Issue details

The report seeks approval to appoint additional Senior Family Workers (G6) and Family Workers (G5) in the Family Connect service on fixed term contracts to provide cover for staff who are away from the service undertaking social work apprenticeships or on maternity leave.
The need to backfill for these posts results from the current levels of demand within the service, which are impacting upon the quality of support provided to children and families.
Early Help teams have recently moved to a new district operating model which will support development of a multi-agency early help offer, which will improve delivery of earliest possible help to children and families. Over time, this new model is planned to reduce the numbers whose needs escalate to require support from children’s social care or targeted early help. However, the new model will not be successful unless teams have the capacity at this early stage to deliver sufficient intensity of targeted early help support to families, and to develop the district partnership offer.