1.1.3 Children in Need Allocation Policy

SCOPE OF THIS CHAPTER

This policy was agreed by the Directorate in July 2011 and included in the procedures manual in October 2011.

It should be read in conjunction with the Directorate's Workload Management System and Staff Supervision Policy (See Staff Supervision (including PRDI forms and A - B Progression)).

Purpose
Policy Principles
Initial and Core Assessment and Ongoing Planning
Child Protection Cases
Recording Allocations on Ics/Swift
Caseload and Workload Management
Management of Cases which cannot be Allocated
Case Management when the Allocated Worker is Absent

1. Purpose

1.1

This policy applies to all Children in Need, as defined under Section 17 of the Children Act 1989, receiving or awaiting Children's Social Care services, i.e. either allocated on ICS/SWIFT to:

A Social Worker (i.e. Student Social Worker, Newly Qualified Social Worker, Level A or B Social Worker, Senior Practitioner, or Assistant Team Manager);
A Young Person's Advisor.

1.2

This policy is designed to:

Ensure that Members, Senior Management and other staff within the Council, and all relevant partner agencies, support and understand the Children's Social Care case allocation policy requirements;
Ensure the Directorate complies with the Social Work Reform Board's Standards for Employers and Social Workers, and properly balances its duties to safeguard children, staff and the community whilst delivering Value for Money and good quality services;
Provide a basis on which to enable Senior Management to keep Members informed of the policy's implementation, including providing exception reports where compliance with b) above is, or is likely to be, compromised.

1.3

This policy is also designed to enable all managers to:

Be clear about the process for case allocation, caseload management and review;
Ensure that all Social Workers and Young People's Advisors have the capacity and time to work effectively with the cases for which they are responsible;
Be clear about the arrangements for Children in Need who cannot be allocated to an appropriate worker because insufficient staff are available, or the capacity of the service is insufficient for any other reason;
Be clear about the arrangements for managing allocated cases when the responsible worker is absent.

2. Policy Principles

2.1	A child's case is considered to be allocated when all the following criteria are met: A manager has identified either that the child requires an Initial or Core Assessment or, following assessment, is a Child in Need (as defined); A named worker has accepted case responsibility; The case responsible person and team are recorded correctly in SWIFT/ICS.
2.2	It is generally contrary to this policy ever to allocate a case only to a team. Cases that cannot be allocated because of capacity issues, and some children with additional needs, requiring only periodic interventions, can be managed in this way, but the arrangement must be recorded in the child's plan and kept under review by the relevant Line Manager and Senior Manager. The case will be recorded as 'awaiting allocation', and therefore unallocated, for reporting purposes.
2.3	In line with the Directorate's Workload Management System and Supervision Policy:
2.4	Skills, experience and support All Social Workers and Young People's Advisors will be supervised appropriately; All Social Workers and Young People's Advisors will have sufficient relevant experience, and/or have experienced support to be allocated or be responsible for appropriately allocated cases (see below).
2.5	Worker's remits Social Workers will be allocated and responsible to carry safe and balanced caseloads of Children in Need (Section 17), Looked After Children and Child Protection work (NB: allocation to workers other than Social Workers of Looked After Children and Child Protection cases are not counted for central government reporting purposes, although reporting arrangements are under review at the time of writing this policy); Social Workers will be allocated and responsible to carry out Initial or Core Assessments, but may be assisted by other workers in the collection of information for these purposes; Young People's Advisors can be allocated and responsible to carry safe and balanced caseloads of Children in Need (Section 17) and Looked After Children. However, they will not be expected to take sole responsibility for a Looked After Child in the following circumstances: Prior to that child's permanency plan being agreed at the child's Looked After Review - a suitably qualified Social Worker must also be involved with Looked After Children cases until their permanency plan is agreed and no longer requires the continuous involvement of a suitably skilled and experienced Social Worker; When other complex or statutory social work issues arise e.g. Section 47 Enquiries, secure accommodation, Care Proceedings (both pre and throughout the Public Law Outline process) - where the case requires the involvement of a suitably skilled and experienced Social Worker; Young people's Advisors may also be expected to assist other workers in Child Protection work to support other workers and/or for their own developmental purposes; Foster carers will be allocated to, and be the responsibility of, a Fostering 'Supervising Social Worker'.
2.6	Joint working Where Social Workers are working jointly with another Social Worker, one Social Worker will be identified as the 'named' Social Worker (for reporting purposes) and will be the 'lead' and accountable Social Worker for the case; Where Young People's Advisors are working together on a case, or are jointly working with a Social Worker, the most senior worker is designated as the accountable worker. Social Workers are defined as the most senior when working with Young People's Advisors, but in other situations the most senior worker will be defined by the relevant manager and would be the person with the greatest relevant skills and experience for the work. The worker who will take responsibility for the day-to day work on the case, and should therefore be the first point of contact on the case, is recorded as the key worker for the purposes of ICS/SWIFT. All other workers will be named as 'involved'; In line with the above remits, and with the correct training and support, Young People's Advisors can undertake work on Child Protection and Looked After Children cases, for their development purposes and/or to help manage the capacity of the team, but they cannot hold case responsibility on Child Protection cases. However, this must be done only where appropriately supervised and, where required, where accountable to a Social Worker.
2.7	Multi-agency teams In multi-agency teams, e.g. Children's Disability Team, other agency workers such as Nurses and Community Workers may only be allocated and responsible for Children in Need (Section 17), Looked After Children and Child Protection cases, and recorded on SWIFT/ICS, as if they were deemed to be Young People's Advisors.

