The Children and Young People Select Committee was scheduled to discuss several reports, including a preliminary response to a task and finish group that had reviewed youth services in the borough, the emotional wellbeing and mental health of the borough's young people and the committee's own work programme.

Response to Youth Provision Task and Finish Group

The report pack contained the final report of a task and finish group that had reviewed youth services in the borough and proposed 15 recommendations for the Council to consider, which are listed in the report pack. The most significant recommendations are that the Council should:

clarify its role in relation to youth services and there should be a clear strategic lead for youth services in the borough

safeguard open-access youth services and placed as the focal point of the local youth system, complementing targeted and specialist services delivered by the Council, commissioned providers and independent providers.

ensure there is at least one youth centre, from which a range of providers can deliver a variety of youth services, in each of the borough’s four children’s service delivery areas

The report pack contains the Council's preliminary response to the recommendations. In its response, the Council says it welcomes the final report and is pleased to confirm that recruitment is currently underway for a Strategic Youth Offer Manager, who will be instrumental in guiding this work and ensuring that the Council’s strategic lead role is fully realised . The response also says the Council is developing a five-year strategy for youth provision in the borough that will set out how it will respond to the task and finish group's recommendations.

Children and Young People's Emotional Well-being and Mental Health

The report pack contained an update on the Council's work to improve the emotional wellbeing and mental health of the borough's young people. The report pack says the number of young people being referred to the borough's Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS)¹ has increased by 5% since 2022-23. It says:

The significant increase in CAMHS referrals over the last two years (2021-22 and 2022-23), coupled with the national recruitment challenges recruiting CAMHS professionals, has led to the Lewisham CAMHS service experiencing significant challenges meeting the demand.

The report pack says the Council's work is focused on:

• Reducing CAMHS waiting times and providing support to young people on waiting lists
• Developing a single point of access for young people seeking emotional wellbeing and mental health support
• Improving access to mental health services for very young children and their parents
• Creating more inclusive mental health services
• Developing a new emotional wellbeing and mental health plan for the borough

It then describes specific schemes the Council is involved in, including:

• Two GP-led youth clinics – The Mulberry Hub and the 124 Hub in Downham – that offer young people advice and support from GPs, nurses, counsellors, and youth workers in non-clinical settings
• The Kooth online counselling service
• The Tellmi anonymous peer-to-peer support app, which is being piloted in five secondary schools
• Reprezent's 'Stepping Up' school transition programme, which was delivered to 50% of the borough's primary schools during the 2024 summer term and is scheduled to be delivered to all of the borough's secondary schools in September 2024
• The Should I Really Be Here (SIRBH) project, which was set up to improve the emotional wellbeing and mental health of 16–25-year-old Black African-Caribbean/mixed heritage young males in Lewisham.

It says funding for children and young people’s emotional wellbeing and mental health has increased by 81% since 2020-21, to £16.085m in 2024-25.

Select Committee Work Programme

The report pack included a draft work programme for the Committee's 2024-25 municipal year. It listed the topics scheduled to be discussed at each of the committee's meetings. It proposed that, at its next meeting, the committee should scrutinise a recent inspection of the borough's Youth Justice Service, and proposed budget savings for services for young people in the borough.