Transcript

Hello, good evening, everyone. Welcome to the Children and Education and Security Subcommittee Meeting. My name is Councillor Abdul-Mannan and I will be chairing this meeting. This meeting has been held in person with the community members and key participants present in the meeting room while others are joining online. Should the technical error prevent online attendants from participating, I will decide if how the meeting should be continuing after taking advice from offices. This meeting has been filmed for the Council website for public viewing. People who are participating in the meeting will be included in the footage. I ask members at the meeting to only speak on my direction and engage and speak clearly into the microphone so that it can be heard and the comment can be properly recorded. Thank you. Also, people online, please keep your mobile on silence and keep the microphone mute so you can hear properly. So, if you need to ask any questions, please raise your hand so we'll be able to acknowledge you as present. Justin, any apologies, please? No, Chair, no apologies. I was informed that Councillor Shibou Hussain will be attending online. I can see that Councillor Lilou Ahmed is online, but no apologies. Thank you. Justin, Deputy Mayor is a lead member. He's apologised here to attend another meeting. So, last minute, apologies from him. Noted, Chair. any members have a pericury interest to declare please do so whether their interest is personal or non-personal thank you not a DPR I believe that the chair has a declaration to be addressed to you sorry you have to declare it in the meeting sorry my voice is gone I'm a trustee of eternal giving and a trustee of KERA centre and also a trustee of the island advice centre thank you swiftly moving to number 3 which is the last unrestricted minutes from 17th October circular can confirm that somebody it's a meaning is accurate yeah thank you sorry update on log including the agenda pack are members happy with this so if we move into our first item our first item this evening is a focus on review of public place planning and the council position on the provision of school places in the borough I would like to welcome Steve who is going to represent give us a report on this on this Steve it's up to you thank you thank you chair hopefully colleagues have had chance to read the papers I'm joined by Catherine Grace who's our lead for school place planning and admissions and also online our director of education Lisa Frazier when we were planning the schedule for the committee we talked about issues that were significant and affecting councils and you will have read about in the press the impact of the birth rate on some local authority areas so we thought it would be an item of interest for the committee we do an annual report on school place planning which has recently been to cabinet as well which myself and Catherine presented which talks about our assessment of the need for school places and an area of focus in terms of the birth rate impact and housing developments but also some specifics around the need for places for children with additional needs which is a subject our committee has talked a lot about Catherine and I didn't want to run through the presentation so we were just going to ask if it's ok chair we will take any questions if that's ok if it's ok we thought we'd just offer questions if that's ok anybody want to question please put the raised hands up I'll go for your questions Steve ok I'll go first Steve I understand from the report that worse of the barra are declining on children with school places what are the reasons behind I know you mentioned there's a report on the birth rate is lowering or is it the younger population moving into west of the barra and pushing the family out of and therefore schools are not going to fulfil if that is the case what are the chances of school closing and those are still what's the plan on this thank you chair so the pupil population is declining across the whole of the borough and that's due to falling birth rates it's due to migration levels so we're seeing children moving out of the borough before they hit school age and we're not seeing the numbers coming through in terms of pupil yield so that's the number of children coming out of new housing developments those are the three primary factors that influence the pupil population and that's why we're seeing those reduced numbers going into our primary schools in terms of the future and what that holds for our schools the local authority is working very closely with school leaders and other key stakeholders across the education sector to ensure that we have a sustainable education system within Tower Hamlets going forward so we're looking at different types of schools we're looking at ages from early years right the way through to post 16 to ensure that they are financially sustainable and providing a quality education to the children of Tower Hamlets okay I guess the most interesting problematic part of the report is exactly what's happening at the post 16 stage so I'm looking at page I'm looking at the section post 16 and I can I mean on the one hand we see this very significant rise since 2018 to 2024 but the issue really is the current sixth form capacity seems to be right so I'm looking at 4,790 and this will increase further with the new sixth form provision so it does seem to me here that we've got an even bigger problem at the post 16 than the better understood issue of birth rate declining yield from new developments that seems to be very well understood but it's the post 16 that seems as though there's a series of real issues and I suspect to get the best out of this there might be a couple of questions as you open this up because I think this is one of the hardest bits of the paper thank you so in terms of post 16 we are well aware that we have sufficient provision going forward we still have those higher numbers within the secondary cohort moving through so that gives us time to plan and to look at what we need to do going forward we are aware that there are planned additional provisions that are due to come on board and they have been factored into our projections and so we have to work with all of our schools that have the post 16 provisions and we won't be adding to provisions certainly additional provisions will only be taken forward where there is a real need and they will address overall quality and diversity within the borough if I could just add as well obviously any additional opening of additional provision or even expansion of existing provision with additional places needs to have the endorsement of the DFE who are regularly in contact with us in terms of our projected numbers having met head teachers recently as a group it was interesting that the secondary head teachers have started to talk about their seeing the impact on lower numbers starting to come through whereas previously it's just been a primary school I think because as we go forward some of our secondary schools are starting to see that impact probably also worth noting in terms of the movement of young people between boroughs Tower Hamlets generally has a lower rate of children moving out of the borough for secondary education and beyond right but sorry if I may come back chair but I mean it does seem to me unless I'm misunderstanding this I'm looking at page 41 post 16 pupil projections where we're looking at projection versus capacity we seem to be having a very considerable right and so I'm looking at years from 2024 onwards 2024 25 I mean what I'm seeing here is a very significant surplus capacity so it seems the projected numbers are effectively flat and the increase in the capacity out to 20 the the the the the capacity is increasing markedly from 2026 2027 so it does seem to me as though there is a there is another issue coming down just round the corner on this surplus capacity so I am I understanding this correctly are the head teachers going to be withdrawing any of their six form capacity and how does the DFE fit into this story so in terms of our existing six forms it will be a decision ultimately for our head teachers and their governing boards as to whether they wish to continue with their post-16 six forms and at the size that they have in terms of the size of a six form there are minimum recommended numbers at post-16 and also a minimum curriculum offer the DFE recommends and I'm sure that head teachers and governing boards will be taking that into consideration so my question is based on primary school and nurseries so with the like I understand with the capacity of like having to place people in the catchment area and with the cost of living and the childcare being so expensive now people are trying to go get school placement near their mum's house or a friend's house who can help with childcare after work right so in a situation like that are you planning to take that into consideration for children's placements but at the moment I don't think that's the case because at the moment it's just like in a straight line if you live in a certain distance that's where you're gonna get placed so I talk about personal experience for example my category was like literally the school was one minute away which was closer by five minutes to say my mother-in-do was health compared to my house but for me it's only one minute distance and I didn't get that placement because they're saying it was a catchment area so now we're having to pay extra money for childcare so is there like a future plan to develop that or also figure out the criteria in terms of understanding those variables as well in the catchment area so we don't have any plans at the moment to change our catchment areas because they're based on the planning areas which take into account wards and population numbers and where the schools are actually positioned a lot of work was done historically to look at how those planning areas and catchment areas would be developed so no we're not looking at changing that in terms of our admission arrangements they are set up specifically to give children within the local community the best possible access to their most local primary school we do recognise occasionally somebody will live across the road and so that takes them into another catchment area but we try to be as fair and transparent as possible and to offer access to a local primary school through those admission arrangements there are no plans at this time to change those we would have to go through a statutory consultation process for that but certainly in the future if there was a need because they weren't appropriate to the pupil population or where children were going to school then yes we would reflect and potentially consult on changes steve going back to my first question how many schools are struggling with the decline role on primary school and what are the ramifications on this and like is there a chance of school closing because of the lack of children in this school so at present we are working with all of our primary schools and all of our secondary schools through the school organisation strategy and that means that means that we are working with them on forms of partnership and