Agenda item
Early Help and Family Wellbeing Centres
To provide a progress update since the establishment of Family Wellbeing Centres (FWC); to outline current service delivery arrangements and examples of the outcomes and impact achieved for families and to update on the proposed wider changes to the Early Help service to align with the new FWC delivery model and the government’s new ‘Best Start for Life’ programme.
Minutes:
Councillor Gwen Grahl (Cabinet Member for Children, Young People & Schools) introduced the report, which looked at the impact of Brent’s 8 Family Wellbeing Centres (FWCs) and detailed some of the results they had on the lives of young people across Brent. She highlighted that the scheme had been pioneered to protect some of the services offered by Children’s Centres, and the transition to FWCs took place between 2019-2021. In terms of their impact, she highlighted that they had been an essential component in delivering early help, and had been involved in the provision of the holiday and activities programme. The FWCs had played a crucial role in children’s health and wellbeing as well as school improvements.
Nigel Chapman (Corporate Director Children & Young People, Brent Council) added that the creation of 8 FWCs out of 17 Children’s Centres had been an imperative of a saving requirement for the Council, but rather than cut services the Council had decided to create something new and created FWCs. This had meant the Council was now ahead of the national debate on the issue as it was the direction of travel coming out of central government for the creation of ‘Family Hubs’. The FWCs were only one year into operation, so some outcome measures were in development rather than fully formed, and FWCs were still gaining new registrations. He concluded by highlighting that the Best Start for Life Programme was coming onstream and the Council was hopeful that by using that model it would be better able to integrate work with health, using FWCs as a place based locality model.
The Chair thanked officers for the introduction and invited comments and questions from those present, with the following issues raised:
The Committee asked whether there was a difference between the Family Hubs model and FWCs, and were advised that they were the same type of service. The name ‘Family Wellbeing Centres’ had arisen following discussions with parents, carers and members of the community who felt that the name meant more to families.
The Committee asked what steps were being taken to identify and ensure those most at need for the service were able to access it. Teni Awoyemi (Head of Early Help, Brent Council) advised the Committee that Community Outreach Workers were in place within FWCs who would go into communities to meet families, into schools, and into different settings to promote FWCs. Officers also worked closely with other partners including schools, health and public health. Within FWCs it was not only Council workers based there but other partners such as the 0-19 service, midwifery, and Speech and Language Therapy. She felt they were well placed for families within communities to know about the services FWCs provided, and the centres were supported by local steering groups made up of parents, community leaders and other professionals.
The Committee asked what outreach work had been done to reach difficult to reach communities. They were advised that each centre had a triage worker who engaged with the local community. One worker had been visiting local Wembley hotels to help families who had been placed there by the Home Office, as those families would not necessarily know about services in the local area. By proactively reaching out, health needs and educational needs for those families had been picked up. There were also over 40 volunteers working in the FWCs and they were out in the community constantly.
In relation to the locations of FWCs, the Committee asked whether they were in the right places and could be accessed by families. Nigel Chapman highlighted that, when the work was done to establish the centres, there had been a requirement to do a full evaluation of where the greatest need in the borough was, and also where the largest sites were. Primarily the aim was geographical spread, size of building, and where the areas of need were highest. It was also important to ensure people in those areas were close to a site, and the site was close to transport links. The sites had been approved by Cabinet three years ago and there were no resources to have more than 8 centres, meaning decisions had needed to be based on those factors. Responding to why the Willows had been chosen specifically for the SEND FWC provision, Nigel Chapman advised that it had already been operating as a Specialist Nursery so had specialist support for very young children with a disability. It was felt to be a good opportunity to expand so that FWCs could support children across the borough in early years and those older children with disabilities, building on an existing area of work. In addition, the centre was centrally based in the borough and it was felt that, for something with a whole borough wide reach, being situated in the middle of the borough would be helpful.
The Committee asked what training and support was provided for staff in FWCs. Teni Awoyemi responded that many of the staff within FWCs had already been working in Early Help, within the old children’s centres, or were Family Support Workers, so already had a level of training, but there was also an established training and development programme specifically for FWC staff, as well as a central programme for all staff across the Children and Young People’s department.
