Child in Need: Assessments, Interventions, Plans and Reviews

1. Introduction

The majority of children involved with Lewisham’s Children Social care are children in need who live with their families. Every local authority has a duty to protect and promote the welfare of children in need in their area. To do so, it must work with families to provide support services that enable children to be brought up within their own families.

We know that the families of children assessed as in need of support under Section 17 of the Children Act 1989 have significant strengths and resources, as well as vulnerabilities. Our work with families assessed as children in need should be collaborative, focussed and purposeful in order to harness existing strengths and to empower families to create change.

These procedures should be read in conjunction with Lewisham Signs of Safety Practice Guidance and the Child In Need Reviewing and Oversight document.

Children and Family Assessment should be completed to reach a decision about whether the child requires a service under Section 17 of the Children Act 1989. During the assessment, members of the family’s network (professionals and family members) will be identified and involved in the in assessment to establish who can support the family. The overarching aim is to work in partnership with the family to identify support with a network of professionals and family members who can offer support to the family.

2. Child in Need Assessments

Lewisham Children Social Care seeks to support children's well-being within their families and communities, to promote better outcomes for children who are assessed as being in need (within the meaning of the Children Act 1989).

It will do so by undertaking assessments of needs of individual children in collaboration with their families and partner agencies. All agencies share a responsibility for contributing to assessments and determining what support should be put in place and what services to provide to respond to the identified need. The aim will be to provide and coordinate a plan which enables children to remain within their own families as much as possible. Such services will be provided directly by Children’s Social Care or in collaboration with other agencies, ensuring that the impact of service provision or other intervention is monitored, and plans are reviewed at regular intervals.

Intervention for a child who is assessed as being a child in need will be a collaboration of children social care and partner agencies. Agencies such as education and health may be best place to provide services directly to the family without requiring children social care involvement. In addition, services in the community may be able to support children and their families as part of Lewisham's offer under ‘Early Help’.

3. Child in Need Planning

Once a child has been assessed as needing support under Section 17 of The Children Act 1989, a child in need plan must be developed. The draft child in need plan should be contained within the assessment. An initial Child in Need meeting should take place within ten working days of the completion of the Child and Family assessment. The overall purpose of this meeting is to develop the draft Child in Need plan with the family and professional network. The parents should always be present, should be involved in developing the plan and should give consent to the plan. In order for this meeting to be purposeful, the social worker will need to;

• Ensure the family and professional network are clear about the existing strengths/safety;
• Ensure the family and professional network are clear about the worries (of the family and of the professional);
• Ensure everyone is clear of the goals the plan aims to achieve;
• Ensure there is clarity about what we need to see to know that the goals have been achieved;
• Enable the family and professionals to collaboratively develop the chid in need plan; i.e. what will everyone need to do in order to achieve the goals;
• Ensure there is a clear, specific plan of action setting out what needs to happen between this CIN review and the next one.

Following this initial meeting, further Child in Need meetings should take place at a minimum of every ten weeks. These meetings must:

• Review the progress of each aspect of the plan since the last meeting, carefully considering the impact on the child. This will include reviewing the previous actions and identifying the things that have gone well/the areas of challenge/worries in relation to each aspect of the plan;
• Develop and refine the plan in response to the above;
• Identify the specific things that need to happen/the specific work to be completed between this review and the next one, in order to continue to progress the plan.

Plans should be developed with families as set out in Lewisham’s Practise Handbook.

The main elements of this are that workers construct the plan with the child young person, parents and others in the child’s naturally occurring network. The focus is on what solutions the family has, as well as clear bottom lines to create safety or improve well-being.

Elements of the plan that create safety or wellbeing should be clearly set out and related to observable behaviours. The network should carefully consider (with the family) what services are included in the plan so that it is realistic for the family to work with. Change is measured by the difference the intervention is making to the child. Whilst some families will need to access services and support, plans should focus on observable behaviours, actions and changes that create safety for the child or improve their wellbeing and the care they are receiving.

