Agenda item

Review the commissioning process and desired outcomes, including how demand for each service is identified and monitored before contracts are awarded and while in operation, selection criteria for providers and how delivery performance is monitored, what the commissioning strategy means for family centres and family support programmes and how it contributes to ‘Getting to Good’.

Witnesses:

Sinead Mooney, Cabinet Member for Children and Families

Rachael Wardell, Executive Director – Children, Families and Learning

Lucy Clements, Interim Director of Integrated Childrens Commissioning

Matt Ansell, Director for Family Resilience and Safeguarding

Eamonn Gilbert, Assistant Director – Commissioning

Sue Turton, Service Manager Early Help Partnerships

Key points made in the discussion:

1. The Chair noted that Children’s Services accounted for a quarter of the Council’s £1.1 billion revenue budget. The Chair asked of the £250 million spent by Children’s Services, what percentage was spent on third party contractors. The Interim Director of Integrated Children’s Commissioning offered to provide a written response.

 

2. The Interim Director of Integrated Childrens Commissioning gave a summary of the paper and stressed the importance of understanding the needs of the population. This understanding informed the service model and commissioning model. The Interim Director noted that financial constraints and increasing complex needs post Covid had been challenging for the service. The report also focused on family centres and family resilience 1-1 family support models that worked together with local services. The Interim Director shared positive verbal feedback from inspectors from the SEND inspection in September 2023.

 

3. A Member asked following the award of a contract, was it sensible that past performance was not considered when commissioning The Interim Director explained that the procurement process must be fair to all bidders. As part of the quality questions, providers could input their positive past performance to demonstrate their knowledge.

 

4. A Member asked the Interim Director what the realities and challenges of delivering commissioning services were. The Interim Director noted that commissioning collaborated with operational teams who had a good grasp of operating models and challenges. She discussed the community research and outreach on early help, co-designed community sessions, partnership forums, market engagement events which shared the proposed commissioning model - all ways the commissioning team continued to meet the needs of Surrey residents.

 

5. A Member asked how challenges with commissioning were being addressed. The Assistant Director of Commissioning noted that now was the opportunity for innovation. Mainstream schools’ new funding systems had been introduced to allow schools the flexibility to deliver based on individual student’s needs. The Assistant Director emphasised that the private market was used and there must be a balance between what the service wanted and needed and what providers wanted and needed.

 

6. A Member noted that many charities providing Short Breaks would not agree that children’s needs were being met. The Interim Director agreed that Commissioning must meet the needs of residents and noted the Member’s frustration. The Chair noted that she has received similar feedback from charities as well and hoped that collaboration could be improved going forward.

 

7. A Member asked how barriers faced by smaller partners like local charities were tackled so that they were not disadvantaged. The Assistant Director of Commissioning answered that there was an effort to not create artificial thresholds, but the quality of providers was the biggest consideration. The voluntary sector usually had a good local footprint, but the Council must ensure that there was a fair bidding process.

 

8. The Cabinet Member for Children and Families suggested that the Committee look at the outcomes of the report and note the improvements. Outcome data reporting was being improved on. The Cabinet Member noted that young people in children’s services would eventually transfer to Adult Social Care and a close partnership with that Directorate was vital so that social service needs were being met across a person’s life.

 

9. The Chair noted frustration at the lack of progress on outcomes for children and young people with mental health difficulties at the previous Adults and Health Select Committee joint meeting but noted the improvement at the recent MindWorks meetings.

 

10. The Chair noted that since 2018 there had been a policy to reduce the financial envelope of contracts in the Children’s Service by 10% and asked why this policy was continuing despite the current increased demand and high inflation. The Cabinet Member for Children and Families noted that that policy was being considered more broadly.

 

11. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning noted that she had not felt constrained by this policy. The Director noted that although a reduction policy was not ideal in a climate of high inflation and costs, efficiencies and mitigations would have to offset to make up for the extra spend if the policy were dropped. The Executive Director said that when setting the budget for 2024-25, the policy could be reconsidered, but emphasised the need for offsetting costs.

 

12. The Service Manager Early Help Partnerships gave a summary of family centres and family resilience recommissioning. The Plan was to bring together the family centre provision and early help provision and create a more efficient system through a lead provider based on a district/borough level who have vital local knowledge. Shared outcomes would be monitored closely through quarterly performance discussions. The Service Manager emphasised the importance of joining up partnerships in local areas and that the Council would be retaining the same level of family centres as the previous 5 years and hoped that the new model would bring together larger existing national providers and smaller local providers.

 

13. A Member asked a further question regarding the 10% reduction to the budget envelope. Would the recommissioned family centre and family resilience plan have the 10% cut or would that provision be removed. They also asked for those using the services right now, under the new disposition what were the consequences of the commission, and would it be an improvement for users? The Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning answered that currently there had been a 10% decrease and the budget options were closed. Finding alternative areas to reduce spending was explored but this was the better option.

 

14. The Service Manager Early Help Partnerships stated that families should not see a substantial change in the way they got support from family centres as feedback had been positive so far. Users could gain access to additional resources which could come from national funding initiatives. In areas where there was more demand and pressure, timeliness could also be improved. The Interim Director of Integrated Children’s Commissioning added that the provision to the tender document meant that a provider could come back with a business case after one year if they require uplift. Providers should focus their budget on family centres and remainders of the budget were allocated on evidence-based family resilience services.