collaboration and financial sustainability going forward it's new models of organisation that we are looking at first and foremost as opposed to school closures that would be the last option that we would be considering in this borough and that's because all other options have been exhausted and it was the best option we really do have to ask the imposition of VAT sort of story we've got quite a lot of private schools one of the great policy unknowns is how many are going to pay the extra VAT or how many are going to come back into the state system what sort of planning assumptions are you making around this or when might you have a better picture of what this will be and this would be just absolutely critical public policy issue so whilst this hasn't been covered in this report we have done analysis based on DFE estimates and the numbers that we have in Tower Hamlets so the population of children who are currently in some form of independent school could be accommodated should they move back into the maintained sector and comfortably accommodated the sorts of fee structures that we are seeing in a number of our independent schools and the subsidies that charities and other foundations are putting in place to support parents with those fees going forward means that actually we are not expecting a huge exodus of children out of the independent sector and into the state maintained sector but we could accommodate them actually on the forecast projected numbers and just to add I think it's an excellent question when I've been in regional meetings with the children's directors quite the majority are talking about their concern going back to the last question about potential school closures but one or two London boroughs are actually seeing the opposite and seeing a large move of population into their boroughs and in those boroughs one or two children's directors are really concerned about actually meeting the needs of their current cohort and in those boroughs they are really concerned about what you've raised there which is some of the private provision those young people seeking a state school place so it's not uniform there are some London boroughs where it's a real concern but based on as Catherine says based on the DFE estimates when we apply that within Tower Hamlets we're not concerned that we won't have the places and we did also do worst case scenario planning as well which was actually even higher estimates than the DFE had projected and even then we would be able to accommodate those children you've you've you've anticipated really my question I mean it is the worst case sort of a scenario I think you ought to put a paper or a note to this to set out your your the assurance that you've just given that you don't think there is a problem and it would be helpful also to see as far as that sensible a sort of a worst case type of scenario or some other maybe it's not so much worst case scenario but to to give as soon as you can a sense of what what there must be if people are coming with first of January out of independent into into state do you have any numbers for that already or I mean so so there's a range of issues there I hope you get my picture I don't want to press this too much but I think it would be really helpful to see that to see that chair if it's okay and to respond we can certainly share the note of our estimates and the and the projections also the London Council's organisation has been doing surveying across London so we'll check with them if they've got the outcome of that for London and we can share that so you can see the compare and contrast between areas and definitely share that with the committee yeah I wonder obviously like say we do have some of the best schools in the country I think personally and I know that we also in terms of primary school I think I mentioned this before to you guys we have the best in the country the best primary school in the country Mayflower so we talked about a few I think last session we mentioned about like copying what the other schools are doing and retaining skilled staff and I can see from one of your notes that's one of your targets to like retain skilled staff or train them up so that everyone's getting the same level what I'm trying to say is that ultimately some schools are better than others and people obviously by nature what they want to admit for those schools because it affects their future and unfortunately colleges look at that universities look at what schools you go to so it does affect so how do you encourage people to say you know all schools are the same even though they're not in terms of offset quality and also how do you how are you going to retain the staff members and scale them up so that they can be the same level as say Mayflower or another good school so that people are not feeling like say if I was to admit and I'm not going to get into Mayflower but I'm thinking a bit dejected now thinking why does somebody else when my neighbour for someone gets to Mayflower why can't my child go into Mayflower they have the same level of skill whereas that's the best school in the country so yeah if you get my picture sorry yeah yeah I think it's it's a really important point again when we look at the data in terms of school admissions and parents preferences for schools and whether they're young you know their children are getting into their schools of preference I think Tower Hamlets performs really well in terms of the percentage of parents getting their first second or third choice and I think you make a really important point which is judgment of schools from Ofsted reports and exam results and where young people go on to is really important but I think also we're increasingly starting to hear from both young people and parents about the culture of a school as well and how inclusive it is and that also affects young people and parents choice of school but I think yeah I think obviously schools have their own individual governance and governing bodies and you'll see schools do their own individual marketing and selling their school across the borough and I think as we said earlier given particularly post-16 there's real competition because because of oversupply so you know you do schools really strongly marketing their own schools but anything you'd add to that in terms of selection and we do we do an awful lot of work reaching out to families and encouraging them to attend open days open evenings go and have meetings with school leaders the teacher Senco inclusion leads because it's really important that families make a decision about the best school for their individual child and often the one that's top of the list in all of the league tables isn't necessarily the school that suits their child so we really do encourage that visits is really important sorry so obviously I also talked about upscaling the staff members how are you doing that and if you talk about schools like obviously if you're setting schools on top of the league that means they're giving the best education as per ofsted I say in quotation mark right and that means they must have good facilities good staff so why are we not copying that and pasting it to a different school that same model to follow that model so in terms of staff retention that also is part of our school organisation strategy going forward because we recognise that where schools are financially sustainable and financially secure so they will be able to fund staff retention much better so they will be able to pay their staff they'll be able to retain their staff and they'll be able to develop them with CPD and other training opportunities and so that is one of the reasons why we are working collaboratively as to how we build those partnerships across schools going forward so that staff have those retention and those staff development opportunities and just on your point around good practice our school leaders do take part in networks across the borough and share good practice with each other so obviously we support and encourage that but again you have to take it back to schools have their own governing bodies and make decisions about how they provide services but we certainly and obviously as you say through inspection and also through peer reviews and networks between school leaders there's certainly a really positive culture in Tower Hamlets of sharing good practice sure thank you chair so I was going to ask how do you determine that which school should be closed which should be merged together or how do you reduce the numbers I've seen a lot of good schools and a lot of average schools I've seen that walking distance schools where the head teachers they apply for a better when there is option even walking distance that way what the people are looking at the moment is when they are trying to go to best schools how do you ensure that all the schools are at the same level they're delivering the standards they need to yeah I think there's two elements to that there's the school standards and obviously with Lisa our director of education we have oversight of school standards and monitor the performance of schools and obviously do visits and obviously as I said there's peer review activity that goes on to look at how schools are doing and share good practice and obviously the inspection regime tells us how well schools are doing as well alongside the outcomes the exam and test results of our young people so we're regularly reviewing that and there'll be an annual report that comes to Cabinet that we'll share with yourselves which summarises the outcomes for the year across all types of education so there's the monitoring of standards and your question about how would we make decisions about whether schools close or not I think as Catherine was saying this juncture for ourselves into our hamlets through the school organisation group and working closely with schools where our school leaders and our team in the council are working really hard to ensure that we don't find ourselves in that position where we're having to consult on school closures which is something we're seeing a lot of in some of our neighbouring boroughs last question probably from me it is understood that the council has recently piloted additional resource provision how successful has the pilot been in addressing the significant shortfall in special needs placement yes so that's part of our delivering better value programme which is a programme councils which have a lot of pressure on their high needs budget so that's a programme that we're currently operating and one of the strategies within the delivering better value programme for SEN is the additional resource provision so where we are at at this point we've consulted some schools about setting those up within their school and that is where you would have a sort of a unit within the school with additional support there where so the young people could still be educated on site but would have some of their provision within within that separate unit on the school site at this point we haven't actually opened any of those with schools where we're going to be piloting some of those soon but again from national research that has proven to be quite effective but I think it's really important