Children and Families: National Leadership Group Minutes - 5 August 2024

Attendees and apologies

• Louise Long(co-chair), SOLACE 
• Hannah Axon, CoSLA
• Ali Macdonald, Public Health Scotland
• Tracy Davis, Child Health Commissioners 
• Alison Gordon, Social Work Scotland
• Mary Morris, Care Inspectorate
• Neil Hunter, Scottish Children's Reporter Administration 
• Elliot Jackson, Children's Hearing Scotland
• Carron McKellar, Police Scotland
• Sheena Devlin, ADES
• Mhair Grant, Child Protection Committees Scotland
• Jude Turbyne, Children in Scotland
• Mary Glasgow, Coalition of Care and Support Providers in Scotland
• Kathy Henwood, Children's Services Planning Strategic Leads Network 
• Claire Burns, CELCIS
• Jane Scott, CELCIS
• Alex McTier, CELCIS
• Andrew Warson(co-chair), Scottish Government
• Gavin Henderson, Scottish Government
• Bryony Revell, Scottish Government
• Mair Macpherson, Scottish Government
• Mariela Fordyce, Scottish Government
• Paul Beaton, Scottish Government
• Peter Donachie, Scottish Government
• Emily Aitchison, Scottish Government

Items and actions

Welcome from co-chairs

Louise Long welcomed members to the meeting. The meeting’s purpose was to reach clear decisions on the group’s priorities. Workforce issues have been raised on a number of occasions and today’s meeting will help set out areas of focus. Links between the leadership group and other groups has also been a recurrent issue and the meeting will consider how best to improve connections and collaborations.  

Workforce development

Mariela Fordyce described the work taking place to define the children and families’ services workforce that would come within the scope of the refreshed workforce development group and the outcomes to be achieved.

The routemap for the children, young people and families outcomes Framework helps to place the aims of the workforce development group within the broader context of the actions that need to be taken to improve children and families’ wellbeing. The outcomes framework is firmly based on the GIRFEC model of practice and the routemap includes an outcome that “the workforce is equipped to confidently and competently deliver high quality, rights and relationship-based trauma-informed practice.” 

This can be used to develop an approach to conceptualising children and family services workforce in relation to their contribution to the SHANARRI wellbeing indicators, across three domains:

• care and safeguard, for professionals who work with the most children and young people experiencing adversity and risk
• support and prevent, for those who support children’s development and learning, and
• love and nurture, for the wider workforce, as well as families and communities

The three domains will be used to help develop an outcome-based theory of change for the workforce centred around the five principles of workforce planning - plan, attract, train, employ and nurture. The theory of change will also set out short, medium and long term outcomes and a means of evaluating impact. The theory of change will also be used to help identify the membership for the refreshed workforce development group.

Alex McTier set out how CELCIS will be assisting the workforce development group by undertaking research on workforce wellbeing issues. Workforce wellbeing is multi-faceted and the research will ensure a breadth of issues is covered from pay, terms and conditions to workloads to training and retention. Work will begin by mapping existing research in Scotland; the rest of the UK; and internationally. This will help to identify options for improvement and any gaps in the data. Potential further work to address any gaps could include targeted focus groups and surveys. Overall, the research will provide a robust evidence base to understand the experience of different wellbeing aspects and better enable the workforce development group and leadership group to support workforce wellbeing.

The following points were made in discussion:

• it is important to clearly identify the “core” and “wider” children and family services workforce being included within the scope of the workforce development group. This will help to identify any risk of overlaps with other workforce groups and crucially opportunities for collaboration. For example, with the mental health and wellbeing workforce plan. As part of this work, social work and social care staff should be explicitly included in the materials being produced for the workforce development group to consider
• he focus on identifying short, medium and long term outcomes is helpful. Working back from what should be achieved by 2030 and linking into the promise plan will help in prioritising and sequencing the group’s work. So too would be distinguishing between outcomes to be delivered nationally; those to be delivered locally; and the interconnections between them
• there is a risk of over-emphasising the role of training in improving outcomes particularly given the other pressures on staff. The five principles of workforce planning should help to provide a more balanced approach. However, these need to be used carefully to avoid the workforce development group’s remit being too wide and creating risks to effective delivery
• the workforce development group also needs to consider the development and implementation of trauma-informed practices in its widest extent covering leadership and workplace culture; staff welfare and resources as well as training
• uncertainty over continuity of funding from year to year and the consequent implications for staff retention is a significant source of anxiety particularly for third sector staff. Moving to multi-year funding cycles would help to alleviate this by providing greater job security and better maintaining support and services to children and families
• the decision to map out and review the existing research first before undertaking any new surveys and focus groups was welcomed. Staff are already being asked to contribute to significant numbers of surveys and consultations which are in themselves a workforce pressure. Alex confirmed that the research will seek to include existing surveys of health and social care staff including IMatter

Louise Long concluded the discussion by noting that the leadership group agreed with the approach being taken; re-emphasised the need for the workforce development group to set clear deliverable short, medium and long term outcomes; and the leadership group should have a further discussion on the results of the mapping work of research on workforce wellbeing.

Reducing complexity of the policy and legislative landscape

Andrew Watson summarised the ongoing work within the Scottish Government’s Children and Families Directorate and other parts of Scottish Government to improve prioritisation, sequencing and co-ordination of initiatives.

The outline policy and legislative timeline circulated to members provided a forward look of upcoming issues and opportunities for early advice and input. The timeline will continue to be developed although subject to change depending on parliamentary timescales and other issues.  It was agreed to consider the potential for members to provide early advice on the development of the promise bill. 

There was concern over the number of different consultations taking place over the summer period which creates difficulties for staff in considering all the issues involved and responding to short deadlines. This should be an issue for improvement as part of broader work on prioritisation, sequencing and co-ordination of initiatives.

Peter Donachie highlighted the work ongoing within Scottish Government to map key groups involved in delivering better outcomes for children and families. A work-in-progress paper covering key groups within the responsibility of the Children and Families Directorate had been circulated to the group. Future versions will include key groups within other Scottish Government Directorates. Members were invited to provide their views on improving alignments between the leadership group and other key groups on which their organisations were represented.

The following points were made in discussion:

• there are significant workload implications arising from the current number of groups and action needs to be taken to make certain they deliver value for all concerned. This includes a sharper focus on the role of each group to ensure they all have a clear purpose and outcomes; timescales for delivery; and a means of evaluating their impact
• there is scope to rationalise the current number of groups. For example, implementation groups should be setting an end point for their work and be discontinued when this is achieved
• there are also opportunities to reduce duplications and overlaps. As part of this consideration should be given to taking a more portfolio-based approach to structuring the work of the different groups
• there needs to be a better balance between national and local level work to avoid over-centralisation of delivery

Next steps

The co-chairs invited members to comment on the added value this meeting of the leadership group had provided. Views were that the group had an open discussion about the challenges being faced. It was also positive that the group was aiming to take a different approach to its business and keep the focus on priorities.

Any other business and date of next meeting

There was no additional bussiness. The next meeting will be on Tuesday 10 September from 15:05 to 16:30.