Scotland is ten years behind England on child welfare - Kenny Graham

During a recent conversation with a colleague who has extensive experience of working in both Scotland and England supporting the care and education of children and young people with a range of additional support needs, I was informed of their belief that “Scotland is simply ten years behind” in relation to our policy and legislation.

The conversation started as we attempted, again, to understand the processes that support children and families in England to gain access to a robust plan, with the associated supports, when compared to Scotland. There is a clear ongoing contradiction that exists between the number of children and young people north of the border who have an identifiable additional support need and the disproportionately small numbers of Co-ordinated Support Plans (CSPs).

The topic of why there are so few CSPs in Scotland prompted the creation of a Short-Life Working Group (SLWG) by the Scottish Government. The group reported and made recommendations in late-2021. These recommendations were based on several themes, four in total. There is a common thread that appears in the recommendations - the plans are not well understood; the plans cause confusion when considered against other plans, such as the Child's Plan or Healthcare Plan; professionals don’t have time and resources to create good plans let alone support families to collaborate in the process, and there is a need to streamline all planning.

What is required apparently, therefore, is a planning process to address all of the above. As I was considering the recommendations and the work of the SLWG, in comparison to what my colleague had explained to me was the case in England regarding their equivalent support plan, the Education Health and Care Plan, and support more generally, it occurred to me that planning is not the issue. Accountability must surely be the determining factor in whether the legislation and processes we have in place leads to better outcomes for our children and young people.

Kenny Graham is the Principal at Falkland House School, a member of the Scottish Children's Services Coalition

It is in the creation of accountability that my colleague may well be correct in stating that Scotland is ten years behind. In 2020 updated guidance was published in relation to Children’s Services Planning. Children’s Services Planning came about as a result of the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014. The Act requires every local authority and its relevant health board to jointly prepare a service plan for their area every three years. The first plans had to be prepared by 1 April 2017.

During the same time period England were adding to their Children’s Act 2004 with the creation of the (Joint Area Reviews) Regulations 2015. While we in Scotland were insisting on the writing of a plan, in England they were working on a process to check and enforce the quality and effectiveness of plans. In England, the local authority is subjected to a statutory inspection process through Ofsted. This means that there is a far greater degree of accountability in ensuring that English children and young people get access to the services that they need.

Our local planning processes are supposed to ensure good outcomes through the expectation that all parties will hold each other to account. With the ongoing issues surrounding access to support for so many of our children, perhaps now is the time to consider catching up with not only planning, but also ensuring the plans lead to better outcomes.

The English system means that if issues are discovered in the provision of services to children through the inspection process, local authorities must complete a Written Statement of Proposed Actions to address any deficit. How many of Scotland’s local authorities would actually need to write such a statement if they were required by law to create a plan that worked?

Kenny Graham is the Principal at Falkland House School, a member of the Scottish Children's Services Coalition