Commissioning of children's services could be at risk, warns report
Lauren Higgs
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
The government must urgently clarify the role of local health and wellbeing boards in children's services commissioning, a report has warned.
The study, which evaluates the impact of the government-backed Commissioning Support Programme (CSP), makes recommendations on how councils can continue to drive improvements in commissioning after the support programme draws to a close this week.
It suggests that local authorities should carry on producing children and young people’s plans to assist in planning services, despite the fact that the government has removed the duty on councils to create such documents.
The CSP's report also claims that the commissioning of services for children could be at risk unless local authorities have some sort of access to support to identify and rectify their own failings.
On workforce development, the report concludes that the role of a strategic commissioner should be professionalised and that a broader range of professionals across children’s services should be trained in commissioning.
Lorraine O’Reilly, director of the Commissioning Support Programme, argued that there are still significant challenges to overcome to make sure that effective commissioning is used to improve outcomes for children and young people.
"CSP has responded to incredible demand for tools and training on commissioning," she said.
"We are concerned that there is currently no ongoing provision for this beyond the life of CSP. Momentum will be lost without securing robust networks across the sector. It is crucial that mechanisms are in place that will enable local authorities to assess the effectiveness of their services and to measure themselves against others."
O’Reilly urged government to build on the work of the programme.
"Successful practices such as the CSP self-analysis and planning standards on commissioning should be embedded into subsequent support being considered by the Department for Education (DfE) commissioning board, while also retaining the networks of commissioning champions across local areas established by CSP as a means to ensure the consistent excellence in practice," she added.
The CSP estimates that it has helped local authorities achieve savings of £200m to date.
PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) canvassed the views of 50 directors of children’s services (DCSs) as part of an independent evaluation of the CSP being carried out for the DfE.
The final PwC report is due to be published later this year but early findings show that 64 per cent of DCSs believe the support programme led to a significant improvement in commissioning in their area, 89 per cent thought it helped make more efficient use of resources and 93 per cent said using the CSP was a worthwhile investment of their time.
