Communities and Local Government CommitteeWritten evidence from Leeds City Council
Leeds welcomes the opportunity to submit evidence in relation to cost benefits and the national Troubled Families Programme. In Leeds this has provided an opportunity to explore how central and local government can work differently to achieve better outcomes and reduce costs across the public purse. This report is submitted on behalf of Leeds City Council and illustrates the background to and an overview of the Programme in Leeds as well as implementation and progress to date. A number of challenges are also articulated.
Background
Last year, Leeds led the Commission on the Future of Local Government, using the concept “civic enterprise” to illustrate how councils still have an integral role to play in the 21st century. For further details see http://civicenterpriseuk.org The Commission’s report is being used by a number of councils, including Leeds, to help them to work with the wider community to improve outcomes for citizens. The Commission advocated a new leadership style, where councils are more enterprising, business and partners more civic and the public more engaged. Two of the five propositions are particularly relevant here: making the most of devolution and devising a new social contract between citizens and the state. These key propositions are central to the implementation of the Troubled Families approach in Leeds.
Children’s Services in Leeds have undergone significant changes in recent years. Improving services provided to vulnerable children has been a significant city-wide priority for a sustained period, as reflected in the agreement from elected members to increase funding for children’s services during a difficult economic climate. The impact of this investment and approach to service improvement was noted by OfSTED inspectors in their inspections of the council’s Children’s Services in 2011 and of Independent Reviewing Officer arrangements in 2013.
The adoption of two new ways of working has been central to our improvement approach. We have used the Outcomes Based Accountability (OBA) methodology/approach to focus attention on key performance trends and to work with partners to develop clear action plans to turn the curve on our baseline performance. For further details see www.resultsaccountability.com Alongside this refresh of our approach to performance, we have also re-focused our frontline delivery to adopt the principles of restorative practice, which is based on the fundamental premise that people are happier, more co-operative and more likely to make positive changes when practitioners do things with them, rather than to or for them. For further details see http://uk.iirp.edu Restorative approaches are underpinned by the principle of high support and high challenge; this fits well with the Troubled Families programme: getting the right service to the right family at the right time.
Leeds is a vibrant, diverse and growing city and the second largest metropolitan authority in the country. The 2011 census showed that Leeds has a population of 751,500 living in 320,600 households. The population has increased by 5.1% since the 2001 Census. There are just over 180,000 children and young people aged 0 to 19 in Leeds. The proportion of pupils in Leeds schools that are of Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) heritage has increased by 7.9 percentage points since 2005 to 23.9% in 2011. A higher proportion of primary than secondary pupils are of BME heritage. Over 170 languages are recorded as spoken in Leeds schools and 14.6% of pupils have English as an additional language. Whilst Leeds is overall less deprived than other large cities and average income is above regional averages, 23.4% of children and young people aged 0–16 (around 31,000) live in poverty.
Overview
Leeds has embraced the challenge of Troubled Families within its overall ambition to be a Child Friendly City (see www.leeds.gov.uk/childfriendlyleeds), using the concept of a new social contract to help change the relationship between the state and the family. Within Leeds the programme is known as “Families First” emphasising the central role of families in owning and contributing to the solution to the issues that they face. The programme and approach has strong strategic backing from partners. Local governance arrangements are managed through a strategic board, the Leeds Families First Programme Board, which is chaired by the Deputy Leader of the Council (also the Lead Executive Member for Children’s Services).
Leeds has a long history of successful partnership working and providing evidence based support to families with complex needs led by a well-established Children’s Trust Board. Therefore the Troubled Families programme was not our starting point for looking at how we could improve outcomes for our most vulnerable families whilst reducing costs to the public purse.
Over the last three years Leeds has developed 25 locality based multi-agency clusters which have evolved from the extended schools offer. Our clusters coordinate the identification of families and early help services. The cluster “Top 100” methodology can be summarised as the local identification and support of vulnerable families through a multi-agency approach. Alongside these Leeds has been incrementally developing restorative practice, family group conferencing, and other evidence based family intervention approaches.
The Troubled Families programme strategically fits and complements our local approaches in the ways we work “with” families in Leeds. The Children’s Trust Board has developed a particular focus on our three “obsessions”; as these issues have a high impact on children and are resource intensive. These are:
safely reducing the need for children to become looked after;
increasing school attendance; and
decreasing the number of young people not in education, training or employment (NEET).
The principles within the Troubled Families programme provide further leverage for us to bring partners together and work towards system and cultural change that results in better outcomes for families, communities and generates longer term cost benefits. We believe that it is crucial in the current financial climate to get identification and investment right first time.
