CELCIS publishes review of family support services to prevent children going into care

Date: 15th July 2019
Category: Family Environment and Alternative Care

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The report sets out key learning points following a national review of Part 12 of the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014.

The 2017-18 Programme for Government included a commitment to ‘commission a progress review on the use of family support services to prevent children going into care’. One of the aims of Part 12 of the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 is to provide early and effective support services to prevent children unnecessarily entering the formal care system.

Scottish Government commissioned CELCIS to undertake the review. The objectives were to explore the progress and journeys across 32 local authorities in supporting families where children are at risk of becoming looked after.

The report highlights key learning points, including:

1. Working with families using a strengths-based approach can lead to children and young people being loved, cared for and happy with the right support in place.
2. Poverty, parental drug and alcohol misuse, parental mental health, domestic abuse and parental learning disability are key factors that may contribute to children being taken into care in Scotland.
3. Children can be at risk of becoming looked after at all stages of childhood. The importance of relevant services for families with teenagers deserves greater attention.
4. Family group decision making (FGDM) services are flourishing in a small number of local authority areas in Scotland but require embedding into local systems to be effective across Scotland.
5. Access to information about support services for families is limited despite the legislative duty to publish information about relevant services.

Read the report here.