Effectiveness of children's services planning guidance: consultation analysis

Supporting Practitioners and Staff

The final question in the consultation explored the role of the guidance in supporting practitioner delivery of Plans.

Q5. Does the statutory guidance support practitioners and staff in delivering the contents of the Children's Services Plan?

	Number	Percentage
Yes	16	33%
No	21	44%
No response	11	23%
Total	48	100%

This question attracted the least positive response overall, with only one third of respondents (33%) expressing that the guidance was supportive of practitioners in delivery. Almost half (44%) said that it was not and the remainder gave no response (23%).

Clarifying Scope

One of the main reasons for not supporting this statement was that the guidance should not seek to do this, as 'Operational Plans' would likely exist alongside Children's Services Plans (which were seen as more strategic documents). As statutory guidance, it was seen as appropriate that the document make reference to Plans being implemented without also referencing operational considerations:

"We do not believe that the role of this statutory guidance is to support practitioners and operational managers in delivery, given the complexity and variety of service delivery across Scotland. We consider that the statutory guidance exists to support strategic managers across partnerships, and it is for local agencies to then provide guidance and direction to operational staff. As such, we do not think changes to the statutory guidance in this regard are necessary."

"Part 3 guidance is primarily strategic in nature and therefore most relevant at an organisational level to senior and strategic leaders in its current format. While senior leaders set the direction of travel for practitioners within respective organisations/services, this is not covered in much detail within the current statutory guidance. Guidance such as Part 4, 5 and 18 (and others) would have greater direct relevance to frontline practitioners and operational managers."

The Plan, rather than the guidance, should support practitioners to deliver local priorities and actions, it was felt.

Improving Accessibility

While many felt that supporting delivery was outwith the scope of the guidance, respondents were asked how, if at all, the statutory guidance could be enhanced to enable Plans to support practitioners and operational managers with the delivery of local priorities and actions.

The main suggestion was making the document more accessible to front-line staff by simplifying the language, removing technical jargon and shortening the document overall (similar to views expressed in response to earlier questions):

"More succinct and clearer guidance with user friendly language would help practitioners and operational managers understand the Plan is a working document that sets out clear actions, measures and outcomes that focuses on the children and young people they work, this would be assist in making the Plan a more meaningful 'working' document."

Again, including case studies of 'strategy translated into action' for practitioners and managers would be helpful, it was suggested.

A shorter summary document for practitioners was also suggested:

"If it is one purpose of the guidance, then briefer and more actionable content could be helpful in achieving it. For instance, providing sample (non-statutory) templates for reporting may be useful. These could cover, for example: How the partnership has delivered joint training/development/conferences, etc.; Actions taken to join up commissioning; Checklist of groups for consultation and space to record briefly what was done; and Clear cross-references / links to relevant quality frameworks such as Care Inspectorate for children in need of care and protection." 

Few operational staff would read the full guidance in its current format, it was felt. Production of a summary may, therefore, increase accessibility of the guidance and support engagement in the planning process.

Linking Plans

Again, (as raised elsewhere in the consultation), making clear to practitioners where the Children's Services Plan fits in the hierarchy of other Plans that may be required by the Scottish Government (and encouraging a streamlining approach), would also be beneficial and reduce possible duplication of effort:

"Local authorities are operating in a complex and cluttered planning and reporting environment, the complexity of which is not fully acknowledged in the current guidance. Refreshed guidance would greatly benefit from including clearer links to the wider strategic planning landscape."

Similarly, other local strategic documents should also link clearly back to the Plan to ensure that practitioners understand how each relate and how they (and communities) can implement change:

"The guidance should require clearer links back to the strategic plan in all action plans and resource decisions that sit beneath it. We would suggest strengthening the content relating to reporting requirements, which should include how the Plan and related activities have contributed to the overarching aims of children's services, and from our perspective, most importantly, how these are preventive and early intervention focused. Not all Plans are clear on how this shift is going to be achieved. In addition, it would be very helpful to translate the strategic plan into an action plan that people in communities and providers can relate to, in terms of what specific differences it will make in their local areas."

If to be used by practitioners, the guidance could also usefully encourage operational staff to cross-reference Children's Services Plans to the individual Plans that they produce, to make sure that they are congruent, it was suggested:

"Have the guidance emphasising to practitioners in the delivery of services that there is a clear need to ensure that individual care plans are in line with the key elements and commitment contained in the Children's Services Plan…This cross-referencing will more ensure priorities are met and the focus the child/young person's wellbeing is contributed to by with all services and agencies agreeing the priorities that are in line with the Children's Services Plan."

The guidance could also be more helpful for practitioners if a more prescriptive guide were provided around the kinds of data that local authorities and their partner service providers should be collating in order to fully understand the needs of children and young people within their authority (with specific reference to including data on numbers of children and young people with learning disabilities in each local area). This would help both identify potential priorities in the coming years and aid in the measurement of impact in the longer term, it was felt.

Local authorities and relevant health boards should ensure that relevant national outcomes and objectives are reflected in the Children's Services Plans and it would be helpful to have national outcome links in the guidance, it was suggested.

Similarly, if more co-ordination or interconnection was made between the Children's Services Plans and Community Planning Partnerships and the Local Outcome Improvement Plans (LOIPs), this may enable greater clarity in planning and identifying need and responses across local authorities. Further clarity on how to achieve this could be included in the guidance.

Accountability

Clearly setting out expectations of accountability for delivery of the plan at all levels of the workforce was also suggested as a way of enhancing the guidance:

"There could be more explicit detail about the responsibilities of practitioners and other font line staff (or their operational managers) to implement the outcomes/interventions/changes in partnership outlined in a Children's Services Plan and how these are intended to align with the other plans that they work to. This is important as transformation of services may be required and sharing of budgets across sectors to ensure actions are well placed to meet priorities."

Similarly, clearly setting out priorities and objectives which are clear, measurable and rational and which can be monitored in the short and medium term would be welcomed. Linking these to wider reporting demands was again seen as helpful:

"A clear, concise and comprehensive overview of these legislative demands would greatly help in making clear to practitioners and staff how the various reports and plans have a clear purpose and rationale in supporting them to improve outcomes for Scotland's children and young people."

Other Suggestions

Other suggestions for making the statutory guidance more helpful in supporting practitioners and staff in delivery included:

• lengthening the period of the Plan from 3 to 5 years (with annual reviews) to allow for effective implementation and make the impact of improvements more apparent. This would also promote a longer-term strategic focus, it was suggested;
• creating more opportunities for showcasing good practice and effective partnership working (especially in relation to working with marginalised and at-risk groups);
• offering advice to practitioners to ensure that Plans are co-produced with communities and hard-to-reach groups (drawing on practitioners' skills/experience); and
• better enforcement/more accountability for non-delivery.

Finally, although not directly answering the question, some comments were also made about increasing budgets to expand or extend provision of local support services for children and young people (to enable Plans to be better implemented and positive outcomes to be met). Similarly, it was suggested that Self-Directed Support (SDS) for children should feature in the guidance.

Overall, it seems that while some small changes could be made to the guidance (including production of a summary document) to help practitioners, this was considered by many to be outwith the scope of the guidance. On the whole, it was supported in its current guise for meeting its core purpose:

"The guidance sets out clearly how the Plan is able to support practitioners and operational managers to deliver the local priorities and actions and is sufficient for our purposes."