In a perfect world every child and young person in Liverpool would live in safe, stable, happy homes, thrive in a community where they feel like they belong and dream about everything that the future holds.
That’s the vision for the emerging Liverpool Children’s and Young People’s Partnership (LCYP), a partnership made up of Liverpool City Council, Merseyside Police, Alder Hey, Merseycare, primary and secondary schools alongside the third sector.
Sadly, that’s not the reality.
Last month Capacity was invited by LCYP to facilitate a workshop to develop a single, shared vision for children’s services in Liverpool.
Jenny Turnross, Liverpool’s new Director of Children’s Services, opened the workshop with a powerful call to action.
Since her appointment, Jenny has undertaken a reset for children and young people’s services. A reset that recognises the urgent and deep-rooted issues facing many children growing up in Liverpool. And one that creates a new vision to represent Liverpool’s status as a UNICEF child friendly city.
The recent publication by Public Health ‘State of Health in Liverpool 2040’ was a turning point. It starkly highlighted the inequalities impacting the life experiences of our children and young people.
The challenge to everyone in the room was to focus on three priorities – improving outcomes for children, reducing health, social and economic inequalities; and organise our services and resources to give children and young people the experiences and opportunities they deserve.
It triggered some brilliant insights and tough conversations. Capacity’s Emma Lord and Alice Green reflect on the day.
What should a new vision look like?
What’s clear is the high demand for services and regulatory pressures are making it tough to get out of the day to day and accelerate a new vision for children’s services.
Making children feel like they matter and giving them a voice has to be at the heart of the new vision. And we need to be ready to listen and respond to children, young people and their families. Engagement can’t be tokenistic.
It was clear to everyone in the room that we wouldn’t design what we have now. But there’s an opportunity to start again. To reimagine what children’s services look like in the future. And to create a new vision and way of working that’s aspirational, recognises that communities are crucial in supporting families and providing safe, great places to grow up.
What’s stopping us and how do we make the systems to create better outcomes? Among many issues, challenges and opportunities discussed, these stood out.
Building effective relationships and trust
The need to mature relationships, increase trust and build confidence among stakeholders is essential. It needs to happen at pace and at every level within organisations. And let’s focus on shifting the narrative and aspirations at primary school age.
Improving communication and engagement
If we’re serious about putting young people’s voices at the heart of a new strategy, communication with children and young people has to be relevant, consistent and with real feedback loops. Assemblies, parliament, mentoring, shadow boards are the gold standard and had worked in other cities. There can be no shortcuts, no box ticking exercises.
Building the A team
Radical, long-term change doesn’t happen by accident. It happens by having the right people and right support in place. And better outcomes aren’t the responsibility of one council department or organisation – integrating social value, housing, and employment into the strategy are essential for its success. A new vision means a new way of working. That means a transition to a digital transformation, away from outdated, paper-based ways of working.
Ensuring collaboration and continuity
A transient workforce is an ongoing challenge. How can you build trust with a family when the workforce is changing? We need to build communities around families. And that means meaningful connection between every part of the council and wider partnership to ensure continuity of care.
Engaging with the voluntary and community sector is a real opportunity to address challenges and improve outcomes. They are trusted and can help build stronger links between the council, police, NHS and families.
What do better outcomes look like?
Children and young people need long-term support. Someone who genuinely cares about them. Someone who can help them navigate life – housing, health and employment opportunities.
We spent time thinking about what this might look like for children and young people leaving care. There was recognition that more can be done to work with care experienced people to understand what better could look like. Let’s start by removing ‘care leaver’ language and the stigma connected to the label. How are we as a city working as a collective to give children and young people leaving care the best start into adulthood
Wrapping up
Every child and young person deserve the chance to grow up in a loving, secure home with a future to look forward to.
Spend some time with the Liverpool Children’s Partnership and you’ll understand its importance in making that a reality for our city’s children and young people.
This first workshop was an opportunity to get under the skin of how we as a system are contributing to improved outcomes and set out a shared vision for the future we all want to see for our children and young people.
A future with relationships not services is at heart of every interaction – making every connection count.
There is lots of work to do. Everyone wants change that children and young people can see and feel. Last month’s workshop felt like the start of the journey.
Following the session, we caught up with Carly Brown – Strategic Improvement Partner, Children and Young People’s Services, LCC – and asked what she thought about the session.
Carly told us ‘the session was such a positive experience and enabled system partners to come together to passionately discuss what needs to change and commit to really driving that change through action. By creating the right conditions for this change, the future for our children and young people in Liverpool is bright’.
Emma Lord, Alice Green
Capacity.