Adult Support and Protection National Strategic Forum minutes: September 2023

Attendees and apologies

• Maree Todd, Minister for Social Care, Mental Wellbeing and Sport (Chair) 
• Iain MacAllister, Scottish Government
• Robert Peterson, Scottish Government
• Vikki Milne, Scottish Government
• Jamie Aarons, Scottish Government
• Gemma Graham, Scottish Government
• Brian Auld, Scottish Government
• Fiona Brown, Office of the Public Guardian
• Brenda Walker, IRISS
• Mike Harkin, Care Inspectorate
• Jane Byrne, NHS Healthcare improvement Scotland (HIS)
• Laura Kerr, Social Work Scotland
• Frances Donohoe, COSLA
• Maureen Scott, NHS HIS
• Suzanne Swinton, Scottish Independent Advocacy Alliance
• Jeffrey Ace, NHS Chief Executives
• Grace Gilling, NHS Adult Support and Protection Network Group
• Jim Carle, Scottish Care
• Claire Wilson, Social Work Scotland
• Vicky Low, Moray HSCP
• Elaine Stevenson, Moray HSCP
• Stephen Grimason, Police Scotland
• Sylvia Chatfield, Chief Social Work Officers Group
• Elaine Torrance, SASPICA, Conveners Group
• George Whitton, Scottish Government

Apologies

• Stuart Muirhead, IRISS
• Kirsteen MacLennan, Care Inspectorate
• Donna McLean, NHS HIS
• John Urquhart, COSLA
• Iain Ramsay, Scottish Government
• Gillian Faulds, Police Scotland
• Cathie Cowan, NHS Boards Chief Executive Group
• Gemma Ritchie, Social Work Scotland
• Karen Hedge, Scottish Care

Items and actions

Welcome, introductions and business from last meeting

Maree Todd welcomed everyone to the Forum. Ms Todd noted a copy of the previous meeting’s minutes and invited the Forum to respond on whether the minutes were an accurate record of the last meeting, and whether there were any matters raising from the minutes (none were raised). She also praised the resilience and resolve of everyone who contributes to supporting and protecting adults at risk of harm.

National Strategic Forum (NSF) Terms of reference review

Vikki Milne said that as part of the review of the NSF Terms of Reference, ASP Team conducted a survey of views on the format, membership and objectives of the Forum and received nine responses from twenty-four members. The respondents made some suggestions on the NSF Terms of Reference. However, there was no consensus on the way forward.

Brenda Walker, National Adult Support and Protection Co-ordinator, reflected on the work of the National Implementation Group, highlighting the commitment of the group, especially due to historical and systematic issues. The sub-groups now have workplans in place and are beginning to develop approaches to improve ASP practice across Scotland. The Forum noted its role in providing leadership and support the work of the sub-groups, including consideration of any outputs form the subgroups and, if agreed, endorsing these for wider dissemination. In extending this remit, the Forum membership may need to be revisited. This was agreed by the meeting.

Biennial report

Elaine Torrance, SSAPICA National Convenors Group, confirmed they welcomed the Biennial Report, which gives us an opportunity to share good practice and raise the profile of the ASP work. Messages from the COVID pandemic show there was continued focus on ASP work and data shows there were increased referrals and complexity. There has been positive practice in training and development, whole-system approaches, multi-agency working and early intervention. Moving forward we should concentrate on chronologies; workforce issues; hearing people with lived experience, quality assurance; budgetary challenges; and cross cutting agendas, such as Multi Agency Risk Assessment Co-ordination (MARAC) and Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA).

Mike Harkin updated the Forum on how the Biennial Report findings support the joint inspection of adult support and protection inspections programme phase 2.

• the report summarises the ASP community landscape well. Increased referrals and vulnerability in the community during and post pandemic. In the context of workforce, financial and new policy challenges. The joint inspection team recognises this and will balance its scrutiny and improvement approach accordingly
• the report points to challenges around self-evaluation, and improvement. Of collecting consistent and accurate data, analysing outcomes, and sharing learning. This will shape our discussions with the NIG(s) and support the development of a multi-agency improvement framework that has the potential to address this
• the report highlights areas of very promising jointly delivered early intervention and prevention approaches across the sector. We will now use this information to open conversations with partnerships who want these externally assured as part of their planned self-evaluation in 2024/25. Evidence of success in our thematic review of this work will encourage further national improvement
• the report highlights the importance of a learning culture inclusive of staff involvement and lived experience. The joint inspection team will develop the quality assurance framework and year 2 programme of work and will illustrate these principles in our work

Jamie Aarons said the Biennial Report underlines the need to address issues around the workforce, particularly around the recruitment and retention of the workforce. The minimum dataset is also improving how we collect information. It gives us a more robust way to compare what is happening across Scotland. The national ASP workforce survey was the first to be done and there was a 100% return. The survey aimed to quantify ASP capacity nationally; as such, provides an initial insight into the key issues that will require further exploration. The survey results indicate the workforce is varied across Scotland. What is being offered across different partnerships needs consistency across the country. The workforce is unique and have specialist skills that need to be supported. Demand for ASP support has also increased. The report will be disseminated to the group soon.

