Green light or flashing red light for vulnerable children?

This week, the County Council cabinet decided to move forwards on closing 35 Children's Centres throughout Buckinghamshire and replacing these with a new "Early Help service" based around "nine community team bases" (or "hubs" as they have also been called).

I am profoundly worried about the impact this change will have on families with new babies and small children. Of course the Tory administration will issue hundreds of emollient words and assurances that nobody in real need will suffer as a result. Of course they would. But how can they be so sure? And what measures will be installed to identify whether these assurances are true as the new service is rolled out?

You can read all about the proposals here in their press statement (see annotated version below too), the agenda for the meeting which discussed and agreed these proposals and the core paper on which all this is based.

As both a politician and as adviser on organisational change and development over nearly 30 years, I am always intensely interested in aims and measurement: what will success look like and how will you measure whether you are making progress towards this goal or not?

Turning to measurement first, the core paper says this:

46. The proposed new lower cost model has been introduced in a wide range of local authority areas across England over the last 3 years, with many citing positive impact on children and families. 

I would have expected to see some reference here, you know the sort of thing: a footnote listing the "wide range of local authority areas" or an article which does so. But of course there is no such footnote and frankly I am sceptical about whether there is any well researched basis for such an assertion. I am of course, because I am a scientist, more than happy to be pointed towards the research. But currently, for me, this statement has about as much evidential substance as a exhalation from Nigel Farage after four pints.

Earlier in the paper, I should add, three authorities are mentioned as places of good practice: North Lincs, Kent and Sutton.

14. An analysis of best practice in other Local Authorities shows that strong Early Help services support an effective system of help and protection for children and young people. 

Here is a page describing the full list of Childen's Centre in North Lincs. And here are details of the Children's Centres in Kent. And the ones for Sutton. So the three authorities cited as sources of good practice all still have Children's Centres... Interesting. Tell me again, why is Bucks closing all of its Children's Centres...?

The paper goes on:

47. Whilst there has been no formal benchmarking of success measures to date, there is an increasing consensus that the Troubled Families measures are a valid and evidence based approach, as they address the following key areas of success:

• School attendance rate including exclusions

• Crime and antisocial behaviour

• Worklessness in adults and young people 

• Children in need – reducing the demand for statutory services

• Domestic abuse incidence 

• Health and wellbeing of children and parents

OK. Let's highlight that statement "Whilst there has been no formal benchmarking of success measures to date". What this means, in fact, is that the current service has not been measured in any serious way against other models of service up until now. Millions of taxpayers' money has been spent on a wing and prayer. If there is no benchmarking data, the County Council probably doesn't even know whether the current service has become more or less effective or efficient over the last (say) 10 years. Without doubt there will also be no way of knowing whether the new service will be better than the old one or not. Because... there have been "no formal ...measures"! How is this a good way to run council services?! Indeed, how is this a way to plan new ones?!

But let us also examine the statement "here is an increasing consensus that the Troubled Families measures are a valid and evidence based approach". Really? Again no reference, just a set of bland words that sound good. Here is a quote from "Troubled families: progress review. Thirty-third Report of Session 2016–17. House of Commons Committee of Public Accounts. December 2016"

The Department [DCLG] had a target of “turning around” the lives of 117,910 families identified by local authorities as troubled. It made payments to local authorities for “turning around” the lives of 99% of these. An evaluation commissioned by the Department could not find evidence of whether or not there had been any significant impact.

Let me emphasise that last statement again, this time in bold:

An evaluation commissioned by the Department could not find evidence of whether or not there had been any significant impact.

I think we can dispense immediately with the fatuous statement "there is an increasing consensus". Evidently, this not the case and assert such is at best misleading and at worst downright disingenuous. As to whether the measures are "a valid and evidence based approach" is at least debatable if not also untrue.

It seems to me that the whole basis of driving forward on these plans has no substance or evidence. And moreover, I am not exactly persuaded that there will be any serious measures of success of the new service as it is established. Which means that the County Council is either gambling with the future of some very vulnerable children's lives or will continue not to measure seriously the impact of the new service... or both!

