Children and Young People Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health strategy

WQ.496/2021

WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR CHILDREN AND EDUCATION

BY SENATOR S.W. PALLETT

QUESTION SUBMITTED ON MONDAY 6TH DECEMBER 2021 ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON MONDAY 13TH DECEMBER 2021

Question

With regards to the Children and Young People Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Strategy 2021- 2025, will the Minister advise whether the following have occurred, and if not, why they have not –

1. establishment of a Strategic Advisory Panel to ensure meaningful input for young people;
2. appointment of a Mental Health and Wellbeing Quality Assurance Manager;
3. development of a multi-agency mental health skills and competency framework;
4. development of an integrated multi-agency perinatal mental health and early years pathway;
5. co-production of a Quality Reporting Framework;
6. agreement of a Jersey's Children First Practice model;
7. creation of a core early intervention mental health team; and
8. creation of a dedicated team in Adult Mental Health to support 18-25 year olds;

and will he further state whether the current Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service includes a duty and assessment function that is available 7 days a week?

Answer

The Government plan investment for emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health services for children and young people is in the main available from 2022 with funds prior to that being used to develop the strategy and redesign of services.

1. establishment of a Strategic Advisory Panel to ensure meaningful input for young people;

The idea of the Strategic Advisory Panel was to set up of a group of interested individuals who would like to support the implementation of the Children and Young People's Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Strategy. The Panel would include young people, parents/carers and professionals across the Island who have lived experience or work experience in the field of children and young people's mental health.

Work has been undertaken with key stakeholders such as Youthful Minds, CYPES and the wider community to define the draft terms of reference for the group, governance arrangements and selection criteria. Communications will go out shortly (second week of January) to invite people to apply for a role on the panel, including directly to those who have expressed an interest via the draft Strategy consultation. The first meeting of the group will take place by the end of Q1 2022 and happen on a quarterly basis throughout the implementation of the four-year Strategy 2022-2025.

2. appointment of a Mental Health and Wellbeing Quality Assurance Manager;

Interviews for the Health and Wellbeing Quality and Assurance Manager are taking place on Friday 10 December.

3. development of a multi-agency mental health skills and competency framework;

The Anna Freud Centre have been commissioned to undertake this as part of a larger piece of work. They will report on findings and provide the competency framework by July 2022

4. development of an integrated multi-agency perinatal mental health and early years pathway; The pathway has been developed and funding secured subject to States Assembly approval of the Government Plan 2022 – 2025. The pathway will be formally launched in March 2022.

5. co-production of a Quality Reporting Framework;

Work around a strategic framework has already commenced in the delivery of the outcomes-based Children and Young People Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Strategy. The Quality Assurance Manager (once in post) will further lead the detail of the framework development, consulting with a wide range of stakeholders.

6. agreement of a Jersey's Children First Practice model;

The Jersey's Children First practice model was developed by a multi-agency group and was launched in September 2018. The framework was agreed in 2018 by the Council of Ministers.

The model is underpinned by shared values and principles which promote a restorative, strengths-based, child and family-centred way of working with families across the continuum of need. It establishes the responsibility for all those working with children and their families to identify when a child has additional needs for support or protection through a child and family assessment. For those requiring multi-agency support, the model promotes effective partnership working with a team around the child and family and an identified lead worker developing a single plan with the family. The model promotes providing support as soon as a need emerges at any point in a child's life through early help and the shared assessment and plan templates ensure that there is continuity in the work with families if they move up or down the continuum of need into or out of statutory provision.

Pre-covid, over 2000 practitioners completed face-to-face training in the practice model and online introduction and essentials training courses were made available in September 2020. A refresh and re- launch of the practice model is planned for early 2022.

7. creation of a core early intervention mental health team; and

A specification for the core early intervention mental health team has been agreed. Interviews were held on the 7 December to recruit the Early Intervention Mental Health Team Manager

8. creation of a dedicated team in Adult Mental Health to support 18-25 year olds;

Work has been undertaken throughout 2021 to develop the model of support. Improved governance structures have been created (commenced late 2020) to ensure a smooth transition between CAMHS and Adult Mental health. Funding has been requested via HCS Government Plan to provide additional capacity to meet the needs of 18–25-year-olds who require support from Adult Mental health. Kooth has been commissioned (Dec 2020) to provide online counselling and support for 11-25. We also have a practitioner within the adult Community Mental Health Team who care co-ordinates the more complex cases of 18–25- year-olds and medical provision for this too.

The Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service includes a duty and assessment function that is open 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday, with the out of hours crisis service for all ages on the island delivered by adult Mental Health Team.