In summing up she said we need to embed this work into the wider social care and social work sectors. We are just at the beginning in getting the data from partnerships. She asked how other organisations use this data. She is happy to engage in further discussion with the Forum members on issues raised by the report.

A discussion then took place where the following points were raised:

• happy to see that there was a 100% response
• would be interested to know how they can map this work across to the NHS workforce and provide training and support to help health staff
• we need a national approach to provide training

Public protection

Sinead Power, Head of Public Protection Team in SG, provided an update on work being taken forward across adults, children, and justice to explore how we might work more collaboratively on key areas of ‘public protection’ including governance, learning reviews, data, and legislation. Sinead highlighted that there have been newly created posts of Public Protection Officers across three local partnership areas. They will develop a more integrated support network. We need to learn what is happening locally across Scotland. It is important we work together across the Scottish Government on key issues. There are a few priorities we must consider including; progress on improvement, collaboration with child protection on issues key issues such as learning reviews and chronologies. How do we bring together ASP and ensure we have an effective ASP service in the NCS. How can we use this as an opportunity to improve ASP.

The following points were raised after the presentation:

• it was interesting to hear about the priority areas and recognise that we need to do more to improve children’s and ASP services
• will the introduction of the NCS create a barrier in ASP or will it lead to improvements in children’s and ASP services
• the NCS is the next step in integration

Chronologies

Brenda Walker, vice chair National Implementation Group, introduced the discussion on chronologies setting out the challenges and the extent to which this is an issue in ASP and across public protection more widely. There have been longstanding challenges in producing them, across the ASP sector. A subgroup has been established as part of the ASP National Implementation Group which aims to look at how we can improve the quality of chronologies, the barriers across the sector and how the issues are like those in children’s services. She will return to the Forum for future support on this issue.

Mike Harding set out the extent chronologies has been identified as is an issue through the ASP joint inspection of 26 ASP Partnerships. Chronologies are a critical element of ASP work.

• chronologies were absent from a substantial number of records they read
• where they were completed, the quality was mixed
• a high proportion were evaluated as weak. Every partnership needed to improve
• it was not clear how chronologies were being used to inform risk, and decisions to move from investigation to case conference
• the lack of chronologies also compromised decisions made at case conferences significantly weakening the strength of accountable decision making
• business systems did not always support good practice

Elaine MacDonald, ASP lead Moray, outlined the key challenges practitioners faced, including there being no shared IT system or understanding of chronologies. They are often seen as an extra part of people’s workloads. The information gained from them cannot be analysed. They do not support individual involvement. Chronologies only focus on the negatives. We need a national strategy to support local led initiatives. There has been a suggestion to change the name from chronologies to ‘life story.’ We also need a clear message on what a good chronology looks like and how to share good practice.

Ellen Daly, IRISS, highlighted evidence of challenges and best practice focusing on role of strategic leadership from her report on chronologies ‘Moving from Current to Best.’ There are multiple related challenges within and across agencies. However, there are opportunities here if we can find levers in one area, they could benefit other areas. One way to look at chronologies is as an information problem. This is in how we access, share, record and co-create them. Data from the scoping research called for a) improvement of leadership, management, and b) strengthened accountability of managers to ensure completion and quality of chronologies. But also, a ‘national expectation’ and ‘national opportunities to take a lead on chronologies.’ The key question to leave the forum with is: What opportunities exist or can be created in your networks to set a national expectation around ASP chronologies?

Vicky Low, Chronologies subgroup lead, confirmed that she and her colleagues from the group have been working with Ellen on chronologies since November 2022. She asked why we are talking about chronologies, when we do not have a good chronology producing system in place. We need to make chronologies to be seen as more than an administration task. We must recognise we are not re-inventing the wheel. The work done in Phase 1 of the ASP Joint Inspection Improvement Programme produced a list of priorities and identified that we need cultural change. We need practitioners who are committed to improving the quality of chronologies. We need the right people around the table to help take this forward. We need to collaborate with professionals and those with lived experiences to produce a shared document.

There was a discussion where the following points were raised:

• are there any specific forums we can use to have conversations to bring this together in the right place
• we would need to call a meeting to bring together the right people to map out the issues
• could we organise a workshop where we could discuss the issues and good practice
• Vicki Low would be happy to move this forward and to see how we link this in with child protection

Thanks and meeting close

Ms Todd had to leave the meeting early, as she had another meeting to attend. She thanked everyone for their input and will be interested to see how the ASP progresses. Iain MacAllister took over as chair and asked if there were any questions. As there was none the meeting was ended.