Implementation and Progress to Date
A co-located programme team has been established with key secondments from partner organisations which include Probation, Police and Job Centre Plus. Leadership and strategic overview is provided through the Leeds Families First Programme Board. The programme has been operationalised through the children’s services workforce within the context of clusters (the locality arrangements of schools and other related services).
Additional funding has strengthened and increased capacity within the Leeds intensive family support offer. In particular we have expanded our existing multi systemic therapy (MST) services, the Signpost family intervention programme and family group conferencing. Each of our 25 clusters has a nominated Targeted Services Leader who, in effect, is the troubled families coordinator in the locality. Third sector organisations have been commissioned to provide additional capacity, including acting as lead family practitioners in some circumstances. Sustainability and building on existing good practice are key drivers of the programme.
Implementation in Leeds focuses on three key principles: one lead practitioner, one plan, and one assessment. Our ambition is that every team around the family is co-ordinated by a skilled lead family practitioner and fit for purpose.
Progress to date includes:
A high proportion of families have a named lead family practitioner, which has been built using a strong support and challenge model to achieve the workforce and cultural change.
More than 100 individual organisations or agencies have taken on the lead family practitioner role.
Robust information sharing agreements are in place.
Robust systems are in place to support data matching and identification.
There is a strong menu of evidence based services available from a wide range of partners, including the third sector, using the principle of getting the right service to the right family at the right time.
Workforce development plans are in place to support cultural change, including mentoring support for lead practitioners and practice development.
Lead practitioners trained in restorative approaches.
Improved integrated working across Adult Services, Police, Probation, Job Centre Plus and the third sector, focusing on system and cultural change to support whole family approaches, improve outcomes and reduce duplication across the system.
In terms of implementing a system of payment by results (PBR), Leeds submitted a successful claim for 135 families in January 2013. This equated to 15% of our year 1 cohort. Of the remaining 85% where a PBR claim was not made, 50% of these families demonstrated improved outcomes against one or more of the national criteria. Leeds were unable to submit PBR claims in relation to work/employment due to appropriate systems not been in place to capture data requirements. This has now been rectified.
The principles of PBR offer opportunities to incentivise partners and services to focus on outcomes. However within this context local evidence suggests a set of complex issues at play. Therefore achieving the PBR for a family is not necessarily a measure of “turning around a family” but demonstrates part impact in relation to needs. True measurement would be based on longitudinal studies.
Current Challenges
Although Leeds has embraced the Troubled Families programme and the opportunity to develop new ways of working across organisational boundaries significant challenges remain:
Despite flexibilities around local filters there is evidence the programme is not targeting some of our most complex families (for example, only 43 households out of 867 have children on child protection plans and a low correlation with our top 100 methodology). Learning from Year 1 and a refresh of local filters will ensure smarter identification for Year 2.
Some “silo” structures remain that inhibit a focus on families and look at isolated incidents as opposed to the broader picture and family interactions.
Workforce development and cultural change remains a challenge to coherently address (for example, we are beginning to have a focus on employment within the assessment process).
There are continued challenges and opportunities with the scalability and sustainability of the Programme, for example by ensuring enough lead practitioners are confident to lead beyond their regular professional boundary.
Developing integrated commissioning arrangements so they complement emerging national frameworks including Health and Wellbeing Boards is a complex process.
Impact of the Welfare Reform changes still to be established.
There is a critical lack of coherence within government policy that does not support integrated working on the ground. For example aspects of Education and European Social Fund provision for families with multiple needs (ESF).
Cost Benefits
Although we have undertaken cost-benefit analysis on individual case studies, it is too early in the programme to estimate the longer term cost benefits to families, local communities or the public purse. For this reason Leeds welcomes the opportunity to be part of the National Evaluation. Locally we are also looking at social return on investment approaches to support local research and learning.
Conclusion
“Troubled Families” highlights an approach where central government, councils and partners, and families, can work differently and in partnership together to achieve greater impact and save money. Leeds has embraced these opportunities and has welcomed and valued the support of the national Troubled Families team and their role regarding promoting local flexibilities. Their efforts to develop coherence within central government policy is much needed and appreciated.
Our experience in Leeds suggests that a much longer period of time is needed to reap the systemic changes, cost benefits and cultural change needed regarding this area of work. However we are optimistic that this programme will continue to move us closer to those ambitions.
Leeds has developed an architecture which puts us in a strong position to identify and respond early in the life of the problem to families with complex circumstances. Leeds would welcome the opportunity to explore and negotiate further freedoms and flexibilities in other areas of our responsibilities and influence.
June 2013
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