Meeting documents

To consider and comment on this report, that will also include an update on about ‘get-set’.

The Committee considered this report and accompanying presentation, that provided an update on the progress to deliver a new Family Support Service (FSS) for the parents, children and families of Somerset, following a Cabinet decision in February 2018.

Members were reminded that a public consultation had been undertaken (September – December 2017) to inform the development of Family Support Services. A further public and professional consultation were undertaken on the proposal to remove get-set level 2 services. The outcome of the consultation was reported to Cabinet in February 2019 and the decision was

taken to approve the decisions set out in the key decision papers.

It was reported that the Family Support Service would be developed over three phases. Phase 1 (2018/19) would address the development of the Family Support Service and the delivery of a co-ordinated and coherent "early help offer" utilising technology and a wide network of local community venues such as families’ homes, schools, health centres, village halls and children’s centre buildings, this phase would also include the transfer of Public Health Nurses to the employment of the Council.

Phase 2 of the change between (2019/20) would focus on the integration of Public Health Nursing (health visitors and school nurses) with the Council’s get-set service and this phase was on hold pending the outcome of the get-set consultation. Phase 3 would then consider the integration of additional child and adults services to achieve a holistic ‘think family’ model.

It was noted that a staff event had been held last January and had been well attended and well received by attending staff. From 1 April, all staff from PH nursing will be based in County Hall or GP surgeries. Members heard that the process of Care Quality Commission (CQC) registration had almost been completed to recognise the service as a regulated service and a patient safety officer had been recruited.

The service offer was nationally defined, and the service would continue to adhere and remain aligned to that and would be able to focus on other areas rather than immunisations. Healthwatch was completing a project to meet service users to identify what worked well and possible areas for improvement.

The Committee then received an update from the Director of Children’s Services on the de-designation of the Children’s Centres that was continuing and a list of 11 of the centres that had been transferred to schools, nurseries or a trust was highlighted. It was also noted that Bishops Lydeard would be transferred to the Bishops Lydeard Village Hall Management Committee and Oaklands in Yeovil would transfer to the Nursery by the end of the month.

Members heard that 3 sites (in Bridgwater, Taunton and Chard) would be retained for both staff accommodation and service delivery and an update was provided development of plans for Minehead, Wellington, Chard and Yeovil following the decision made by the Cabinet last February.

The DCS stressed it was about working in collaboration with health colleagues for all ages and strong concept of neighbourhood working in Somerset. There was a brief discussion about a diagram that was part of the presentation that showed how services might be provided in a setting.

Points were made, issues raised and/or questions asked/answered including: 

Developments in Frome to consider children’s needs and services in an holistic way;

In respect of services being pooled at Reckleford in Yeovil it was noted that detail would be provided;

The term hard to reach families should be dropped, it was more about families finding services hard to reach, so thought should be given to accessibility;

RIO system for data collection/continuity from Year 1 onwards;

It was confirmed that the current Information governance framework would be taken forward/maintained;

Families on the border of an area, where there services were in another area this would be picked in the neighbourhood strategy but would probably be school lead as this was the universal service;

Capacity for school nurses based on their duties including those home educated and EHCP process. It was confirmed there was a lot of interest in the 15 Somerset school nurses, and capacity was an issue, a lot of pressures on their time, including health review assessments for all children in Somerset (including out of County placements), and the national child measurement programme (year 6 and 7 Children);

CLA CCG review capacity of health needs of CLA would hopefully alleviate some of the pressure on the public health nurses;

The Chair thanked Officers for the update and the Committee requested that an update report be provided for June/July to monitor transition of the PH nurses in to the service and he requested that any issues or pinch points be highlighted in the meantime.

The DCS suggested that the Committee might wish to invite the new Chair of the Early Help Commissioning Board to a future meeting.