that the model that you use to do that additional resource provision is tailored to the local circumstances so we'd like a version of that that works for Tower Hamlets I think the other thing just to flag is obviously from our special schools we've had some successful outreach from our special school providers who've gone into mainstream schools to support a number of young people again to improve and drive inclusion so they can remain educated on site within mainstream that notes Steve we are lucky to have a one of the special schools Tower Hamlets which is picking for us like Phoenix school one of the best in the country are we engaging with them to see how how they've been really successful in the time but not only in the time but they've been any special tourism SCN any headmaster know Phoenix is well known and they've been expanding internationally as well so are we engaging with them to see how we can improve on that as well I just want to know on this yes absolutely obviously Tower Hamlets can be very proud of Phoenix and everything it does locally and in other places and what it does for our young people here is really positive so yeah myself and Lisa the director of education have regular conversations with Phoenix and they are doing some of that outreach work into mainstream schools some of their staff with their specialist training and skills are supporting some of our schools and we had the very successful education awards the other week and I was talking to the head teacher Phoenix there about how we can work together so yeah absolutely working with Phoenix thank you Steve thank you for your presentation and your colleague as well we're swiftly moving on to the next item which is cover parenting thank you chair I'm joined by my colleagues Susanna and Shalila to talk to Shalina to talk for this item so you will see in the papers the update on corporate parenting and just if I might say we updated the committee on our inspection readiness in terms of social care inspection previously and Susanna has been to talk about that we've actually had the social care inspection the process went extremely well obviously the result is embargoed and we expect the report on the 7th of January and we are really looking forward to that and we'll definitely be sharing that with the committee as soon as we can and part of the reason for raising that is some of the feedback from Ofsted inspectors whilst they were here about our approach to corporate parenting was really positive but I'll let Susanna say a few words and then we'll be happy to take any questions if that's okay thank you Susanna welcome thank you I've just got two brief slides that just gives an overview of where we're at both about children we care for and our care experience care leavers as well so just in summary we have 280 children we care for at the moment we have really low numbers of children in care we continue to have that because we really focus on early intervention with families whether that's family group conferences edge of care ensuring that social workers have low case work loads to be able to do work with children and their families we've got very positive relationships with our judiciary and positive court work we've strengthened our approach to permanency for children that can't remain within their birth families we've really been using data to track that we've got amazing foster carers who are really committed to our children in the borough and a high percentage of them are now therapeutically trained so that they can support our children more effectively and they're very committed to our children we have a strong virtual school offer and good educational outcomes for our children in care and our placements for our children are in the main very stable things that we're working on recruiting local foster carers is the real challenge for us but we've got innovative approaches that we've been working with housing we've also we're now part of local community fostering which is several boroughs looking how we can strengthen our recruitment we've also developed a course called access to fostering to support people who've got an interest in fostering to get the experience as well and we're one of the first places in the country to trial this and we currently have 14 prospective foster carers on that course as well we continue to want to embed the improvements we've made about permanency we've got some really good examples of life story work for our children who are in care but we're just trying to make sure that that really is consistent from the moment a child enters into care in terms of our care leavers we've got 365 care leavers at the moment a large percentage of those are unaccompanied asylum seeking children we have we really are a sanctuary for our unaccompanied minors and we've developed a tailored health offer and also an education offer for our unaccompanied minors we continue to break barriers around care experience of a protected characteristic that was accepted last july we now have six apprentices within the council which we like to see as our family business for them as well we've got a strong multi-agency offer for our care leavers so department of work and pensions cams we have tutors we have a dedicated housing officer and our strong education and training and employment focus every care leaver has an education training and education worker and we perform stronger than nationally in terms of this we've refreshed our local offer and our digital app we work pan london in terms of to make sure we have the best offer for our care leavers so for example that free prescriptions reduce cost in travel about council tax for example and we're very excited about the refurbishment of Kit Kat which our care leavers call home from home and we're hoping in January that that refurbishment will be finished as well we've continued to get scrutiny not just from Ofsted but we had the government advisor to care leavers Mark Riddell come and see us again and was really pleased about the progress and the offer that we give to our care leavers we continue to work on transitions to adulthood there is no cliff edge for us when children get to that 25 if somebody comes back to us at 26 we will continue to support them but we're working with adults to make sure that adult services as well when necessary pick them up we now have an independent reviewing officer that supports children post 18 and want to work with community organisations and partners to see their role in championing corporate parenting and care leavers have said to us that they would like to be mentors for some of our younger children in care so that's just an overview for you for you thank you for your questions you have okay hold on any other person want to ask questions time be okay question from me please what specific measure in the council taken to ensure that timely management of the cases at the pre-proceeding stage in response to rising volume of cases and also you mentioned on the report the foster carers I understand that the council was running a training course intake for foster carers I would like to know how successful it is on that if there is any success on that because we know we are struggling for foster carers in their time let's think so in terms of timely pre-proceeding work we have a pre-proceedings panel we're tracking all of the data so it's there that we really want to make sure that it's just the right families where we have to go into court and we try to work we've really had a shift to working earlier with families but in that stage that actually they're quite complex assessments that might need to happen also assessments of family members and although we would like ideally pre-proceedings that time scales with families just to be 12 weeks before we go into court there are times where we've had to extend this because it's in the best interest of giving a fair assessment and working with families before we make that decision so we work closely with our local judge who believes that it's the right children that are going into court and that there aren't delays that the children are coming in at the right time if they need to go into care proceedings and so she's happy with our pre-proceedings work but we continue to focus on that timeliness the second one about the foster carers yes our access to fostering course it only just started in September so it is early days but I think the last figures that I'd heard that three of those were wanting to go into the next stage to be formally assessed as well as part of the course some of them need to do work experience so they might not have spent enough time with children and so we want to make sure that when we do put those prospective foster carers through for assessment that we're not setting them up to fail as well we're really pleased with the retention rates on this course as well because it's quite time intensive for prospective foster carers to be part of this but we will be monitoring the success of this as the months go on we are looking at running in the spring next year another one of these courses as well the London community fostering initiative has actually now led to three assessments that are ongoing of foster carers so we can see that there are some green shoots that being able to have some more foster carers from some of our initiatives hi I'm ex-care liver here so I might come in before that support that you offered after 25 so I think being an ex-care liver I think I have experience of KitKat Terrace especially if you're refurbishing it now some of the challenges that we mentioned previously when we had this discussion was like so A is that you are recruiting a lot of foster carers out of borough so you're displacing a lot of young people out of borough and then they're forced to come back to this borough where they might have gone there when they were 10 years old and they had to come back on their 18 for the house here so they already have a life out there college university friends everything and now they're coming back here so that's still an issue that's my first point second is that we noticed last time one of the main reason you can't recruit foster carers within the borough is the housing they don't have enough rooms so are you doing any work on that side to help people who are interested in foster but they can't do it because of the rooms and stuff so I myself want to be a foster carer and it's difficult because of that and thirdly sorry is that you talked about access to foster care it's a great initiative but I don't think it's well advertised that course is because how are you communicating that to the local public for more people to access the course because I know we have the whatsapp channel for example so that I get anything to do with the council directly to my whatsapp maybe you could say something like that up for the future in terms of communication thank you I'll take some of that and I guess just to say we really really welcome any ideas from yourselves as a committee around opportunities to promote fostering and communication channels and any ideas you have we really welcome any suggestions just on housing absolutely right we discussed last time housing obviously is a