Every child’s plan should be purposeful, written in simple language and have a clear trajectory. All plans should be created and reviewed in line with statutory requirements. The views of the child, young person, parent or carer must be recorded in the plan itself.

Child in need meetings should always include the family or carers. The child or young person’s wishes and views are a central part of the meeting, and they are encouraged to attend some or all of their meetings if possible. Meetings are chaired using the Signs of Safety framework and care should be taken to make sure everyone can contribute.

Plans should be SMART – specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely. It is important that progress is regularly reviewed with the network, the family, carers and the child or young person. Plans should be updated to make sure it is making a difference to the child. For more information, please see Lewisham Practise Handbook.

A copy of the Child in Need Plan should be provided to the parents, child (depending on their age and understanding and using words and pictures) and the agencies or other key professionals involved in the provision of services under the plan. Equality and diversity issues and how the child’s needs will be met in these areas should be explicitly addressed as part of the planning process.

In order to facilitate participation and understanding for the children and young people we work with, a child friendly version of the plan using words and pictures should be completed. This is so that the children can understand what is happening in their lives and make it easier for them to contribute to the process.

4. Team Manager Oversight of the Child in Need Plan

Team Managers should review the effectiveness and progress of the plan with the Social Worker in supervision at a minimum of every two months. The focus of this should be:

• To consider the progress being made in relation to each goal;
• To consider the impact of this progress on the child;
• To reflect and collaboratively problem solve where there have been challenges/barriers;
• To ensure consideration of how the plan will be sustained beyond our involvement (i.e. ensure the involvement of the family’s wider network/utilisation of community resources);
• To consider the contingency plan if things are not improving for this child;
• To identify clear next steps between now and the next supervision.

5. Six Month Review

If a child continues to need a Child In Need plan at six months, a multi-agency case mapping meeting with the family will be facilitated by an independent facilitator either from the workforce development or quality improvement service. This case mapping will need to:

• Consider the original reason for referral;
• Map the existing strengths and safety and areas of progress over the past 6 months;
• Map the current worries and the impact of these on the child(ren) if nothing changes;
• Map the challenges/things that have made it difficult to achieve the goals;
• Develop clear, focussed next steps for what needs to happen over the next six to eight weeks.

Data will be available on a monthly basis which identifies all children who have had a CIN plan for five months and therefore require a case mapping meeting.

The ‘next steps’ should be recorded by the facilitator in the ‘case mappings’ case note and the mapping uploaded to the case note.

6. Nine Month Senior Management Oversight

A selection of child(ren) who continue to need a CIN plan beyond 9 months, will be identified each month and the progress of the plan for these children will be reviewed by the Social Worker, Team Manager, Group Manager and Head of Service at the monthly ‘CIN over 9 months’ meeting. The purpose of the discussion will be to:

• Collaboratively review the progress of the plan;
• Ensure there is clarity about what still needs to change in order for the child to be safe and therefore to be able to close the case;
• Ensure the work being undertaken is focussed and is supporting the plan to progress/support sustainable change;
• Collaboratively think through and problem solve where there are particular barriers/challenges;
• Ensure there is active contingency planning;
• Collaboratively identify clear next steps;
• Agree a future date to return to the monthly review meeting.

7. Visits to Children in Need

Once the child in the plan is drawn up and agreed by the network and the family the social worker will coordinate progressing the actions. Visits to children in need should be held no later than every 20 working days. For some children this will need to be reviewed and the frequency agreed in supervision.

8. Closure

Prior to close closure the Team Manager will chair the final Child in Need meeting which will consider whether this there is a need for the child to receive services under Lewisham’s Early Help offer or universal services. If the child is to be stepped down to another service a Lead Professional should be identified. The final child in need meeting will identify the most appropriate Lead Professional and a support plan will be formulated containing actions to address the ongoing needs and proposals for how these will be met.

The social worker will complete a closing summary, place on LCS and transfer responsibility to the Lead Professional or close as appropriate.