Supporting (Troubled) Families in Hampshire

Winchester City Council Provider Event

July 2013

Background – National Programme

• Civil unrest over 5 days of August 2011

• Prime Minister’s commitment re 120,000 families

• Troubled Family Unit – Department for Communities and Local

Government

• Emphasis on Public Services working differently together

• National Efficiency – Families cost £9bn per year (£75,000 each p/a) and

cross cut every Public Sector Agency

The Hampshire ‘ambition’

• 1,590 families across Hampshire over the next 3 years (approx 80-90 in Winchester)

• Improved outcomes and lasting positive changes to the lives of families

• Greater inter-agency coordination and more effective partnership working with whole families

• Challenging and changing the way we work – Not just more of the same

• 3 year programme, but sustainable transformational change

National definition

Troubled families are households who:

1. Are involved in youth crime and/or anti-social behaviour;

2. Have children not in school (<85% attendance, 3 fixed term exclusions, permanently excluded, or head teacher discretion);

3. Have an adult on out of work benefits.

…..and as a result cause high costs to the public purse.

Local discretion filters can also be used by partners.

DCLG funding claimed for those families meeting at least two of the three criteria

Not about chasing the money – if a family will benefit they will be included

Programme Structure and Governance

STFP Management Group(Chair: Paul Archer, Director Policy & Governance, HCC)

STFP Partnership Board(Chair: Cllr Keith Mans)

STFP Strategic Coordinator and Programme Team

Ian Langley, Gary Westbrook, Volker Buck

HCC Accountable Body

DCLG Troubled Families Unit

10 Local Co-ordination Groups based on District Council Areas (Havant & E Hants Combined)

Delivery Approach

• Multi Agency Identification of Families

• Single Family Plans for every family

• Twin Track Approach – Intensive Support Service and Local Solutions

• Independent Evaluation and Strategic Business Case

1,095Families

495 Families

“TRANSFORM” Centrally commissioned Intensive Family Support Services

Locally determined solutions

The Single Family Plan

• Not another assessment

• Sharing information at the family level – no organisation has the complete picture

• Simple action plan – what will make the difference

• Looking at the whole family and not just individual members

• Joined up approach – 1 family, 1 plan, 1 joined up approach

• SafetyNet

• Family engagement and consent

What’s new about this approach?

• 1 Family, 1 Plan, One joined up approach

• Not a new service to “refer” into. But a new way of working

• One agency/one professional leading the work (doesn’t mean they ‘do

everything’)

• Using existing assessments rather than further resource being used for

further assessment

• Statutory & voluntary agencies working & targeting precious resources

together

• Family based information/intelligence sharing

• It’s everybody’s core business!

• 10 Local Coordination groups and SROs in place

• Year 1 cohort (530 families) identified

• Single family plans and lead agencies in place for approximately 500 families

• SafetyNet – Single “family” view

• Evaluation Partner (University of Portsmouth) appointed

• Intensive Family Support Service (IFSS) provider appointed

Year One Progress

• Family Engagement

• Nominations to “Transform”

• Monitoring progress with year 1 families

• Year 2 cohort of families

• Embedding a new way of sharing information and joining up service delivery at the family level…

Year Two and Next Steps