big pressure it's a massive priority for the council we are well supported by our housing colleagues in terms of their representation our corporate parenting board and the housing team work really closely with us and particularly with our care leavers and in fostering we've also had some creative solutions where housing have helped a family move on one of their older children to free up a bedroom to support them to become foster carers and even despite the massive pressure on housing in our borough our housing team have been able to support that we'd like to do a lot more of that but we're really thankful for that support from our housing colleagues so in terms of the point about children when they're in care being out of borough and coming back in the majority of our children are only in the neighbouring boroughs so Hackney in particular and Newham as well that's where we've got our mockingbird hubs as well to support children and we try to work with our care leavers about their housing offers we give three offers of housing which most local authorities don't give three offers as well and we work with housing where we've had situations where say a care leaver wasn't particularly happy in the area that actually we've worked with housing to rehouse a care leaver as well and we've got but as I say we've got a dedicated housing worker because we think it's absolutely key and I suppose what the personal advisors and also working with some of the voluntary sector is how we support holistically care leavers it's not just about giving them a house it's about making sure access to services in the community as well but I do think that's a good point to take back to think about in terms of the advertising about the access to foster carers we're actually on the gold standard for comms so it's and we're working really closely even more to do more creative and intelligent using of not AI but different technology around the internet and different stuff and searches about our different initiatives we actually did have a lot of traffic on our adverts for the access to fostering course more than we had for some of our others but I'm really happy to take back your idea of the WhatsApp group or different things because anything we can do to get that message out about this course or anything to do with fostering definitely would want to do thank you sorry just to follow up on the housing section it's about you mentioned I'm talking more about when they've been placed out borough some can be in Essex for example even in Newbury Park Ilford area so what kind of work are you doing to integrate them back into the borough when they're isolated first of all as you can imagine the mental health of a young person without the proper parents and the family network is extreme as it is so they're coming back to the service are you doing any kind of work in the integration back into the community and also supporting them into their education sector as well because some of them might have already started college or university and they're having to travel two hours distance because of that so yes absolutely definitely are we're doing that through the personal advisor but the other thing is we recognise that just because the child is in care or care leaver their family is still really important and many have family still within this borough so we've been doing a lot of work we've got our lifelong link service that helps build those relationships not just with family but it might be with a trusted teacher or somebody in a youth club or whoever that is important to that child looking holistically about who's important to that care leaver and integration is definitely really important I think the virtual school also has an important role in terms of education and training as well and every care leaver has named education and training officer and we previously just had one we now have a manager who holds young people's cases and we also now have two additional workers and definitely we and as well as the virtual school as well so looking holistically at what they want to do and our performance on care leavers and education employment and training is well above average we perform nearly well on that thank you Steve to you what measure have been taken to support a small transition of the adult mental health service for young people who have significant mental health issues and maybe Susanna would answer that on this I can so in terms of transition to adult mental health so we have cams of course up to 18 however our cams worker who are based at times within KitKat helps signpost to adult mental health as well we've also got a project at the moment looking at transitions of care leavers but also in particular around children going to adult mental health from cams to mental health we've also now got continued from at the age of 18 but those children transferring into adulthood who we see might have vulnerabilities in particular around mental health we continue to have an independent reviewing officer post 18 to make sure that the network and the services are transitioned effectively and to help advocate for that voice as well we also have advocates for our care leavers as well and we also have Barnardo's who offer emotional well-being as well which is lower level to adult mental health but emotional well-being is one of the things that our care leavers have said to us is one of the most important things and so they have been a kick cat not during the refurbishment we've been here at the town hall as well but we continue to work on this right well first of all I like very much the feel of the offer the description that you have given this evening and whilst we are no doubt slightly apprehensive about the 7th of January this does sound a very good offer that you put forward this looks a good feel to it and I suppose the two things that strike me is the unaccompanied children within the asylum seeking setup I mean how do we get I realise the key number is 280 children in care and 28 unaccompanied children is what I believe you've told us this evening how does how do the 28 what would be the how is the allocation who allocates the unaccompanied children is this sort of question I'm trying to feel for putting to you if you can answer that please there's actually a national scheme on this and you'll have seen possibly in the media not as not as much recently but certainly a year ago colleagues in Kent where a lot of those young people were received and talking about how that area of the country was overwhelmed so there is a national transfer scheme where local authorities across the country are contacted and there was a national level which I think from memory is 0.07 percentage of your children in care population 0.1 0.1 so central government effectively set a target and said local areas should be offering to provide support for unaccompanied asylum seeker children it's a really interesting one this because I've worked in some different places in the country and where on one level local authority areas and this is such a positive inclusive place and so welcoming and makes that offer but not you don't always see the transfer of young people to us so despite there being this big pressure in some parts of the country even though there's an offer in places like Tower Hamlets and some others you don't always see the numbers come through but I have to say again comparing Tower Hamlets to some other places that have worked it's exemplary the support that's an offer here and listening to some of our young people we had an event this year somebody said to me the other day could you come up with a few highlights of the year and I think one of the absolute highlights was an event that Susanna and her team and the asylum team put on in the town hall to recognise all the work done with families and young people who were seeking asylum it was a massively positive event so I think we could certainly in a future committee you could have direct feedback from some of those young people about the quality of support and the nurturing support that our teams provide across the council not just in children's services but it's a really interesting question that around how do young people arrive here there are parts of the country where because of transport networks and other things there's a lot of what you describe as spontaneous arrivals of young people who are unaccompanied asylum and we do occasionally have those in our hamlets but yeah I think we benchmark about average in terms of our levels of unaccompanied young people we also because of the hotels here when there's an influx into those hotels we see we see a percentage of children who say that they were wrongly classified as adults and so therefore we've got trained age assessors within our team who in terms of sensitively age assess and we work with them these are some good answers I mean I'm interested to know about how Tower Hamlet has the 28 so I think that I think it does sound a good sorry let's put it this other way what gets in the news is Kent and so what is happening in Kent how they managed to export to the rest of the country is clearly sensitive and significant and I mean I heard with interest what you said is the situation here in Tower Hamlets thank you thank you chair my question is just want to clarify something in terms of foster carer applicants how do you are we in balance with the applications and the amount of children that need foster care service or they need a home are we in balance of any applicants that are in the queue are they average I mean it's to balance with the children who need the care service and is it educated at the moment do you have enough applicants I think there's a national issue around foster carers you'll see in the national press around this that all areas of the country are saying they're seeing a reduction in terms of foster carers so it's a real issue for us and that's why we're in the regional arrangements that's why we're trying creatively to market fostering as an opportunity for people so we're working really hard to recruit foster carers what I will say is that because of the work that Tower Hamlets has done and the hard work of Suzanne and her team to work as hard as possible to keep families together the number of children in our care is comparatively much lower than other places what the other question is then so what do you do if you can't place the young person with their wider family and you can't find a foster carer then you have to use something like residential provision and again Tower Hamlets is in a really fortunate position that we only very rarely do that for our young people. So in terms of where we are on balance we're in a good place. I think other councils will be will in future learn from how Tower Hamlets has kept its children in our care population so low but we are always seeking new ways to recruit more foster carers and we are always seeking new ways to recruit more foster carers and the ensure that we are to ensure that we are to ensure that we are to ensure that we are using residential care in as limited way as possible. Yeah. So I think we have, I think it's about 126 foster carers at the moment and you've seen that the number of children in