Issue - meetings

Background:

This report sought permission to commence the procurement of the Advocacy for Parent/s of Children in or on the Edge of Care Contract.

The report set out that the Council had committed to prioritising work to strengthen families, and the Advocacy service was a key element of this work. The Council believed, that where safe and appropriate to do so, keeping children in the family home, delivered better outcomes for those children. In addition, reducing the number of children coming into care contributed to significant cost avoidance for the Council.

The current service provision was due to end on 31 March 2026, so it was imperative to procure this service as soon as possible to minimise any disruption to service users.

An Exempt Appendix to the report set out financial analysis in relation to the procurement.

Reasons:

Medway Council believes that where appropriate and safe to do so, every effort should be made to support families to keep their children with their family setting. This service seeks to build on the experience of the original Advocacy service for mother’s contact which ends in March 2026. This service will work in similar multi-disciplinary way to support families on the edge of care and those with children already in care to build their strength and emotional resilience. Giving them the confidence to access support and services to ensure they can safely keep their children in their care.

This multi-disciplinary approach to supporting mothers directly contributed to keeping 29 children out of care in the last 4 years, allowing them to safely and appropriately remain with their birth families. In addition to the benefits for a child in remaining with their birth family, based on a conservative estimated cost of £65000 per year, the cost avoidance over 4 years is circa £7million.