3. Initial and Core Assessment and Ongoing Planning

3.1	Responsibility and accountability for resources The allocated worker is responsible for co-ordinating the child's plan and the Social Worker and/or their manager are accountable for ensuring plans are carried out. This includes visits to the child and family in accordance with the standards for Looked After Children and Child Protection statutory visits to the placements, and the Care/Child Protection/Child in Need Plan.
3.2	The relevant Senior Manager, and Senior Leadership Team, are accountable for cases which cannot be allocated and, within the context of this policy, Team Managers (with the support of Assistant Team Managers) are responsible for ensuring the best use of staff resources in order to minimise both the number of and time cases remain unallocated.
3.3	The relevant Senior Manager will be responsible for ensuring any capacity issues raised by the managers or staff of the service, or identified otherwise (e.g. by themselves, trend data, forecasts, new pressures), are raised and addressed with the Assistant Director, Children and Families and the Senior Leadership Team as needs be, including the recording of risks on the Risk Register in line with Corporate Policy.
3.4	In line with the above, children where the assessed needs are not complex including not involving Child Protection matters, and where services are to be provided short-term only, i.e. less than six months, may not require an allocated Social Worker.
3.5	Subject to the above, it may be appropriate for such children to be allocated a Young People's Advisor with sufficient relevant experience as long as the case continues not to require the involvement of a Social Worker for Child Protection/Care Proceedings or other complex/statutory matters. Should it do so, it should be allocated to a Social Worker, but the Young People's Advisor may continue to work with the case under the guidance of the Social Worker.
3.6	Transfer of cases
	Transfer of cases between workers/teams/areas, must be in accordance with the Children's Social Care Transfer Protocol. There must be no periods when the case is not owned by a team.
3.7	No case will transfer until the receiving team has identified that all work has been completed up to the agreed quality standards and it is signed off by both transferring and receiving managers.
3.8	Where it is identified by the receiving manager that the work will be accepted as unallocated this should be brought to the attention of the relevant Senior Manager by the receiving manager before transfer occurs.

4. Child Protection Cases

4.1	Every Section 47 Enquiry and every child with a Child Protection Plan should be allocated to a suitably skilled and experienced Social Worker. i.e. in line with the Children's Social Care Progression Policy, or where the Social Worker is a Student Social Worker or Newly Qualified Social Worker (NQSW). This must be done with the appropriate support and supervision of a suitably skilled and experienced Social Worker (the latter decision should be recorded in the Student's records/NQSW Training Development Needs Plan and Supervision Record).
4.2	When child protection concerns arise on cases which are already allocated and the worker is insufficiently qualified or experienced to respond, the involvement of a sufficiently experienced Social Worker will be necessary.
4.3	Achieving Best Evidence (ABE) interviews are only to be carried out by Social Workers who have completed the accredited ABE training.

5. Recording Allocations on Ics/Swift

5.1	To record case allocation, the 'Involvements' section in the child's record is to be completed with the names of the Key Team, the Key Worker and any other involvement.
5.2	When the case is closed or transferred all the involvements must be ended. It is the responsibility of the Team Manager (with the support of the Assistant Team Manager) to ensure this takes place.
5.3	When a case is transferred, it is the responsibility of the Team Manager (with the support of the Assistant Team Manager) of the receiving team to ensure the new allocated worker and team are immediately recorded on the Relationships screen on the child's record.
5.4	Events in ICS/SWIFT should normally be allocated to the Case Responsible Person and Team.

