Agenda item

The Panel are asked to note the progress being made with Connecting Families Strategy.

The Chairman invited Paula Bromley (Connecting Families Manager) to give the presentation to the Panel.

Paula Bromley gave the presentation as included in the report.

Members of the Panel felt that the map showing Connecting Families by Ward should be more specific.  Each Ward in Bath and North East Somerset has community pockets where there are more troubled families than in the other areas of Ward.  Members of the Panel also commented that this is long term project and it needs to be seen if 16 families who claimed Payment by Results (PbR) will be the same families next year or there will be more families on top of these 16.

Paula Bromley replied that she will circulate a list of troubled families by Ward. 

Paula Bromley also said she is working on having more families in terms of the support.  The next big project is to create a proper sustainable strategy in terms of the troubled families.

Paula Bromley mentioned, as one of the positives, that Sainsburys has taken one young person from the programme that had no education since they were 14 years old (now they are 16-17 years old) for a 4 week trial.

Members of the Panel asked what is the current process to identify the abuse towards children and how the project works with river dwellers/travellers.

Paula Bromley said that the Council has really good and strong safeguarding policies in place.  The Connecting Families team works really closely with the colleagues from safeguarding teams (children and adults).  The officers working with troubled families will report straight away if there is any abuse towards children in those families.

Paula Bromley also said that it is not that easy to engage with river dwellers/travellers, considering that they do not have permanent site where they live and invited the Panel to offer any suggestion, or advice, on how to get in touch with those people.

Members of the Panel asked about the use of volunteers for helping with troubled families.

Paula Bromley replied that she would be interested to use volunteers in her team at some point, though not at the present time.  Some of the workers are in the potential works and there are quite strict policies in place when working on site with these families.  It would be very difficult to put volunteer to work with high dependency family, where there are drug, alcohol or other similar issues. 

Paula Bromley added that she was invited to speak at one multi-faith event which will be good opportunity of partnership working with other organisations on this matter.

Members of the Panel asked if there is any resistance from the troubled families to enter this project.

Paula Bromley responded the team approached these families and there are 35 families who signed up.  Members of the staff that work in the team are persistent and they will go back and knock or put notes in the door.  Though, everything is done by the book.  This is voluntary and people don’t have to do it if they don’t want to. 

Members of the Panel asked if the team began to understand the reasons why these families are troubled and how the team manage to get children from these families back to education.

Paula Bromley replied that the team is fortunate to work with the West of England University and looking at the research project.  Paula Bromley said that she is really keen to find out triggers what makes families troubled.  At the moment, what the team can see is that mental health problems encourage that behaviour.

Paula Bromley also said that it is too early to talk about the education now.  It will take time because there is a lot to analyse.  More data will be available in 6 months’ time.

The Chairman summarised the debate by saying that these is not new modern phenomenon.  Troubled families were present for centuries because this is an issue of social problem.  The Chairman also said that he is slightly concerned that the exit strategy was mentioned already as these are generational issues.  It is useful to hear that there is a possibility of research that can look back in five or ten years’ time with answers on whether this project worked. 

The Chairman asked for a further update on Connecting Families for one of the future meetings of the Panel which should include answers on these questions/queries amongst the other information in the report:

·  Are there any sanctions if people don’t take part?

·  Family consent or active participation?

·  Are we talking about extended families?

·  More details on what Payment by Result means

·  More details about child care and protection

It was RESOLVED to note the report and presentation and to receive a further update at one of the future meetings of the Panel.