Involvement and participation

Origin of the Norfolk In Care Council Care Matters stated that local authorities needed to involve looked after children in service planning, evaluation and to encourage them to participate in all aspects of planning for their individual cases. There were no guidelines on what an In Care Council should look like. The only thing that seemed to be insisted on was that it would engage with senior managers.

Norfolk In Care Council (NICC) an example of good involvement Young people designed the model The purpose and role of the NICC was agreed by young people and senior managers as suitable for both. Clear boundaries were set for access to the group making sure there were no “tick box” exercises. Clear lines of communication were developed between the NICC and senior decision makers and vice versa from the start of the project.

From little acorns The In Care Council held its first meeting in April It had 7 members all had belonged to KICT. It had no ongoing work to pick up It had a new worker who was still building relationships with the group. It had no dates set for meetings with managers Children’s services had no work it wanted the NICC to pick up

Through saplings Over the first year we managed to meet with the corporate parenting operations board. We decided we had to prove ourselves before people would take us seriously. We selected a piece of work we wanted to do The dreaded consultation document for statutory reviews. We won’t bore you with the details but this piece of work meant working with the independent reviewing officers. They fully supported the involvement of young people and children in reviews and so were keen to work with us.

Large Oak trees This year so far we have developed organised and run the first ever inspirational adults awards. We have run our own conference delivering workshops around how to support over 16’s to overcome the barriers to staying in Education Employment or training We have been trained as auditors and audited our own pathway plans. We have sat on all party parliamentary groups We are having to prioritise work as we are asked to be involved ion more and more things.

Participation It is essential that children and young people participate in all plans, procedures and meetings that affect them. Why ? That is not the way to look at it, the question you need to ask is why not ? Can you think of any good reason why children and young people should not participate in a process that may make decisions that will impact on the rest of their lives?

Reasons often given Oh the way we run meetings just isn’t young person friendly a lot of difficult information is shared Change the way you run meetings. Have a portion at the start where the young person can hear what has happened since the last meeting add their opinion if they want and then have them rejoin at the end for planning. They may get upset, some difficult things are talked about at these meetings. More upsetting than possibly hearing half truths or gaining your information from family arguments? Sometimes they get manipulated into saying things at meetings and conferences. And you don’t think that their emotions aren’t manipulated and what they are told outside the meetings might be manipulative?

Possible solutions Seriously look at how you run meetings. The fact it is not young person/child friendly is no excuse Yes you are discussing difficult things Yes the meetings can become confrontational Yes people get upset Yes it can make the work of the social worker harder as they have to prepare the child/young person. It can mean the independent chairs or workers have to learn to communicate in a new way at meetings …..relying on simple English (is this a bad thing?)

Offered solutions 2 Children and young people don’t want to attend meetings or talk to us in most cases. Temptation to add “well no poo Sherlock” here has been resisted. If they/ we do not understand what’s happening If they/we have to rely on hearsay about how social services want to take them away. If they/we have to rely on being told how social workers lie and twist things to make them look bad If they/we do not feel involved Why would they/we want to attend, talk to you, or trust you to make sure their voice is heard.

Personal experience Put yourself in the place of a child/young person on your case load or that you have worked with. Think about, looking back, how aware were they really of what was going on Think about the inaccurate information they could have been given and how that may have affected them Think about how it would feel to be that child/ young person Now think back and honestly consider is there nothing about the way you worked you would change Is there anything that should have been more important to everyone involved than protecting, informing and think of the emotional well being of that child/young person. Informing and involving is not a nice thing to do it is essential and is the right of every child and young person to understand what is happening and have an opinion Check out Article 12 of the United Nations Rights of the Child it tells you this there.

My experience How aware were you of what was happening before you came into care? What were you told by people around you? Was what was happening ever explained to you by a professional? Were you well prepared for being taken into temporary care? Did you understand why you came into care? Do you fully understand now why you came into care? What impact has that had on your ability to work with professionals? What impact has it had on your life in general if any? What one piece of advice would you give to people here about how to improve the way we involve children and young people Why do you feel it is so important

Don’t just listen to us Here are some quotes from other young people about the importance of being involved. My worker has always made sure I feel involved in things she even went through my plan and explained what it all meant and why I had one. This made me understand things better and made me like her more. It also meant I knew what was happening and didn’t have to ask people that might lie to me Female 14 My worker Lyn is amazing she always sits down and talks to me about my problems and why things mess up then when she gives me advice we write it in my plan. This works for me because when we look at it again we remember what I was going to do and we can talk about how it went and I can look at my plan rather than bugging her every 5 minutes to remind me what I said I would do.. Male 19 My worker spent ages helping me understand why I came into care I didn't have a clue my dad said it was because social services pick on people and they were lying about him. My worker talked to me about it all and showed me what the plan was for me to see my family and what help I would get when I was sad. It was all written down and she made it easy to understand. Female 11

Don’t just listen to us Its really nice to finally have a worker that asks me what I want to see in my pathway plan. It sort of feels more like mine now and I can check what we said and ring her if things change just by reading it. It does feel more like my plan now I am doing part of it not just having it done to me. All through the time I have been in care and before no one ever asked me what I thought, what I wanted its all oo don’t upset the child they think we are stupid and then we are supposed to say oo yeah I really want to sit with you and tell you how I feel. And when I say I am not coming to a meeting or talking to you its all down like I am difficult or can’t be bothered it makes me sick they blame it on me when all they did was jump up stick a bit of paper in my face coz they had to and go away ticking a box … I attempted to involve the child! female 18 My worker really listens to what I have to say. I had problems with my carers and wanted to leave she sat with me and then after we talked we wrote a plan together about how I can start moving to independence. I have things to follow now and it means I haven't broken down this placement or run away again but can see where I am going and when I will be able to move. Female 16

Record Now we know you are all amazing And you all love to record things In fact you live for paperwork But Many of you are not recording how and when you involve children and young people in planning etc So how are we, and the dreaded word drum rooooollll Ofsted (boo hiss) Supposed to see how brilliant you all do this. But please get the young person to sign or evidence their involvement. You know it makes sense

Finally some good news We didn’t promote the NICC to you to say ha ha look what corporate parenting have and you don’t We did it to encourage you to want something similar Soooooo We are happy to announce that there are plans to develop your very own version of the NICC but for safeguarding alone

Good news cont You need your own because Whilst the NICC will always support the work you do Our experiences are too similar of safeguarding to give you the answers you need You need a group that reflects all the different types of safeguarding procedures there are.

Finally But the new group needs your support It needs to be promoted as an opportunity to the young people you work with Please do not become gate keepers and decide who is ready and who isn’t we can make that choice ourselves Help this new group grow into a mighty oak. Today you have all helped plant the seed by listening

Thanks Thank you very much for listening We can take a few questions, unless we have run over in which case please speak to us at break.