Directors Children’s Care Services/Children’s Trusts etc

You will want to:

1. Ensure the authority’s Carers’ Lead (if this person is within Adult Services) is fully linked in with Children’s Services, remembering that the existence of this role ‘…does not remove the responsibility of other workers to address the needs of carers, but should offer leadership and a coordinated approach to carers' issues. SCIE Practice Guide click here
2. Ensure there are clear protocols to ensure effective joint working between Adults and Children’s Services (particularly around transition and young carers) and give the Chief Executive and Carers Strategy Group an annual position statement with the Adults’ Director on this area of work.
3. Ensure carers’ issues are fully integrated within overall commissioning strategies:
   - parent carers are not an add-on needing a separate approach but need to be fully involved in the way plans are made to support disabled children as well as having their own support needs met
   - young carers will need a strategy of their own, ensuring the overarching principles of carers’ strategies are made age appropriate and ensuring they are seen as children first
4. Ensure parent carers’ and young carers’ voices are heard in a range of processes to include as appropriate:
   - carers’ strategy groups which include a parent carers forum and process for involving young carers
   - training of staff
   - commissioning forums and tendering processes
   - the new LINks service(Local Involvement Network(replacing patient and public involvement forums) from 2008.  More information is available here
   -Local Area Agreements and Local Strategic Partnerships include issues about and targets for supporting parent carers and young carers
   - Feedback on front-line practice
5. Ensure there is a culture among managers of supporting staff who are carers around:
   -Flexible working practices
   - Confidentiality around their own caring responsibilities in an environment where services they/their family use may be very sensitive
6. Ensure carers have excellent access to information through a range of age appropriate mechanisms including:
   -A multi-agency information strategy so all agencies can support carers to identify themselves (Job Centres, GPs, schools etc)
   - Leaflets in a fully accessible range of formats
   - Effective and co-ordinated web-sites
   - Excellent networking and strategic support to the voluntary sector
7. Ensure the use of the balanced scorecards provided by CSCI as guidance to measure progress on the strategy available here
8. Promote equal opportunities for carers in line with guidelines from the General Social Care Council Standards for practitioners which say ‘As a social care worker, you must protect the rights and promote the interests of carers’. It states that this includes ‘ Promoting equal opportunities for carers‘ and ‘Respecting diversity and different cultures and values’.  A tool to help you achieve this is here