CYP Now - Editorial - The hardest year yet for service reshaping

2005 was the year in which policies and reforms set out in the Children Act 2004 started to take shape on the ground. Most of the structural changes, such as the appointment of directors of children's services and the establishment of combined departments for education and children's social services, as well as children's trusts linking up local authority services with other agencies, are now largely in place.

However, the reshaping of services at the points that will be noticed bychildren and families themselves are at a very early stage. Agenciesfrom the health service to the police and voluntary and private sectorproviders - but especially local authorities - are all grappling withthe practical implementation of the Every Child Matters reforms.Councils are also in the thick of a very demanding programme to build2,500 children's centres by 2008, while the transformation of schoolsinto extended schools is now gathering pace.

Meanwhile, work on other key elements in the reform package has barelybegun. This includes information sharing and workforce reform to improvetraining and qualifications as well as the status of work with children.The publication in December of details of the national child indexsimply tells local authorities what they now have to do to get theinformation sharing database operational by 2008.

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