care is 280. Of course some can take more children. I think there are about 176 children or something in foster care. We have to use at times independent fostering agencies which is more expensive than our in-house and also we want to use our in-house and also we want to use our in-house and also we want to use our in-house because they're excellent and we provide such excellent training for them. I'm going to say it's something about 90% of our in-house foster carers are now therapeutically trained and that makes such a difference for, yeah, the love that a child gets and the placement stability as well. But we are also looking at how we are also looking at how we make sure that our independent fostering agencies provide a similar sort of care to our children because we don't want, just because a child can't go in an in-house foster placement, that they don't get the best experience of care that is possible if they can't be with their family. Susanna, can I just ask on this, I understand most of our foster carers are out of the borough, what's the ramification on that, what's the reason behind, because of the housing stock list or any other reason? It's housing and lots of our foster carers used to live in Tower Hamlets, are absolutely committed to Tower Hamlets, they're literally over the border in Newham, in Hackney but their allegiance is to Tower Hamlets but it's just the house sizes that they can have spare bedrooms, they moved out when their families got bigger themselves but they see themselves as Tower Hamlets even though they're just over the border. And actually we have looked at what is the offer, are our children, is it a detriment to our children being placed outside of the borough in terms of educational achievement, emotional well-being and it isn't any different, children aren't penalised because of that and as well we continue to support their relationships with their families if their families are within Tower Hamlets. But we would like more within the borough. Thank you. What's the current average age limit that at the moment that we are facing for a child to be housed and what's the timeline that who are coming off the list as well? Can I just clarify as your question, how long do children stay in care? I mean, I'm talking about the average age at this moment that you are facing, is it from what age? Age group. Oh okay, I can get back to you with the actual precise figures but it's an actual, it's a real range of ages when children have to come into care. I wouldn't be confident, I wouldn't, I'll get back to you in terms of clear figures of what the breakdowns is in terms of the average there. But if a child needs to come into care, a child comes into care, we don't make a child wait because we've got a good placement team and we work closely with commissioning in terms of making sure that we have the right placements as soon as they arrive as well and need that care. So my question is based around our commission services in terms of placing our young people in like some independent placements. So I know at the moment we have like, look ahead I think in the town, that's like the leading one that's leading. So have you, and also recently the government advised that most commission services have to be ofsted. So what, for me personally I manage about five or six commission services myself in the borough of Wandsworth. So what provisions have you taken to support those commission services to meet the requirements and provide without diminishing the quality of service to just meet the standard of ofsted and doing it in a psychologically informed environment? And also like, how are you receiving feedback from young people directly to say, is this commission service okay for them? And are you considering maybe looking at other commission services rather than just look ahead? Because at the moment it's just look ahead, I think that's the lead one. But maybe there's others in the country that are more advanced I guess and provide more support maybe? Yeah, no it's a really important question because of that change recently in terms of the supported accommodation providers now need to be registered with Ofsted. The council has been supporting providers for the last year or so in the run up to registration. It is the case though that in both Tower Hamlets and in many other councils because of the number of providers who had to become registered and the timescale, not all of them whilst they've applied to become registered and they're engaging with Ofsted, not all of them are absolutely registered with Ofsted. I think it's a sector that's gone through significant change because of registration and we've run some procurement processes. And we'll be going out again with a procurement process and we know that we're going to have to look at how we fund that and at what level we fund to make sure we can secure the right provision for our young people. And I think through our commissioning team we've got a good process in terms of quality assurance. And I think one of our strengths, actually your question about feedback from young people, one of our real strengths is the amount of engagement and listening we do with young people, both at an individual level when they're being engaged with the social workers and PAs and others, but also in terms of how young people come together to tell us about services and tell us what they want to see. I think there's a lot of strengths and I'm resisting the temptation to tell you what Ofsted said about some of this, which was, you know, it was really positive, but I'll have to pull myself back until January, but you won't be disappointed. That's all I can say. Just to say, so there's a placements board that I chair, which commissioning our colleagues who are sitting behind us actually attend that. And we've been really working on those children where their placements aren't yet registered yet. I sign off a report for every single child and where I look is what their views are, what the independent reviewing officers' views are, what our placements team are, want to know what the quality assurance is, and I expect fortnightly visits as well to those children. So there's a lot of scrutiny about them. And, yeah. Are you recording those feedbacks somewhere, or are you, like, the data? It's in a report. Are we able to have some sort of... So we have that, that's in our, well, it's in the, it's in all of our, in the reports that come to me to sign off. There's a section which talks about the children's views as well. We could share examples of that without the provider's name. Yeah. Councillor, do you want to go ahead? I just want to know how Tower Hamlet Council is supporting for children in our care, like housing, jobs, obviously concern about the child's well-being, like separation from the carer, changes in a child's life. So what is the, what is a need assessment for a care leavers? If you can, um, touch little, please. Thank you. Um, generally speaking, it's extremely good, um, in terms of, again, our recent inspection experience and the feedback we had about care leavers services. Um, and again, we have, um, uh, regular contact from our young people in terms of their feedback directly about their experiences. And, um, and myself and, uh, the lead member for, for, for children, the deputy mayor, meet, meet young people regularly to, to hear that feedback. Um, as we said as well, we, we've got key performance measures as well around, uh, care leavers, health and wellbeing, employment and housing that we have to monitor really closely. And we report that to the corporate parenting board and other places. Susanna, anything else you'd like to add? Um, yes. So just within the documents that, um, I sent you on page 10 sets out, um, where all the holistic support that we give to our, our care leavers and how that aligns pan London. So London has signed up to standards of what we want. So, for example, about housing, we, we give council tax exemption, but not just if they live in this borough, but if it's outside of the borough. Um, we, they're exempt from being made intentionally homeless, priority need until 25, we give rent deposits, um, you know, health. We've got free prescriptions, um, we've got our bespoke mental health offer with, um, Barnardo's and the work that we're doing with CAMS. We're now giving free leisure passes, um, as well. Um, we've talked about, I've talked about the education and training offer, where everybody's got their own, um, uh, eat worker as well. Um, and, and we don't just put people in the same old apprenticeships. We put them in a complete range, and, and we're seeing our, our care leavers really achieve. We've just got our first care leaver started in September medical school, for example. Um, we've got another two who are really interested in taking that route to doing their A-levels at the moment. We're aspirational, um, I think, in terms of our offer, um, in terms of education and training. Um, transport, we, we've signed up for the reduced, um, uh, transport fees. So, we've got a whole holistic offer that we look at. We've also got, we've got a corporate parenting board, but we've got a corporate, uh, it's our operational group, which is multi-agency, where we're progressing, um, how we can provide even better services for our care leavers. We're still working out what does, um, care experience as a protected characteristic mean in terms of the council. One of it is about apprenticeships, but actually, what more does that mean in terms of work experience, and really, if this is our family business, what more can we do for them? And we're working in terms of, with legal as well, to, you know, what does that definition mean? How far does it stretch? And, and that's nationally, we're part of that debate as well. Other Sam, uh, is here? Afro Jamal online? Yeah, hi, it's Ashra. Um, can I, um, can I just say, um, you know, just looking at the, the work that's being done, um, I do feel, you know, some amazing work is being provided for this, um, group of, um, people within the, the care kind of, um, sector. Um, I think historically over the past few years, as I've seen, um, a lot of great works being done. Um, and I certainly see some of them in my, my own work, um, in, in the general practice, um, realm. Um, but, and again, I think you've touched, I just want to come to a couple of quick points. One was around, obviously a lot of feedback that you've been talking about, um, and, um, the, the slides are quite extensive in terms of how far you go into the following them up. Um, um, it's just, I guess the question I had was, um, and the support and offer that you're giving in terms of employment and now you're supporting a lot of this stuff. Now, is there, um, have you got any in-house, um, service where you can bring some of these, um, you know, children who go on to kind of study and, and, and going to employment? Is there an in-house service where you can bring some of them back and offer opportunities for them to join the team within the council kind of set up to then, you know, work. And, and, and, and probably from experience as well, some, um, um, to have some of these kids who have grown into and grown up and, and, you know, taken up certain