All that we see in the report is:

I. Progress Monitoring70. Implementation of the new service will be through the Change for Children Programme Board and reported regularly to the cabinet members for Children’s Services and Education and Skills. Once the new service is fully established, the project management and governance arrangements will transfer to normal operational management arrangements. The Children’s Partnership Board will monitor the new Early Help Service.

There is no mention of how the new service will be measured. I will be watching closely how the programme board will conduct its work. How much of this will be done behind closed doors and how will be open for the public/service users/taxpayers to see, will be illuminating. I await to hear about what reliable, evidence based and even consensual measures are being established....

But what is the shape of success? Against what vision, should this new Early Help service be compared? The paper describes that it aims to:

• put the children and families at the heart of our thinking and design services that simplify the complexity of support that is currently available across a range of organisations
• make sure children and families in Buckinghamshire get the right support at the right time
• help children and families be independent and build their own resilience so when problems occur they can find their own solutions at the earliest point of difficulty
• ensure that children and families only have to tell their story once, by working closely with our colleagues and partners to identify and meet their needs together

Noble aims which I would broadly agree with... but how will these be measured? Clearly the Troubled Families measures do not even come close to measuring these. So I repeat: how will progress towards this visions of success be measured? How will, once the detail has been worked out by the programme board, the new service be guaranteed to deliver this vision. At the very least, I would expect to see a link between the new structures, cultures and processes of the new model service mapped against these four points - showing clearly how one will achieve the other.

But finally let's turn to the press statement that was issued within minutes of the decision being taken. I have annotated it below (original in italics - my comments in bold & non-italic):

Green light for new service to help children and families earlier

Published 08.01.2018

Today, 8 January 2018, Cabinet gave their seal of approval for a new service that will help children and families more effectively by developing one Early Help service for Buckinghamshire. [to be clear: whatever now happens is the responsibility of the Cabinet and if Ofsted later criticises the model when it is operating, the buck stops with the whole Cabinet]

Following public consultation in 2017, the council plans to improve services and help families most in need by shifting the focus further from reactive services, to preventative support. [noble aim but I thought Children's Centres have always been about prevention through education. If they have become reactive that will almost certainly be as a consequence of reductions in budgets rather than an strategic plan to do so] By providing more coordinated support to children and families as soon as a problem emerges [really? And will this be identified? And this does sound rather, errr, reactive, does it not?] , the aim is to prevent small problems from getting out of control and help families to become more resilient to deal with problems in the future. [for me the question here is how? What is the basis of lack of 'resilience' in families with small children? My hunch, as a non expert, is that this is down to four things: lack of resources, lack of family & community support, lack of confidence built up over many years and lack of parenting skills for a whole array of complex reasons. Tackling these requires monumental skill, time, patience and probably resources that won't be easily magicked into existence. I await to see how this is done. I do know this won't be done without highly qualified and well resourced staff... do we have these now or will they be acquiring such?]

Cabinet agreed that the new service will be created by bringing together council delivered and commissioned  services that currently provide early help support across the county. This will enable the council to support families with all of their problems at the same time; meaning families and children only have to tell their story once. [OMG: If I had hot dinners for the numbers of decision makers who blithely assert the ease by which fragmented services can be combined into one seamless organisation, I would be very much fatter than I already am! This won't be easy and without proper transitional resourcing, it will be nigh on impossible. I am not holding my breath because I don't think the transitional resourcing will be provided...]

The new service will:                                                                                       
Be targeted at children and families most in need

[what a wonderful word 'targeted' is! What is usually means is lets reduce the service and then describe it as targeting. Two issues emerge - how far do you go? And can services be so easily 'targeted'. Let's deal with the second first. To target a service, you have to know of the whole range of need to begin with. If the new service is so limited, it may not be possible to target the services as the people most in need may not appear on the radar. The advantage of Children's Centres was that everyone was welcome. Those who needed most support would become evident. In a service that won't have that same broad appeal, it is highly likely that many of the people who need the service most will disappear under the radar. But back to the first point: allow me to propose that we strip back the Royal Navy to just six ships. I will convince you that these six ships will be very well 'targeted' where they are needed most. You see what I mean: targeting is meaningless unless you are also clear about the thresholds of need...]

