Agenda item

This report is provides information to advise the committee about the service provided by First Response and the process by which referrals relating to Children and Young People living in Haringey and believed to either be in need of support or at risk of harm are managed and appropriate action taken.

The committee considered detailed information about the service provided by First Response and the process by which referrals relating to Children and Young People living in Haringey and believed to either be in need of support or at risk of harm are managed and appropriate action taken.

Members noted that the First Response department consists of 6 social work teams.  This included the screening team, the first in the country of its kind, a multi agency triage service consisting of a core team of Metropolitan Police, Health Visitors and Social Work staff.  This team has responsibility for screening contacts, made by fax and post with the First Response service about children and ensuring that appropriate action is undertaken according to the issue. There was extended support to this team from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health, the Youth Offending Service, Education Welfare and the Police Child abuse Investigation team.  The duties of the remaining four teams: Social Work Team, the No Recourse to Public Funds team, the Emergency Duty Team and Local Authority Designated Officer, were also explained to the committee.

The process for logging, processing and evaluating contacts about children was set out.  It was noted that this collection of information was consistently monitored by a manager and where there was insufficient information supplied there would be proactive contact with the referrer to gather necessary additional information about the issues around the child. The committee noted that, due to the collated multi agency experience of the screening team, they were able to provide advice and information without the need for social work intervention when required. Examples of this provided were mothers with acute post natal depression, who could be supported by GP and health visitor and parenting advice for parents with adolescent children.

The committee were advised that contacts about children resulting in a referral to the social work teams were on average 20%. This was explained to be a good rate as it indicated that the initial contacts with the service were being dealt with effectively and only those requiring an initial assessment were being passed onto a social worker.  When the committee enquired about monitoring the quality of decision making at this stage, they were advised that there was an audit exercise undertaken every six weeks to ensure that thresholds of need (agreements about levels of need and risk which will trigger referrals to universal or targeted services) were being correctly adhered to. The committee particularly noted that referrals of an urgent nature, such as those relating to child protection concerns, were dealt with immediately via a referral to the police (Child Abuse Investigation Team) and a strategy meeting.

The committee sought an understanding of the mechanisms in place to detect whether contacts were continuously being dealt with effectively. In response a number of conditions and indicators were outlined which would provide an awareness to managers of any issues and delays.

The committee continued to consider information on the initial and core assessments and discussed the complexities of dealing with cases of neglect.  The committee noted that contacts regarding children or young people known to other parts of the service were passed to the named service. Similarly information on children known to other local authorities was passed to their allocated social worker. This was also the case with Looked after Children who were placed from outside the borough in the borough’s 17 private children’s homes.  The committee noted that the Council held a general corporate parenting role for these 300 children and for children on child protection plans, living in temporary accommodation in the borough, but registered with other boroughs. The committee also noted the overriding responsibility that local services in the borough would have for these children.

An outline of the current referral rates and workload of the service was illustrated. The committee learned that families with multiple needs would require a team response. This was where the live partnership working of the screening team was invaluable. Clarification was sought and information provided on current social workloads and the committee noted the improvements made to the Framework I computer system to ensure it was user friendly.

RESOLVED

That the report be noted