6. Caseload and Workload Management

6.1	In line with the recommendations of the Social Work Reform Board and the implementation of the standards for employers and Social Workers:
6.2	All employers should: Have in place a social work accountability framework informed by knowledge of good social work practice and the experience and expertise of service users, carers and practitioners; Use effective workforce planning systems to make sure that the right number of social workers, with the right level of skills and experience, are available to meet current and future service demands; Implement transparent systems to manage workload and case allocation in order to protect service users and practitioners; Make sure that social workers can do their jobs safely and have the practical tools and resources they need to practise effectively. Employers should assess risks and take action to minimise and prevent them; Ensure that social workers have regular and appropriate social work supervision; Provide opportunities for continuing professional development, as well as access to research and practice guidance; Ensure social workers can maintain their professional registration; Establish effective partnerships with higher education institutions and other organisations to support the delivery of social work education and continuing professional development.
6.3	When allocating a case to a Social Worker, the manager must also ensure that the Social Worker is clear as to what has been allocated, what action is required and how that action will be reviewed and supervised.
6.4	Case work must be allocated in line with the Directorate's Workload Management System and Supervision Policy and must never be allocated to a worker who lacks the skills, experience, time or resources to carry out the plan, or where adequate supervision is not available.
6.5	This policy recognises that each child's case is unique in its demands, and therefore does not set an absolute maximum caseload size, but instead expects the standards and reporting arrangements contained within this policy and the Workload Management System to be complied with.
6.6	Allocation will be made in line with the Workload Management System where actual caseload size, whilst being compliant with standards and procedures, will depend on the complexity of each case and take account of the worker's training and development needs, and their student/NQSW status (if applicable), and other workload responsibilities.
6.7	To ensure caseloads are manageable, every worker's caseload and workload will be monitored by the manager, including during Supervision. Managers will also monitor team allocations weekly and allocation data will be made available to managers and Senior Managers to ensure compliance with this aspect of the policy.
6.8	When a child's case can safely be closed or transferred out of the team this should take place without delay. Any delay must be reported to the relevant Senior Manager. This will help to ensure manageable workloads and prevent a build up of unallocated cases.

7. Management of Cases which cannot be Allocated

7.1	All cases of children assessed as needing a service should have an appropriate allocated worker, as outlined in this policy. In cases where this proves to be impossible, arrangements must be made to maintain contact with the child. The nature and reasons for unallocated cases must be reported to the relevant Senior Manager/SLT as outlined above.
7.2	Teams may not have the capacity to work with all the cases which are assessed to require a service. The policy permits some Looked After Children and children who are receiving services as Children in Need (Section 17) to be held as 'unallocated cases' whilst awaiting allocation. However, neither Section 47 Enquiries nor Children with a Child Protection Plan can be held as unallocated cases.
7.3	For each unallocated case where an Initial Assessment or Core Assessment (excluding a Section 47 Enquiry) is deemed necessary, the manager will consider the following actions an apply them as appropriate to the situation and in line with this policy: Record in the 'Involvements' section the team allocation; Record in 'Record of decision' the reason why the case has not been allocated; Reach agreement with partner agencies, such as schools or health that they will monitor the situation, report periodically on the child's progress, and notify any concerns to Children's Social Care; Write to the family, the child (if appropriate) and involved agencies advising them what casework is to be delayed, giving the reasons, the interim arrangements and the contact details of the Manager to contact where circumstances change; Ensure that new information on the case is reviewed at least every week; Arrange duty visits, as required and by appropriate workers, to ensure statutory responsibilities towards Looked After Children and Child Protection cases are met and all Children in Need cases are safe; Review the case with the Senior Manager regularly, and at least every four weeks, recording the review and decisions on the child's record.
7.4	NB: The policy does not require the Team Manager to carry out the child's plan or any aspect of it. No manager (other than Assistant Team Managers who may carry a small case load) can be deemed in any way to be allocated casework.
7.5	Closing cases Cases that cannot be allocated should not be closed without clear evidence that their needs have been addressed. Premature closures are likely to lead to an increase in re-referrals and make partnership working with families and agencies, less effective. Whenever a case is closed consideration should be given to any need for continuing support through other services (single or team around the child).

8. Case Management when the Allocated Worker is Absent

8.1

Urgent situations arising when the allocated worker is not available (short-term absences only) must be managed within the team. This does not affect overall case allocation unless the absence is deemed long-term when responsibility and allocation must be reviewed and the case considered for 'relocation' (managed unallocated on duty) or allocation in line with this policy.

8.2

When an allocated worker has an unplanned absence the manager will need to immediately identify specific tasks that need to be undertaken on their caseload - if the absence is likely to persist more than two weeks it is then that consideration of temporary allocation must begin. The Line Manager must review their caseload and either allocate their cases temporarily, or, if appropriate, add them to the list of team unallocated cases and report this to the relevant Senior Manager at the earliest opportunity.

End