Ready to Act: interim report on implementation and recommendations

3. Our focus for 2018–2020

“It’s been very helpful to talk to you first. I’m not worried about bringing him now.”
Parent

By the end of 2018, AHP CYP services in Scotland will evidence the following.

• Impact and change in delivery to the ambitions of the AILP CYP programme through a demonstrable increase in provision of early intervention and prevention offerings using baseline universal and targeted scoping activity from 2015 and comparative data from 2018 across agreed pilot board sites (see: Annex G. AILP CYP Programme: Key Performance Indicators).
• Activity to interrupt the intergenerational cycle of poverty and deprivation across the CYP age ranges, with a focus on early years and early primary schooling, criminal justice, mental health, and involvement of CYP, parents, carers and families and their stories.
• Creation of mutually beneficial, collaborative and supportive partnerships to deliver CYP wellbeing outcomes, with pilots of effective innovative projects that have been tried elsewhere and evidence of close collaboration with third sector organisations, communities, CYP and their parents, carers and families.
• Impact of the request for assistance/help workstream through the systematic collection and analysis of improvement data from pilot sites. This work will become one of the three key deliverables across all AHP CYP services in Scotland.
• Impact in four new services of piloting the Balanced System® to enable effective use of demographic data and spread and use of resources to meet CYP's needs across a tiered model of service delivery.
• Evidence that the voices and stories of CYP are central to decision-making through a pilot of the Talking Mats CYP resource in two AHP service areas and evidence from other child-centred outcomes projects nationally. We will also evidence commitment to gathering CYP, parent, carer, family and stakeholder stories of their experiences of services – good and bad – and act to put in place real change on the basis of feedback.
• The development and delivery of a national postural care strategy across adult and CYP services, in collaboration with the Scottish Government, AHPs, PAMIS, parents and CYP. The first meeting to take this forward took place on 11 October 2017. The strategy will be developed in collaboration with strategists and leads in adult learning disability and physical disability services, including third sector colleagues, and a draft will be prepared in spring 2019.
• Deliver to a robust public health programme of work to interrupt the intergenerational cycle of poverty and disadvantage through the ongoing development of targeted interventions and the spread of innovative collaborative partnership pilots. We will collaborate to ensure consistency of universal messages and activity across Scotland, with ongoing involvement and collaboration relating to the redesign of Ready Steady Baby! (NHS Health Scotland, 2018) and toddler universal literature. We will build on existing accessible web-based knowledge and support content to develop a once-for-Scotland digital portal/website to improve access to expert knowledge and increase resilience and self-reliance.
• Evidence the visibility and understanding of the role of AHPs in delivering to the CYP policy and legislative agenda through integration and representation in Scottish Government activity, including the adverse childhood experience COP, the Realigning CYP Services project, the Education (Scotland) Bill 2017, the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014, and the development of the CYP wellbeing plan.
• Evidence the impact of the CYP Improvement Collaborative (IC) Practicum, supported by Scottish Government. This will bring together 14 AHP teams with colleagues from early years, primary education and health visiting to learn together and build on existing best practice improvement learning in relation to adverse childhood experiences and closing the attainment gap. Matched funding will be sought from the Scottish Government to enable learning sessions to support improvement teams' understanding of demographic and population need going forward, as well as a shared understanding of initial conversations and request for help decision-making across and between agencies and practitioners.
• Increase in early intervention and prevention activity in the AHP CYP community to deliver consistent evidence-informed activity for Scotland through pilots of innovations that have been tried elsewhere.
• Bring together AHPs working in child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) in line with the Mental Health Strategy 2017–2027 (Scottish Government, 2017c) and ongoing work across CAMHS in Scotland.
• Hold a national CYP Ready to Act event in collaboration with stakeholders, partners and parents to showcase good practice and impacts and develop a collaborative action plan to 2020 that delivers to GIRFEC, the attainment agenda and wellbeing outcomes for CYP in Scotland.

“We must keep going … it is working!”
AHP CYP Lead