roles within this, um, sector, um, to support this, um, you know, this work, um, in the coming years. And, and really from a personal kind of experience, probably it's an opportunity, is that something that's been thought about? And secondly, if I quickly may, um, the role of kind of the cultural and religious kind of sensitivity and accommodating some of the religious requirements, um, how, you know, um, how far does that go? Um, when you, um, obviously there's a shortage of foster parents, um, as you mentioned, um, how do you, I mean, I'm, I'm guessing cultural, religious, and all these other kind of, um, requirements. You, you, you try and, um, bring, you know, try and pick some of those boxes when you're putting people together, um, what's the process? And, and is, you know, where does that feature in your, um, in, in that kind of, um, um, framework when you're, when you try and pair, um, people together? Thank you. Hi, thank you for your question. Um, really, really, uh, an important one, and I think, um, one that really stands our, our children in good stead for the future in terms of their education, training, and employment. And we're really lucky to have a fantastic, uh, education and training employment service. Um, as Susanna's mentioned, that we've actually grown that service now to have from one, one member of staff to actually three. Um, and that's really making an impact. We've seen that, um, in terms of, uh, our education and training employment offer that the majority of our children actually do secure that, um, and go on to kind of secure education and training and employment in really positive sectors. Um, more so than national and regional, um, um, comparators as well. And also, we have, um, five apprenticeship opportunities in, in, in the council. Those are all filled and they're all, uh, widespread across, across the organization. And we've actually, uh, looking to expand that in the, in the new year with three additional, or actually maybe, yeah, three additional apprentice, apprenticeship opportunities. So, um, um, we're really lucky to really connect with, with, uh, with our, with our children who are, who are apprenticeships, uh, apprentices within the council as well. So, they actually give us their feedback, tell us what things that we could do to improve. Uh, I think it's really important to make sure that they have a good support network around them to make sure that they're, they're really, um, supported to do well as well. So, we, we're thinking about the, the, the support offer that's in place for them too. And as we mentioned earlier that they talked, they, they've talked to us about wanting to be mentors for other children as well in, in, in, in care. So, we really want to take that forward. That's something that we really want to explore with them, uh, about how they can, they can shape, uh, the future for other children who are coming into care at a younger age as well. So, I think our care leaders as mentors is really inspirational. Um, yes, and I'm very happy to share after this. They, we, they've done their first podcast, um, and we've got a three minute clip. I know we're constrained by time, but we'll send it round about what their views are and what they really want. And in the new KitKat, there's going to be a podcast room so that we can list. They've got so many different ideas for themselves, but for other, um, children in care who are coming up into care leavers. Um, and it's really exciting in terms of that. In terms of your question in terms of how do we support, um, our children in care, uh, that match in terms of cultural and religious match, um, and how we support our children. That's something that's really important. Um, and we do try and have cultural matches. It doesn't always happen. Um, if it doesn't, it's in terms of working with the foster carer in terms of how, um, the, the needs are actually championed by them. But also I'm going to say our PAs and our managers are very much, um, proactive as well. Um, if somebody wants to go to a mosque or somebody wants to go to a church and making sure that those things are actually, um, happening as well. And those conversations for our care leavers in particular are happening all the time. Um, and it's really, really important. Okay. I think just to add to that as well, um, there's a significant commitment to ensure our workforce represents the community as well, which I think you, you can see that. Thank you, Steve. Thank you very much for your report and a lot of valuable questions being answered. Uh, Susanna and the team and Steve as well. We need to find, we're going to move into next item with children and young people of mental health. Um, chair, if it's okay, if I could just alert you, I do need to leave at eight o'clock or, um, are we sleeping in my office again? I got the message, don't worry. Got to get the train back up north. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So chair, I'd like to introduce my colleague, Sarah Wilson, who will introduce the team and, and, uh, we'll take questions. Thank you very much indeed for having us today. My name is Sarah Wilson. I'm the director of children and specialist services at East London Foundation Trust. There's quite a gang of us today, but if I get everybody to introduce themselves, as properly said, I'll start with Roxana. Hi. Thank you. I'm Roxana Ahmed. I'm a consultant clinical psychologist and also psychological therapy lead. Oh, apologies. Sorry, I'll have to repeat that. Yes. I'm Roxana Ahmed. I am a consultant clinical psychologist and also psychological therapies lead at Tower Hamlets Cams. Hi, Grace Walker, interim head of integrated commissioning at Tower Hamlets. And hello, my name's Jordan Oliver. I'm a senior program manager in the integrated commissioning team covering children and young people's mental health. And we've also got our colleague, um, uh, Dr. Lavelle, who's on the screen as well. Hi, I'm Catherine Lavelle. I'm consultant child psychiatrist and I'm the medical director for children's services in Elf. Thank you. Uh, sorry for the waiting, uh, Captain Lunky, but as I said, with the final item, um, uh, any presentation you want to present? What we were hoping to do, uh, Councillor was, was really to, to take it as read, um, but open it up to questions. So, so what we've presented to you really is a, is a sort of summary, an overview of children and young people's mental health and wellbeing in Tower Hamlets. Uh, talking a bit about what we know about the evidence, um, about the demand, what we know, uh, from public health research into what the needs are in Tower Hamlets. Sort of starting with the very, very young with the sort of perinatal service and, and, and looking at all the way up to the more kind of complex mental health needs. And we've talked a bit about how, how we're working as a system to try and respond to those needs. Um, but we'd like to open it up to questions if that's okay with everybody. And I have the, uh, Syrian please, Shiblu, you are the first. Anybody else want to answer question? Hands up. Shiblu, at the moment, just you at the moment, so. Um, sorry, as you know, my, probably, you probably heard me, my background is working with young people, mental health and care leavers. And I work with a psychologist as well, uh, maybe your counterpart. Um, and I work in the, uh, framework of PI. I don't know if you've heard about it. Psychologically Informed Environment. So my question is in terms of dealing with, um, the young people in particular, and your staff that manage young people. Do you have things like a psychologist working closely with, uh, the workers to provide, say, reflective practice? So that could be for, say, the PAs who work with, um, living care team or the commission services that work with the young people. Because obviously it has an adverse effect on their mental health as well. In addition, do you undertake, as a council, as a borough, like, uh, making sure that all the services that we provide are psychologically informed? So that's not just the environment in terms of the way, like, this is the worst room for psychologically informed, I would say. Because obviously the panels are there, like, I'm sure you've all noticed. So things like that, obviously, you have to consider, right? Um, so do you take those things into consideration? And if you don't, do you have plans to do or bring it in for the future? Thank you very much for that. Um, in terms of the specific groups, um, uh, that you've discussed in terms of young people who are care leavers, for example, um, like our colleagues described, um, previously, uh, as sort of CAMS professionals, um, we work very much in partnership, um, with our local authority colleagues and other colleagues as well, community providers, to ensure that, exactly like you're describing, um, all care and staff are in the future. All care and services that are being offered, um, sort of psychological, um, sort of, um, uh, sort of factors, considerations, needs are sort of proactively being incorporated into all of the work across our services. Um, sorry. Um, yeah, just, just to kind of, um, build on that, we have, uh, in, uh, children's services and in, um, the children in care services and the edge of care service, a, a kind of specialist CAMS offer for our children. So, that's, uh, like an enhanced offer, um, which is, um, run by Roxanne, so I'm speaking for you, but just wanted to kind of, like, be clear that we do have that, like, specific offer for our children and, and they do consultations with practitioners as well who are working with those children. Is, is, is that fast-tracked? Is, is that fast-tracked? Because I know the waiting time can be six months, so it's, it's, it's, it's not fast-tracked. So this, it's not fast-tracked. So this offer is fast-tracked for the young people. Yes, sorry. Uh, just to add a comment in terms of the reflective practice and those sorts of, sort of, the benefits of using that type of, sort of, methodology and work, um, and as, uh, Grace, you've already highlighted, it's very much embedded in all of our offers, um, both in terms of the enhanced offers, um, but all of our offers around psychological care, um, because it's very, very important to ensure that our staff, our staff teams and our staff members are also having that support in, in order to, sort of, give the best care to our children and young people and families that we see. Great. Also, just to share, our public health colleagues lead, um, a community of practice trauma-informed, um, session, and that's open to all professionals who work with children and young people with mental health challenges. So, you might have clinicians, like, I go as a commissioner. So it's really open to discuss those trauma-informed approaches and how we can embed that into how everyone at all parts of the system are working with our young people. Uh, thank you. Uh, thank you. My question to you is, given this, uh, in, uh, secondary increase in autism and ADHD, uh, in, entire Hamlet, is there evidence of overall representation in diagnosis among a specific ethnic group or genders, and how is information being used to address potential bias or inequality in assessment? Um, um, in