on their progress at the evaluation session organised by James Simpson on the 15th July.
· Healthy and Active OG
The H & A Outcome group main points related to the Third sector were that consultation was requested from those third sector organisations who deliver counselling services. Maggie will get in touch with the organisations who contributed to the counselling document last year and check if they wish to update their information. Maggie will also share a reference tool draft (created by ACVO) for children and young people’s mental health services currently available in the Third Sector.
· Respected and Included OG
Maggie Hepburn (ACVO) reported back from the Respected and Included group. There has been no meeting since our last Forum, but there have been some developments around youth engagement. As part of the development of the new Children’s services Plan ACC have dedicated some time from a Development Officer (Catriona Mallia) who is going to be gathering views from C & YP across the city. The Respected and Included group will be able to access harder to reach groups of children and young people through the work of their individual members. Group members have been put in touch with Catriona and it is anticipated that the views collated will be used to inform the aims of the Children’s Services plan.
· Mental Health Improvement Group: Children and Young People - Emma Cameron (The Spark) spoke about the guidance docs that are going to be released about self-harm. These will be shared with the Forum when they are finalised. Emma also shared information about the MHIF (Mental Health Innovation Fund) group that was looking at the creation of a web resource for supporting children / young people/ adults working with C & YP in mental health / wellbeing. The MHIG (Children and Young people) have been working on a stretch aim around mental health. This information was presented at the Integrated Children’s Services Board on the 20th June.
· Integrated Children’s Services Board 20th June
Information shared at the ICS Board:
Operational Guidance for Aberdeen: Getting it Right For Every Child. This document has previously been sent out for consultation with the sector.
James Simpson (Acting ICS Policy and performance Officer) update the Board about the self-evaluation exercise that is taking place at the beginning of July. This will involve the ICS Outcome group reporting back on their progress during the last Children’s Plan period. As part of the new legislation CPP are expected to have a Children’s Plan. James is building up information in preparation for this plan. The CYPVSPF (this Forum) can report progress through the Respected and Included Outcome Group.
Bernadette Oxley (Head of Service CSW) updated the Board in relation to the change to the Single Outcome Agreement. This will now be called the LOIP (Local Area Improvement Plan). There were driver diagrams handed round the board and this information is now available in draft.
The Minutes from the Outcome groups, the GIRFEC group and the ICS Board are available on http://www.aberdeengettingitright.org.uk/ / CYPVSPF to consider whether there are questions for Elaine Michael to take to the Centre of Excellence meetings.
Send the draft LOIP round the CYPVSPF / Questions about the Centre of Excellence to be sent to Elaine Michael.
Maggie Hepburn
8. AOCB / · Maggie let the group know about the role of the new Virtual Head Teacher for Looked After Children in Aberdeen City, Larissa Gordon, has organised a Designated Managers Network meeting and is interested in having contribution from Third Sector partners involved in work with LAC. The meetings will be arranged termly and the CYPVSPF will extend an invitation to Larissa to come and speak to the group about her work as the Virtual Head Teacher.
· Vicky Mackenzie from Action for Children shared information about the latest research by Action For Children on early neglect. The link is below.
https://www.actionforchildren.org.uk/resources-and-publications/reports/child-neglect-and-its-relationship-to-other-forms-of-harm-responding-effectively-to-children-s-needs/
· Sarah Elliot from Barnardos shared information about training events called “Meeting the needs of children and young people with learning disabilities who experience, or are at risk of, CSE: ‘Unprotected, Overprotected’ To build upon the evidence gained through the UK-wide ‘Unprotected, Overprotected’ research study addressing children and young people with learning disabilities who experience, or are at risk of, child sexual exploitation (CSE), Comic Relief has commissioned the British Institute for Learning Disabilities (BILD), Paradigm Research and Barnardo’s to design and deliver training to support professionals to be better informed to meet the needs of this group of children and young people.
· This information will be included with the papers for the Minutes. Sarah recommended that people get in touch to register their interest, as there are going to be 8 free events (2 planned for Scotland) and it would be good to get one of these up in the North of the country if possible.
· Tom Starrs from Archway asked about the availability of translation services in the City as they had been working with a family who required respite care but couldn’t speak English. Vicky Mackenzie offered information about translation services. / Extend an invitation Larissa GordonCheck out information about translation services in Aberdeen City / Maggie – send her dates of CYPVSPF
Maggie to get in touch with Vicky and ask for information.
9. Date of next meeting / · 13th September 2016 at ACVO