Agenda item

  Kathryn Boulton - Corporate Director Children & Family Services – Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council

The Board received a presentation from Kathryn Boulton, Corporate Director of Children and Family Services at Redcar and Cleveland Council on behalf of herself and also Sue Butcher Director of Children’s Services at Middlesbrough Council and Mark Adams, Director of Public Health South Tees. The work of Rebecca Scott from Public Health was also acknowledged by Kathryn Boulton.

 

The presentation provided an update on the work undertaken so far to develop a Whole System Change for Children and Families and an outline of next steps.

 

The Board heard that there is a dedicated and passionate workforce and good examples of evidence based practice but we are not seeing rates change on child health profiles at the pace we would like.

The Live Well South Tees Board had previously given a mandate to:

 

•           Focus on PLACE (not organisations)

•           Build common purpose (vision, values, common function) across members

•           Shared insight and credible strategies

•           Mission-driven

•           Strong, collaborative System leadership

•           Closer connection to communities

 

The Corporate Director advised that there had been many challenges over the past year including:

 

•           Global Pandemic

•           Further inequalities

•           Lock down babies Children’s Commissioner Report

•           Lack of face to face contact with families

•           Responding to the emotional health and well-being of children and families

•           Increase in safeguarding concerns

 

The Board heard that to effect change we need to be focussing on the earliest years and why early years are so important.

 

•           When very young children thrive communities thrive

•           From conception stable caring relationships, enriching experiencing and our surroundings shape a child's life course

•           Adversity can also shape our bodies and brain development

•           Our earliest experiences shape our health as an adult

 

Framing

•           How we communicate about the importance of early childhood development is a critical factor

-           Use of metaphors such as - Serve and return; interaction back and forth that builds the brain

-           Overloaded lorry; when parents are over-burdened they struggle to care for their children's needs and how we view this shapes community and services response

-           We need a common language and common understanding to build capacity

 

The Corporate Director provided an overview of the outcomes of the workshop that had been held:

 

Partnership working

•           We need the community as partners from the beginning – engaging community is not a key strength

•           On-going strategic buy in is key to success – strategic governance

•           A shared understanding and a common language

•           Alignment of services could be key – need to be joined up in thinking/delivery

•           The development of early years is important for the future of South Tees

 

Dedicated Resources

•           Need a focused team – this cannot be done on top of somebody's day job

•           Freedom to focus on the early years and develop new ways of working – this is not a quick fix

•           Pump prime early years – be smarter with the investment we have, look at resource in the system

•           Covid funding

•           We need to use evidence informed practice and build on what already works

 

In terms of achieving collective impact, the considerations and concepts from the feedback session seemed to be  : 

 

•           Focus capacity on the earliest years – possible development of a centre for early childhood development

•           Importance of having the community at the heart and ensuring co-production and understanding what matters

•           Building on evidence based approaches – using the brain science and metaphors

•           Ensuring effective system governance

 

The Live Well South Tees Board were asked to commit to:

•           Developing a common language across all workforces and the community using the brain science and use of metaphors

•           Developing a trauma informed approach across all workforces

•           Engaging with the community as partners

•           Exploring the development of a centre for early childhood development with shared resources

•           Developing system governance for 0-5

 

AGREED that the recommendations, as presented, were approved.