The Committee asked how much more money the department would ideally need in order to do what they would like to with FWCs. Nigel Chapman highlighted that, historically, Brent’s General Fund per head of population was low in terms of London as a whole. If Brent were funded at the London average level, they would be gaining around £200 more per child per annum, which would be around £16m additional for the whole of Children’s Services. Despite the level of funding, Nigel Chapman felt Brent had managed to pull together as effective an offer as possible, as a result of working closely with school partners, health colleagues and the voluntary sector. One of the things officers would like to introduce in FWCs was longer opening hours to expand them to evenings and weekends, but this would require additional staffing. The centres only had a very small core staffing group, and ultimately if there were more members of staff that meant they could be doing more casework out in communities. Councillor Grahl added that one of the things that made projects like FWCs so vulnerable was because a lot of the other services provided by the department were statutory and were not allowed to be cut as it would put children at risk, such as child protection services. As such, additional provision like FWCs ended up being the type of project vulnerable to cuts that may need to be made. This was unfortunate, as Early Help was specifically set up to prevent children going into care by giving them early interventions before a situation became dangerous for young people and children.
Continuing to discuss funding, Nigel Chapman highlighted that the Council had been successful in a number of bids for funding, outlined in the report. FWCs were heavily reliant on grant funding, but the department had also bid for funding, and were shortly due to submit the bid for the ‘Best Start for Life Programme’, requesting £4m across 3 years. In response to whether the steering groups for FWCs could apply for NCIL funding, Councillor Grahl advised the Committee that NCIL would only be a temporary solution because the funding would need to continue year after year and NCIL could not be reapplied to. She reassured the Committee that the department were doing their best to find alternative sources of funding and were constantly applying for grants as soon as they became available.
The Committee asked for more information on what the ‘Best Start for Life’ programme was based on. They were advised that the programme was based on the first 1,001 days of life and was evidence based, focusing on a child’s health and development needs. This included ensuring children received their immunisations, were a healthy weight, were being read to by their parents at home and that they were ready for school, amongst other areas. Parents would receive targeted mental health support to support their child’s development. The programme would be delivered by health providers in FWCs with the Council’s support.
The Committee acknowledged the difficulties with staffing capacity, and asked whether officers had reached out to volunteers to support FWCs. They were advised that there were over 40 volunteers working to support FWCs, and that programme was very successful. In terms of how the number of volunteers was protected so that the support remained consistent, the Committee were advised that there was a contract in place with Barnardo’s who provided volunteer co-ordination and managed those volunteers. Barnardo’s already had an established system of recruiting and retaining volunteers.
The Committee highlighted section 3.30 of the report which detailed the objectives of FWCs, and asked for assurance they were being met as set out. Nigel Chapman advised that there were internal indicators which demonstrated progress against those impact measures and outcomes, and there would be a requirement to report back to central government on the ‘Supporting Families Programme’ on those indicators. An area that was felt to have made a significant impact locally was managing support to families to prevent children entering into the care system, and Brent’s number of children in care proportionally compared very well to London and the national average.
The Committee asked for assurance about the work being undertaken around childcare provisions and early intervention and prevention. They were advised that the Early Years Team, which was part of Early Help, worked on ensuring take up for free entitlements for 2, 3 and 4 year olds, and the data suggested that this was going well and improving, particularly since Covid-19. Childcare sufficiency planning was also doing very well.
In response to how parents and carers and various other stakeholders were involved to ensure genuine and tangible co-production, the Committee were advised that there were local steering groups working with each FWC, as well as the Parent Carer Forum which was made up of parents directly receiving services from the centres. Parenting programmes were a big part of the work in FWCs, focussing on an evidence-based approach. Officers also measured impact through having the voice of children in assessments and interventions with families. Work was being done with older children to attract them into the centres, and they had heard from older children what type of activities they would like in the centres which the Council was now working to provide.
In response to what partnership programmes had been set in place with FWCs, Nigel Chapman advised that there were good connections with community healthcare. Maternity health visiting services and Speech, Language and Communication Therapy were being provided in FWCs. There was also a greater connection with schools close to FWCs, including making use of school facilities for some activities in the evenings.
The Chair thanked those present for their contributions and brought the discussion to an end. The Committee RESOLVED:
i) To recommend that a representative from the Brent Parent Carer Forum or FWC Steering Group attends a relevant scrutiny committee meeting.
ii) To recommend that the Council continues to work in partnership with community and voluntary sector organisations on Early Help.
Supporting documents:
- 7. Early Help and Family Wellbeing Centres, item 7. PDF 605 KB
- 7a. Appendix 1 - St Raphs Summer Timetable 2022, item 7. PDF 303 KB