Children's Trust

The Purpose and Goals of the Partnership:

There are around 56,036 people between the ages of 0-19 in Tameside - nearly 26% of the population. Of these there are 32,156 children attending a school in Tameside including 17,499 attending primary schools, 14,267 attending secondary schools and 390 attending special schools. Outside of the school age population, a further 15,000 young people were attending sixth-form in Tameside (both college and in school), 2157 children were attending a maintained nursery provider and in the academic year 2008/9, around 3000 3 and 4 year olds were claiming Nursery Education Grant at non-maintained nurseries in Tameside, an increase on previous years. The past 5 years have shown a steady increase in the numbers of births in Tameside. Local estimates indicate that births in 2009 were likely to be around 3064, contributing to the overall increase in the population of under 5s in Tameside over the same period.

Tameside Children’s Trust is a group of agencies, which work with and for children and young people in the Tameside area. Trust arrangements were originally formed in 2003, but made into a statutory body in April 2010. The Trust includes representatives from groups including Tameside Council, the Police, Local Health Trust and voluntary organisations. Working together, they aim to achieve the best possible outcomes for children and young people, through coordinated planning and commissioning of services. Tameside Childrens Trust is made up of a board supported by sub-groups linked to the Every Child Matters outcomes.

The National Context:

In 2003, the Government published a Green Paper called Every Child Matters. The Children Act 2004 provided the legislation underpinning Every Child Matters, which set out the Government’s approach to the well-being of children and young people from birth to age 19. The Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning (ASCL) Act 2009 strengthened Children’s Trust co-operation.

The aim of the Every Child Matters programme is to give all children the support they need to achieve good outcomes. The agenda was further developed through publication of the National Children's Plan in December 2007, a ten-year strategy to make England the best place in the world for children and young people to grow up. It places families at the heart of Government policy, and aims to improve children's health, reduce young offending rates and eradicate child poverty by 2020.

The Children’s Trust is the sum total of co-operation arrangements and partnerships between organisations with a role in improving outcomes for children and young people.

The Children’s Trust Board is a statutory body that every local authority is required to have in place by April 2010. It is also a part of the wider cooperation arrangements under section 10 of the Children Act 2004.

The Board has responsibility for developing, publishing, reviewing, revising and monitoring the implementation of the Children and Young People’s Plan (CYPP) The scope of the CYPP includes all services that affect children and young people’s well-being, identifies cross-cutting priorities, with the focus on what the partners will do together to deliver them.

The sub group arrangements of the Trust are in place to implement the Children and Young Peoples Plan. This will be delivered and monitored by the Executive with information from the Outcome Performance and Strategy Groups. Feedback through the Executive to the Joint Commissioning Group enable effective commissioning and de-commissioning of services.

Priorities of the Trust:

Tameside Children’s Trust strongly believes that all children and young people in Tameside should be provided with a framework in which they can:

• Be healthy;
• Stay safe;
• Enjoy and achieve;
• Make a positive contribution to society;
• Experience social and economic well-being.

Tameside Children’s Trust has identified an initial set of 6 strategic priorities (SP) for 2010-2011, as follows:

SP 1. Promote healthy lifestyles with particular focus on obesity and alcohol

SP 2. Improve emotional health and well being for all young people and their families

SP 3. Promote the safety of all children and young people in all settings with a focus on domestic violence

SP 4. Increase the proportion of young people moving into education, employment, training and promote positive role models

SP 5. Continue to raise attendance and attainment at all phases of learning with a strategic focus on vulnerable children, looked after children and continue to narrow the gap for the lowest achieving children

SP 6. Reduce the rates of teenage pregnancy

Priorities are reviewed annually. They provide a key reference framework for the business planning process across all children’s agencies in Tameside, and for the review and development of strategic and operational plans for the delivery of children’s services.

Tameside Children and Young People Plan (CYPP) is the single, strategic, overarching plan for the Childrens Trust Board; for all local services for children and young people up to age 19, young people aged 20 and over leaving care, and young people up to age 25 with learning difficulties.

Membership

Senior representatives of the following organisations:

• Tameside Council
• NHS Tameside and Glossop
• General Practitioner representation
• Pennine Care NHS Trust
• Tameside Third Sector Coalition and Tameside Voice
• Job Centre Plus
• Tameside NHS Foundation Trust
• Tameside Probation Service
• Greater Manchester Police
• Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service
• Tameside Youth Offending Team
• Tameside Third Sector Coalition
• Tameside Connexions
• Tameside Secondary Schools
• Tameside Primary Schools
• Tameside Special Schools
• Further Education/ College
• School Governors

Children and Young People Influencing Policy Development

Tameside’s Children’s Trust vision encompasses a positive and equal society, in which children and young people are encouraged to aim high but also to learn from mistakes as they grow up. A participation model has been developed to feed views into the Trust. The model of local democracy will co-ordinate consultation activity taking place in the borough so that children and young people will be more able to take part in decisions that affect their lives and those of others.

Key Documents

• Children and Young People Plan 2010-13 (710KB)
• Tameside Children’s Workforce Strategy
• Children’s Needs Framework

Common Assessment Framework

• Manager's Guide (2MB)
• Practitioner's Guide (3MB)
• HM Government - Information Sharing: Guidance for Practitioners and Managers (1MB)
• CAF Form
• CAF Flowchart - A3
• CAF Flowchart - A4

To find out more about the work of the Children and Young People’s Partnership, please contact Ameena Ahmed on 0161 342 3254 or visit www.tameside.gov.uk/cypp .