AQW 9848/22-27
Ms Sian Mulholland
Alliance Party
North Antrim
Tabled Date: 10/04/2024
Answered On Date: 24/04/2024
Priority Written: No
Question:
To ask the Minister of Health what measures his Department has put in place to adhere to the Children's Services Co-operation Act (Northern Ireland) 2015.
Answer:
My officials are fully engaged in the mechanisms established and led by the Department of Education on behalf of the Executive to meet the requirement of the Children’s Services Co-operation Act (Northern Ireland) 2015 to adopt a children and young people’s strategy. This includes the Children and Young People’s Strategy Monitoring and Reporting Board established to provide collaborative leadership, oversight and cross-departmental strategic direction on all policy matters affecting children and young people. It will monitor progress against commitments in the Executive’s 2020-2030 Children and Young People’s Strategy identifying areas for prioritisation and driving greater levels of co-operation across government. There are several examples of initiatives being taken forward by my Department collaboratively with other departments, bodies and voluntary organisations in keeping with the requirements of the Children’s Services Co-operation Act (Northern Ireland) 2015 to work together to improve the wellbeing of children and young people. These include the ‘Life Deserved Strategy’ for Looked After Children developed with the Department of Education together with other stakeholders. Both Departments and their arm's length bodies are continuing to cooperate on the implementation of the Strategy's commitments to action, including through a review of care planning and looked after child review arrangements, the development of a revised Personal Education Planning process for primary aged children who are looked after, and the pooling of resources to support the implementation of the Emotional Health and Wellbeing in Education Framework. The ‘Life Deserved’ Strategy also introduced the ‘Corporate Family’ approach in recognition of the need for a multi-agency response to improve outcomes for care-experienced young people or those at risk of coming into care. The joint Regional Care and Justice Campus Programme has led to the sharing of services and the pooling of funds to establish a single dedicated multi-disciplinary team providing enhanced therapeutic care across Woodlands Juvenile Justice Centre and Lakewood Regional Secure Care Centre. There is close co-operation between health and education in planning and improving provision for children with Special Educational Needs (SEN). This includes the collation of data by health professionals to inform long-term planning for provision in education, the development and review of cross-departmental pathways and the creation of SEN coordinator posts and data managers within HSCTs, which have significantly improved response times to statutory assessment requests from the Education Authority. Health and education have jointly funded SEN Partnership Lead to enhance participation and relationships of children and families, local communities, and voluntary sector partners in the delivery and planning of services. Officials from my Department and the Department of Education co-chair a working group alongside the Public Health Agency, Education Authority and other government departments to facilitate improved collaboration on Transitions for children with SEN. The work aims to improve the SEN transitions process and the interfaces with HSC, Further Education, Employment and Housing to enable children and young people to have meaningful choice and control over their lives after school. Funding from the Department of Health led to the establishment of 29 Family Support Hubs which are partnerships of organisations from the community, voluntary and statutory sectors that respond to early support needs of families across all of Northern Ireland. They sit within the wider multi-agency Children and Young People’s Strategic Partnership. In addition, my Department is cooperating with other departments and stakeholders in developing strategic responses in a range of other areas including early learning and child care, child criminal exploitation and domestic and sexual abuse. The Children’s Social Care Services Reform Programme has been established to strategically address challenges within children’s social care across 9 workstreams involving a number of statutory and community and voluntary organisations.
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