 

15. A Member noted that the family centres and family resilience models focused on prevention which could save expenditure in the long term and asked why investment was lower not higher year on year. The Chair noted that prevention was considered at the forefront of Children’s Services and that other local authorities rated as excellent invested a lot in early intervention and early help. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning said that a cost-benefit analysis of early prevention was difficult to demonstrate, also challenged by the fact that not every authority used the same cost centres/cost codes so direct comparisons were difficult to draw.

 

16. A Member asked if funding would not be able to be directed to Early Help as it was not a statutory requirement for the Council. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning noted that funding for statutory duties such as placements or home to school travel assistance could not be redirected and that when there was a limited budget, statutory duties must be the priority.

 

17. The Chair asked for more information on how level 2 and 3 were provided in the new contract. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning noted that Family centre contracts included level 2 and 3 work. Level 3 was one-on-one with families whereas level 2 was done on a group basis so dependent on borough and districts.

 

18. A Member noted that demand for Family Centres was exceeding capacity and asked if there were options to increase the number of family centres and if level 2 referrals would still be made to family centres. The Service Manager Early Help Partnerships noted that as part of the new commission Early Help and Family Centres had been put together, Family centres had always provided early intervention and early help for Surrey residents. Within service specifications the Council would like people to bring their own buildings into the models such as utilising other spaces to provide more centres to increase outreach. The Service Manager noted that level 2 would differ within boroughs and districts. The Member asked for clarification on how fluid delivery could be within each family centre. The Service Manager answered that family centres offered targeted family intervention tailored to each family.

 

 

19. A Member asked if the number of Family Centres would be reduced and if level 2 referrals would still be made to centres. The Director for Family Resilience and Safeguarding answered that the number of Family Centres would remain the same and that the service was moving away from discussing families on a tier system and instead looking at improving relationships between families and practitioners. As a service being flexible around family needs was vital. The Director expressed hope to have one system going forward so that case workers were the same for each family to reduce families having to repeat their stories to caseworkers, unfamiliar with their case.

 

20. A Member asked a question on the streamlining of contracts. The Interim Director of Integrated Children’s Commissioning answered that there were very robust contract procurement processes. Risks that came up could be mitigated and resolved in partnership with the contractors. The Service ensured that the process was equitable across Surrey and there was no deterioration in quality. The Member asked how to discern if the lead provider would identify risks. The Assistant Director of Commissioning answered that the lead provider was responsible for evidencing and justifying the performance of the whole contract.

 

21. A Member asked if there were additional costs under the new plan apart from the lead providers. The Interim Director of Integrated Children’s Commissioning answered that there were no additional costs apart from the lead provider. The service would be meeting with all providers and sub-contractors to ensure that changes to the model had not led to negative outcomes during each quarterly meeting.

 

22. A Member asked if the witnesses could advise the Committee on how many registrations of provider interest in projects had ultimately resulted in new contracts. The Interim Director noted that this information could not be shared currently but would do so as soon as it became available.

 

23. A Member asked a question on how the Council would manage the lead providers under the new Commissioning plan. The Interim Director answered that the Council directly managed 21 contracts, and this would drop to 11 once the lead providers were in place although the lines of responsibility would remain clear. The Service Manager Early Help Partnerships noted that market engagement had been done with providers around Surrey and that colleagues in Districts and Boroughs felt that a lead provider system would work well for Surrey. There were 21 family centre buildings that had been and would be used by providers. This has been in consultation and the service fully expected this to work in Surrey. Districts and Boroughs had been invited to all the engagement events.

 

Actions/requests for further information:

1. The Interim Director of Integrated Children’s Commissioning to provide a written response to what percentage of the £250 million revenue budget of Childrens Services is spent on third-party contractors.

 

2. The Chair to discuss with the Adults and Health Select Committee Chairman on how they will collaborate on the scrutiny of children’s mental health. 

 

3. Cabinet Member for Children and Families and Executive Director for Children, Families and Learning to discuss the policy to reduce spending by 10% year on year and share outcome of the discussion with the Committee.

 

4. Cabinet Member for Children and Familieswill get briefing note sent to Committee on the £1.2m investment in the Intensive Family Support Service.

 

5. Director for Family Resilience and Safeguarding will, in 2024, describe to the Committee what the Council’s offer to families of varying degrees of need will look like.

 

6. Director for CFL Commissioning to provide a written response (a) providing clarity with regard to contracting arrangements, if lead prime contractors can provide any kind of management overhead fee and (b) the amount of level 2 and level 3 support to be provided under the new contracts compared with currently.

 

7. At a point that Procurement regulations allow, Director for CFL Commissioning to share registration of interests of lead providers with the Committee.                    

 

 

Resolved:

 

SCC commissions a large number of both the statutory and non-statutory services provided to families and children. The Committee recognises that this is a complex activity and acknowledges progress in introducing more flexible contracts with break clauses, developments such as the co-production of requirements with service users, and early engagement with providers. The recent recommissioning of Family Centres and Family Resilience services demonstrates this progress and is commended. In support of this progress the Committee recommends the following.

 

1. Children’s Service professionals/practitioners in each area are actively involved in the development of the commissioning requirements and specifications – alongside Commissioning professionals – from the outset of the process.

 

2. Robust consideration is given to reversing the policy of applying a blanket 10% reduction to the financial envelope for each service when it is recommissioned.

 

3. A mechanism for ensuring that providers can apply for uplifts to cover inflationary pressures is built into the lifetime of all contracts.

 

4. Where required, the additional funding to enable points 1 and 2 is found from outside the Children’s Services’ budget envelope.