• Support the whole family and work with them to deal with all of their issues together 
• Be made up of teams of family workers who will work closely with families in the community and with partners
• Operate from  nine community team bases from where family workers can go out into the community and provide services at locations that best suit the families’ individual situations
• Support families with a wide variety of issues from money worries, parenting and child behaviour difficulties to mental health issues
• Work closely with partners for the benefit of the whole family
• The service will bring together a range of experience and expertise from across the existing early help services, ensuring teams of multi-skilled family workers who will be able to support families across a wide range of issues and age groups.

The nine community team bases will be close to areas where we know there are more children and families in need. This will enable workers to go out into the community to meet with families in places where they feel most at ease [unless that most at ease means the childrens centres that will no longer exist of course! It also suggests that all of this will happen at a one to one level whereas it is my understanding is that childrens centres thrive on peer support as well. If the services is fragmented into discrete conversations in the corners of coffee shops, all that peer support is lost!].  The team bases will replace some of our current children’s centres and will be located at:

• Aylesbury, covering the Quarrendon area
• Aylesbury Southcourt, Aylesbury College Campus, Oxford Road
• Aylesbury Elmhurst, Dunsham Lane
• Buckingham: this team base will be established as part of the options being explored for co-location of a variety of public sector services. [so they don't know then. What happens in the meantime? And it is the first I have heard of 'co-locating' services. Such as what? More detail please!!]
• Burnham, Minniecroft Road
• Chesham Newtown, Berkhampstead Road
• Wycombe Castlefield, Rutland Avenue, Castlefield
• Wycombe Millbrook, Mill End Road
• Wycombe Hamilton Road

Seven of these will make use of the existing children’s centre buildings, while Quarrendon and Buckingham areas are currently being assessed for appropriate locations.

Over the next six months discussions with local communities, schools and early years providers will look at how the remaining 28 buildings can be used in the future for the maximum benefit of children, families and communities. [weasel words. Does this include selling them off?]

Throughout the consultation in 2017 concerns were raised about the continuation of specific services that take place at children’s centres such as health visitor clinics and speech and language therapy. Many of these services that are provided by partner organisations using children’s centres as a venue, will continue. For example, health visitor clinics which include drop-ins, postnatal well-being groups, post-natal and antenatal clinics, breastfeeding support, and child development reviews will continue to be provided across the county. Specific services such as speech and language support for children, grief counselling and parenting classes will also continue to be delivered by partners or by the new service. Locations for these services may need to change and be delivered from a broader range of community buildings or venues that are close to where people live. [so the lofty idea above of bringing together services does not extend to those provided by say the NHS or others. Which means where there used to be co-location of clinics and nurseries etc - this is now going to be more fragmented and scattered. Good job!!]

Alongside the development of this new service the council will be improving information, advice and support online for children and families through the Buckinghamshire Family Information Service.

One coordinated Early Help service for Buckinghamshire is planned to have a service budget of £7.125m in comparison to the budget of £10.08m for the current services, saving the council £3.07m over four years. [Please can we stop the use of this Owellian phrase 'savings'. These are not savings - these are cuts, pure and simple!] Alongside this, better early help for children and families at the right time should [should... and with no reliable measures as yet - and indeed no way of comparing to past...] reduce the demand for more costly support from children's services such as social care in the future.

Cabinet member for Children’s Services, Warren Whyte said: “This is a great opportunity to support children and families who need us the most. By going out to where they are, dealing with the whole family and all of their issues and listening to what families need rather than waiting for them to reach a crisis point, I’m confident we can make some real positive changes for families in Buckinghamshire. [I am not confident and I think hundreds of families in Bucks are not either. But I guess we will see and the families concerned will know who to contact if or when the services reduce and more crises happen... And isn't there an Ofsted report on Bucks Children's services coming out soon? I look forward to reading its results...]

I’m particularly keen now for ideas on how we can continue to keep our Children’s Centre buildings in use going forward; whether that is to support increasing Early Years places, schools, other support and services for children, young people and families, or broader community use.” [You can send your ideas to Cllr Warren Whyte here or email: wwhyte@buckscc.gov.uk]