terms of, um, in terms of when we look at, sort of, the research and evidence that's available to date, um, there isn't significant variation, um, in terms of prevalence rates across different, um, genders and, um, different, um, ethnic backgrounds, for example. I think what we see in our services and our work is sort of under or over-representation. Um, so there isn't variation in prevalence rates necessarily, but we will see, um, for example, young girls, um, will be under-represented in our, um, ASD diagnostic services, um, and, uh, young boys may be over-represented. Um, there are also some variations in relation to, um, uh, different, uh, racial backgrounds as well. I think for us, in terms of our services, what we see is that, um, the children and young people that we assess and work with, um, is in line and reflective of our community. Um, so those, those variations sort of reflect the, the, the children and families that we work with. Um, could I just ask, Chad, was there another part to the question in terms of parental, um, sort of, uh, biases or, or reflections? Sorry, apologies. No, there wasn't a question. Oh, okay. Sorry, there wasn't an answer. I mean, you answered it. Because the reason I was asking that question on the report, because within the Mangali community, ADHC has gone up significantly, especially with that particular group. I just want to know what was the, uh, reason behind it and how it's been tackled. Thank you, Chair. So, in terms of those increases, um, we are seeing increases in, um, the prevalence assessment and diagnosis of, of ADHD, um, across all groups and populations. Mm-hmm. I think in terms of when we're thinking about, uh, uh, Bengali community, there's different ways of coming at this. Um, one way of coming at it is actually quite positive in that we are increasing awareness, reducing stigma in relation to, um, these needs. And then, as a result of that, our families are accessing our assessment services. Um, but obviously, I suppose the parallel to that is that, um, there is very, very significant demand. Yeah. Um, children and young people and families with very high levels of need and increasing complexity. Um, so, it's how do we then, sort of, um, um, you know, work in partnership in order to ensure that those children and young people get the best care as soon as possible in relation to those developmental needs, but also how those developmental needs often impact mental health needs and outcomes as well. Sorry, I have a follow-up question on this as well. Uh, I also see on the provincial board as well, and I understand that a lot of children who have got those sort of problems, specifically they want access to their education, and every, every parents who, they're concerned for their children, they want to place their kid into their Phoenix school, which is over-prescribed. Um, yes, we, we certainly, uh, get that feedback, and, and there is, um, a demand for places. They're, uh, part of the solution is what I described before, which is Phoenix doing outreach into schools, and showing how that support can be done in mainstream, and, and working with school leaders and parents on promoting that as an option, sort of, as a more inclusive approach. But we are also in discussions with Phoenix around, uh, how, uh, potential expansion plans, um, at the moment. So, um, we're, we're not, um, absolutely certain exactly how that's going to pan out, but we're certainly looking at opportunities for, uh, for expansion on, on other sites with Phoenix. Could I add to that as well, in relation to, obviously there, there, there are the children and young people who will require access to that specialist level of expertise in those contexts. Um, but we're also wanting to think about, um, um, our children and young people with these needs, um, as early as possible. So, other opportunities that we're considering, for example, our Tower Hamlets, um, education and wellbeing service, our mental health in schools teams, and specifically, um, wanting to, through continuing development, think about neurovariance as soon as possible, and how we can, across all our educational provisions, um, increase knowledge, awareness, uh, use of appropriate strategies in relation to, uh, young people, children and young people, um, who are neuro, who experience neurovariance. I would just add, um, just in, in line with that, the offers that we have going into the family hubs, so supporting parents and children with things like stay and play, so those early kind of interactions that children are having, so before it escalates into, into kind of an issue which, which seems more serious than it might need to be, kind of supporting those parents in understanding the needs of their children at an earlier stage, and that, and those are rolled out across all the family hubs in partnership with our colleagues in children's social care. Sorry, do you want to, uh, do you want to ask the question? Yes, uh, my question is, uh, to you all, um, how long is the waiting time for diagnosis, and considering autism and ADH1-3-4-1 is done? Uh, if it's the waiting list is quite long, do you have a comparison data, if the person in general is diagnosed early, and in the, in between, if it was, uh, diagnosed early and the later, does it actually impact on their mental health or the services they receive? And how are we doing in terms of comparison, if we were to compare with other paras in London? In terms of, um, wait times, um, unfortunately the reality is that there are waits for assessments and diagnosis, um, in relation to autism, and there's been significant work done across all services, um, who assess children and young people, um, for autism, in relation to, to, uh, reviewing, you know, what is a good enough assessment? So, of course, we want to offer high quality assessments, but in terms of managing wait times and resources, how can we offer sort of good enough assessments to progress our children and young people through those processes in a timely fashion? Um, the demand for ADHD, um, assessments has increased even more significantly, um, than potentially, uh, our request for ASC diagnosis. Uh, that demand is very high too, um, but we're seeing significantly higher demands for ADHD diagnosis as well. Um, I think in terms of sort of the wait times, there's a couple of, um, uh, important areas to discuss in relation to the, the wider considerations around, um, how do our children and young people access what they need? Because absolutely, assessment and diagnosis is very important and crucial, but actually through our partnership working, early intervention, prevention, um, and reviewing our sort of integrated pathways, um, we don't want the diagnosis and assessment process and waiting times to impact negative, negatively in terms of your question, in terms of our young people and children not being able to access the support that they need. It's probably also really important to state that in terms of children and young people waiting for support around mental health crisis and, and serious, serious problems. Um, there isn't a waiting time. So, so there is, there's sort of immediate access to crisis support seven days a week, um, which is really, really important. Uh, and, and as Roxana says, there are real challenges, particularly around ASD diagnostic processes and ADHD diagnostic processes, but actually in terms of the, the core offer, what we try and do is get to people as early as possible. So that means if your child's in school, uh, and they need support in school, then we've got the network through Tower Hamlet's, um, emotional wellbeing service across the majority of schools in the borough. How can we get help quickly? Um, and that is, is, is sort of how we're trying to work as a system. But I don't know if, if anybody else wants to come in. I was, um, Sarah, I was maybe going to just add something about the, the question, which was about, does a delay in diagnosis lead to worsening mental health outcomes? And I think that's a really complicated question. Um, what we know is a lot of the children that we see, um, later on presenting with crisis behaviors and, uh, eating difficulties and lots of other complex mental health problems often get a late diagnosis of ASD, but that's not because they've been sitting on a waiting list waiting for one. It's because their difficulties haven't been picked up until they get to that, you know, quite late into their adolescence. When what, what we see is that the capacity of the child to accommodate and manage their difficulties and compensate the problems that they're experiencing gets overwhelmed by the demand. And that we often see that in adolescence. So a lot of children manage quite well with, um, high functioning autistic spectrum difficulties, um, so that it's not really picked up by their parents or by schools. They seem to be doing fine. They've got friends, et cetera, but it's when they hit adolescence that we see a lot of problems emerging. And those are the ones that Sarah saying that we don't have a wait time to be seen. They get seen very quickly when they're in crisis, but the delays, there might be delays later on waiting for their autism assessment, but they're still getting the mental health support that they need. I'm sorry, I forgot to, there was a second part of the question as well about other, other comparing with other boroughs. And we, we certainly, you know, work very closely across Northeast London, and I think there are very similar demand there. Um, and it, it, it is a real, it's a real challenge. And, and it is about how we can do, if we are focusing on the diagnostic part of it, how we can do it as well. But we know it's, it, it's too long. Uh, Councillor Slew. Thank you, Chair. Um, I think, uh, partially my question is probably been answered a bit, but I'm still wanting to, uh, know that, um, um, what policy you have to diagnose, diagnose a child or children very early age, um, rather than a white tail, um, some time that, um, it may become a little bit severe, um, mental issue. So what, what policy you have in, um, um, in place that early, early intervention? Yes, yeah. So, um, not necessarily sort of what are our policies, but I think really importantly, what are our partnerships, um, and, and sort of how we think about the entire pathway. So I think, again, I'm thinking of sort of, um, the work, um, that you were referring to, Grace, in terms of sort of public health, promotion, prevention, um, our health visitors. Um, our family hubs, um, you know, where are those contexts, um, from very, very early on in our communities, where our families are accessing, um, a range of professionals. Um, within all of those contexts, um, there's been quite a significant sort of work, not just into our hamlets, but nationally as well, in terms of, um, skilling up our colleagues in relation to early screening, for example. Um, and so when those processes are embedded in the pathway, uh, the, the, the, the outcome of those that we hope is that then our children, if they require further specialist assessment, that those requests, those referrals, those, those things can be activated as soon as possible. But again, to state as well, in terms of the current pathways and offers, that doesn't imply that the children and, and families won't be able to access, um, helpful support and care as well.

