Minutes:
(1) Mr Lake, Deputy Cabinet Member for Specialist Children’s Services, gave a verbal update on CAMHS on behalf of the Cabinet Member. He stated that at the meeting of the Children’s Trust Board on 4 March 2011, CAMHS had been at the top of the agenda. There had been two inspections of CAMHS, one by the national support team and the other by Ofsted. The issues with CAMHS had been known for some time but had been passed between KCC and health.
(2) Mr Lake informed the Board of the numbers of young people identified at the different tiers of delivery, there were over 51,000 young people at tier 1, 24,000 young people at tier 2, 6,000 young people at tier 3 and 274 young people at tier 4 . He had visited the new tier 4 centre and had been impressed by this facility and was grateful for the work being done in this area by the Maudsley Hospital Foundation Trust. He circulated information that had been prepared for Members by the Director of Child Health Commissioning, NHS Eastern & Coastal Kent and NHS West Kent PCT’s which included waiting times to access CAMHS. Although these had reduced from September 2010 he acknowledged that they were still too long and that only putting in massive support would bring these down to an acceptable level. In Canterbury and Shepway they were targeting the 33 young people who had been waiting the longest and were holding extra clinics on a Saturday to reduce the backlog.
(3) Mr Lake informed the Board that Mrs Whittle, Cabinet Member for Specialist Children’s Services, was determined to establish a Children’s Services Improvement Panel of 8 Elected Members which would initially meet on a monthly basis. This Panel would report to the Leader.
(4) Mr Lake referred to the Ofsted recommendations which mainly referred to Looked After Children. There was a need to focus services on 16 – 18 year olds. Childrens’ services tended to finish at 16 and there was then a gap until they were picked up again at 18 by the adult service. This gap had now been filled by Primary Care Trust funding. A Commissioning CAMHS model was being developed. It was important that the CAMHS worked closely with the Health Service so that there was no duplication of resources.
(5) Members then made a number of comments and Mr Lake addressed a number of questions which included the following:-
· This was not a new issue, as 3 or 4 years ago there had been an awareness at Executive level that there were potential problems with the service. A pilot on emotional intelligence had been suggested but not taken up.
· There was a shortage of psychologists in the UK. Those that were available tended to use a lot of their time in report writing which made capacity for work on early intervention difficult.
· A Member identified the key problem area as being the need for intervention at tier 1.5 to 2.
· Mr Lake commended the establishment of Children’s Centres as being a major contributor to early intervention between the ages of 1 and 3.
· Mr Lake expressed a determination to increase the number of Occupational Therapists and to generally provide support to permanent staff. He acknowledged that there were too many agency staff employed in this service.
· Mr Lake stated that the key to improving the service lay in working in an effective partnership with Health colleagues. The Health and Well Being Board, once established would have a key role to play in joined up working.
· This was an issue that cut across a number of Directorates and Policy Overview and Scrutiny Committees.
· Mr Lake emphasised the importance of holding those responsible for this service to account. It was important to monitor progress, or a lack of it and then take action quickly. This would be the role of the Children’s Services Improvement Panel.
· In response to a question on what was being done to improve the waiting times in Shepway, Mr Lake referred to the work being done by Mr Darbyshire (Senior Commissioning Manager for CAMHS). He stated that the issue for Shepway was that there were a high number of young people waiting for an Autistic Spectrum Disorder assessment. 20 extra staff were being trained to carry out this type of assessment.
· A Member pointed out that the number of young people waiting for an assessment (82,000) was a high proportion of the high percentage of the total number of young people in Kent.
· It was important to ensure that there was a successful transition for young people from Children’s to Adult Services and no gaps.
(6) It was acknowledged that Head Teachers of primary schools recognised the importance of early intervention from the CAMHS. However it was suggested that Head Teachers from secondary schools sometimes did not see it as their role to signpost this service if a young person appeared to be experiencing problems. It was recognised that there should be other professions within the secondary school who could manage these issues.
(7) Members thanked Mr Lake for his open report and for answering Members questions.
(8) RESOLVED that (a) as an Improvement Panel was to be established there was no need to set up a Select Committee to consider this issue and (b) as this was a cross cutting issue a progress report be submitted to the Scrutiny Board twice a year.