In July 2023, the Department for Education officially announced the Families First for Children Pathfinder.
Dorset has been recognised for the fantastic work taking place with children, young people and families by being selected to be one of only three initial pathfinder sites nationally, testing the delivery of key reforms across the sector.
The tragic murders during lockdown of 6 year old Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and 18 month old Star Hobson helped trigger the government consultation called Stable Homes, Built on Love. This led to the trial run of the Pathfinder Programme which introduces four pillars in children’s services. The first of these is Family Help, introducing combined Targeted Early Help & Child in Need support. In essence this means that a social worker will not be allocated to every Sect 17 Child in Need if allocation can be to another appropriate lead professional, whether that is an early help worker, health visitor, teacher or even a police officer. There would still be oversight of the case by social care. The second pillar is enhanced Child Protection carried out by social workers with greater expertise and experience, and access to dedicated and skilled multi-agency input, working with Family Help to protect children who are suffering or at risk of suffering significant harm. One of the key learning points from the Child Safeguarding Practice reviews into Arthur and Stars murders was that the allocated social workers were not sufficiently experienced. The first two pillars of Pathfinder should help to make sure that there will be enough “top tier” social workers available for the highest risk children. Pillar three introduces Family Networks with increased use of family group decision-making and support packages to wider family members. Family group conference in pre-court proceedings & financed kinship care. Pillar four looks at the Safeguarding Partnership and strengthening multi-agency arrangements especially regarding education.