There's a lot going on there. Uh, just, uh, sorry, I'm coming to, uh, after. Okay. This is, um, observation, really. I'm the, um, stats person. So I always look at these reports for, um, evidence of trends. Sorry. So I'm, I'm on key themes. And I, I see presumably the, the, the, the, the statistics that one in five, eight to 16 year olds had a probable mental health disorder and rising to one in four in 17 to 19 year olds. Um, presumably that's drawn from a report, mental health of children in young people in England, wave four, follow up. So does that mean you could actually show a trend in those? Because I think this is what people are waking up to is, is the trend. So my observation really in your report is if, if you could have perhaps given an emphasis to the, to the trend, if that report, and, and I presume it's only England. And so you, we, we don't have any finer breakdown. Right. Okay. Thank you very much. Um, yeah, no, absolutely correct. Um, I, and we'll take that feedback, um, as well. Um, but just really just to sort of add to that in terms of what the trends are actually telling us. Um, so actually for many, many years, the trend, the sort of the, the, the, the data and the trends were actually much more stable. So for a long time, um, the statistics were more in line with one in 10 children. And that was even, but prior, even prior to COVID, unfortunately, we were seeing, um, a, a, quite a shift in that trend in terms of movement from one in 10 to one in seven, um, to potentially one in six. And then the, the, the most recent data that we've, we've, um, highlighted together. That would be most helpful. Uh, and I think it could, that would be, um, I mean, that, that raises other issues, but, and let us just see that, that trend. Um, thank you. Uh, Shibla. Sorry, I've just, just to add really, um, the, the, our public health colleagues are currently doing a joint strategic needs assessment, um, on children, young people's mental health. So hope to bring, bring that back here, uh, next year, which absolutely will, will feed your, um, need and desire for statistics and numbers. So, um, so yeah, that, that, that's coming next year. So that will be, and certainly I'm sure they'll be looking at trends. So, so that will help you be a helpful context for, for all of us to work from. Your turn, please. Yeah. So, uh, my question is basically, I think we might have talked about it in terms of under-representation of, um, children. Who are mis, misdiagnosed or not on the cusp of just that, like who have ADHD or like autism maybe, but early onset where they're not basically qualified to be diagnosed yet. So what kind of support are you providing? And what kind of special support in schools are you providing, uh, um, for those young people, children and the parents? And my follow up question is just to about, so like, how do the services identify and engage with, um, women? Experiencing mental health, um, problems during the prenatal period. We had a session yesterday about maternity and prenatal, so that kind of, and we had the public health team yesterday as well in our scrutiny. And it's like, and then most likely they're not probably actively seeking the help or cultural stigmas as you probably are aware. Thank you. I guess it's, I don't know whether Cathy might want to come in a little bit about the perinatal, uh, uh, sort of offer. But, um, in, in terms of how services work, what we really try to do across the board is to focus on the needs rather than being driven by the diagnosis. So it is really thinking about what a child's presenting needs are in whatever situation. So thinking about it in school, thinking about in primary care, thinking about if they've got more, uh, sort of complex needs and are needing to come into some kind of, um, specialist child mental health services. Really focus on the needs rather than you need to wait and queue for a diagnosis. Obviously, as we go through the care, then we will seek to give the appropriate diagnoses. But it really is needs based. Um, and I think in terms of parent, parental support, um, what we do within the mental health services is really think about how we could, seeing the child very holistically as part of the family unit. So we're working, we're not just working with the child, we'll be working with the whole family. And that's really important. Absolutely. And just to add to that in terms of sort of being ensuring we're needs driven, because the reality is that we don't want a diagnosis to unintentionally act as a barrier. But we absolutely don't want, um, where there isn't necessarily a diagnosis or thresholds aren't met. That would be a really unhelpful barrier to our children and young people and families as well. So I think that's, that's why we sort of revert to and sort of are continuing to sort of develop and thinking about sort of being needs led, um, to ensure that sort of the access to, to whatever intervention is required. Again, very specific examples, whether it's pre-diagnosis, but we have lots of, um, uh, group offers, um, at different stages of the pathway. And often some of those offers are pre-diagnosis and assessment as well, again, in a similar fashion to ensure that we're responding to our parental need as soon as possible. We also work very closely with children and families directly. So that idea of co-producing, uh, material, co-producing training events and listening to young people, uh, with particular needs and disorders and thinking about how they can support each other. Um, cause that, that's very important as well. Well, Kathy, did you want to say anything about perinatal kind of approaches? I can say a little, although it sounds like maybe you, you had a meeting with the perinatal mental health services yesterday. So just to say that the CAM services don't provide perinatal interventions, although they may be working with mothers who are currently pregnant, who are mothers of children in the services. But we do, the ELFT does provide perinatal mental health services, which range all the way from inpatient care. So we've got a very good, um, uh, mother and baby unit based in Hackney, um, that serves, uh, mothers from across the North Central and East London region, um, which is where women who are seriously psychiatrically ill, whilst pregnant or shortly after birth can be admitted with their baby. Um, and the, the, the, the, the two are looked after together and there's additional supports put in there to support the needs of the baby. But then they, they cover the whole range of, um, services down from there. So interfacing with, um, um, um, adult mental health teams, um, maternal mental health teams, um, all the way, all the way down. So I'm not sure, I think it sounds like you had a, a presentation about this already. So I'm not sure whether there is anything specific you wanted to ask where necessary, the CAM services will link up very closely with the, the perinatal services where it's felt that we need to be working closely. So for example, if we, if we have, um, uh, an under 18 girl who's pregnant and mentally unwell, we would link very closely with them. Or if we have a mother who's unwell, whose other children are part of the services that we're providing, we would, when necessary, interface with all of those services. Sorry, my question more was about your services in terms of, so how do you identify and engage women who are experiencing mental health during the perinatal period, uh, who may not actively seek the help or because of social stigma or, and the language barriers as well? So that's what I wanted to know. Well, our, our services are children's CAM services, so we wouldn't be doing that specifically unless they came to our attention through our CAM services. But the perinatal services work very closely with voluntary sector, GPs, um, other health providers to identify women who are at risk of perinatal mental health problems. And then to be able to either support other services, to be able to work with them or to try and encourage engagement with the perinatal services. I don't know if that answers your question and maybe somebody else was going to say something. Yeah, sorry, it was just because our public health colleagues aren't with us and they've provided helpfully some information, um, but public health do lead a lot of the perinatal, um, work and just referring to the information that they've shared, um, they've got maternity and early as working groups, but they've also got specific perinatal, perinatal mental health and infant relationships groups as well. Um, so there's definitely work going on in the area, but if there was anything more specific, we can definitely go back to them and report back because it's definitely their area of work. Just to say though, the, the lead again, um, like I say, the groups in the perinatal space, um, and it's a lot to do with how we just engage as a wider partnership. So again, like that's something I attend and then we'll follow up with, yeah, with, with CAMs, um, if and when necessary. So it's really that partnership approach to it. And as well, like Sarah, I've seen the maternity services as well. Thank you. Any, no, uh, sorry, sorry. Thank you, Chair. Um, do you, um, do you monitor any, any child or children that, uh, been diagnosed early or whenever? Uh, that after, um, the, um, the, um, supporting that child has become well and what's the percentage that it was, you know, a, your team or any external body success in curing that child into a normal life? Um, so, um, um, I suppose in terms of thinking about outcomes for children that we assess, um, whether we assess them as early as possible or, or at whatever point, um, I think the reality is, is that we are working towards optimizing, um, their quality of life and their continuing development, um, and their outcomes. Um, so it's not necessarily that we are able to cure, um, uh, their difficulties, but again, with a range of interventions, and again, that may be across different parts of our partnership, for example, our community partners, speech and language therapy colleagues, um, uh, occupational therapy colleagues, um, and obviously colleagues in education. Um, so all of those aspects in relation to, um, so all of those aspects in relation to sort of care provision across our partnerships is always directed towards, um, maximizing the outcomes, um, of those children and young people and their families and overall their quality of life as well. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Um, thank you very much for sharing your report and information. Thank you for my colleagues and people on the online as well, uh, for participating. And that concludes our tonight meetings. I'll, uh, I'll just conclude the meetings. What's going on? Okay. Fine. There's other, er, any other businesses? No. So we'll conclude the meeting on this. Uh, no. Sorry. No, no. No. No, no. No. No, no, no. interviewer. No, no, no. No, no, no. No, no. No, no. Uh, no. No, not. No, no. No, no. No, no. No, no, no, no.

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