£36m Funding Announced for Children’s Social Care Projects

£36m Funding Announced for Children’s Social Care Projects

The Department for Education has announced a £36m funding boost for innovative social work projects.  This funding is as a result of the £200m innovation fund, introduced by DfE in early 2016, which is supporting the development of new approaches to children’s social care and in turn, improving the quality of support and care to children across the country.  

The £36m in funding will see 11 children’s social care projects in the UK benefit, along with the 10 projects currently being funded through the scheme already.   Below are details of how the £36m boost will aid some of the different projects.

£11.6m to extend Hertfordshire’s family safeguarding model:

Hertfordshire County Council’s family safeguarding model will be extended to Luton, Bracknell Forest, Peterborough and West Berkshire.  The model, in which a family safeguarding team consisting of children’s social workers and adult professionals is put together, has already seen Hertfordshire halve its number of child protection plans in 18 months.

£5m for The Family Rights Group:

The Family Rights Group, a charity that works with parents and wider family members whose children and relatives are at risk of or are in childcare, has been granted £5m to evolve a model called “Lifelong Links”; a model that will create life-long support networks for children and young people in care.

 £4m for Northamptonshire County Council:

Northamptonshire Council has been awarded £4m to help develop its children’s services trust, enhancing services for young people across the county. 

 £3.8m to expand the ‘Mockingbird Family Model’:

The Fostering Network’s ‘Mockingbird Family Model’ of foster care will be able to expand into new areas of improving placement stability, safety and permanency for children in care and improving support for foster carers.

 £2.4m for multi-agency services in Havering:

Havering Council will use their funding to offer a multi-agency service for 11-24 year olds, helping them to provide more effective safeguarding.

 £2m to test ‘Contextual Safeguarding Theory’:

Hackney Council, have been awarded £2m to test ‘contextual safeguarding theory’, which promotes the idea that: “young people’s behaviours, levels of vulnerability and levels of resilience are all informed by the social/public, as well as private, contexts in which young people spend their time” (Source: https://contextualsafeguarding.org.uk/)

 £1.4m for Slough’s transformation project:

Slough Children’s Services Trust has been awarded an additional £1.4m in funding to aid its ongoing transformation programme.

The Children’s Minister, Edward Timpson, was very positive about the latest funding announcements and said: “…these fantastic projects will help make a real difference to children’s lives. I look forward to seeing them deliver great results in the future.”

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