Cllr. Thomas: Making sure the voices of children and parents are heard

Children and young people are our future and getting a good start in life and childhood, building resilience and getting maximum benefit from education are important markers for good health and wellbeing throughout life. Offering support to all children, young people and their families, as well as focusing on those who need help the most, reduces inequalities and improves health outcomes.

In November last year, a report from Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission identified significant weaknesses in the service for children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities in Torbay. It said that collectively the council, education and NHS Partners must do better.

We have come a long way in the last 10 months since that inspection. Our recently approved SEND Strategy shows this. It places children, young people, and their families at the heart of this work. It shows we are committed to working in partnership with SEND Family Voice Torbay, who are the voice of the parents of children with SEND, as well as children, young people, parents, carers and partner organisations. Together we will radically improve support for children and young people with special educational needs and/or disabilities so they have the very best life chances.

Delivering the actions from this strategy are now happening at pace. There is a lot on offer and if you are parent or career of a child with SEND, I would really recommend that you sign up to our SEND Newsletters. You can do this at www.torbay.gov.uk/send-newsletters. In these regular newsletters we share the progress and the action that has been taken as well as events, online and in-person, that are taking place to support you.

One of our actions is to ensure we are making sure it is easy to speak to a SEND professional. This has seen the creation of a SEND van, which was launched at the recent Fair Play Day last month. Starting this month the van will be visiting all Torbay schools, colleges, early years settings and alternative provisions and form part of our Graduated Response roadshow. For those of you who haven’t heard of Graduated Response, this is our pledge to ensure children and young people have their needs met in the right place, with the right support, at the right time.

Each school it is visiting will share with parents and carers when the van will be in their playground, so keep an eye out for those dates. We will also share them in the SEND Newsletter.

Changing topic now, the next week is going to be a busy one for us in the council. On Tuesday September 19 we have our cabinet meeting where we will be discussing, among other things, our new Community and Corporate Plan.

The Community and Corporate Plan is central to the council’s policy framework and it sets the highest-level strategy. This plan is different to previous ones as it is being recommend that the Community and Corporate Plan runs for the next 20 years, to 2043. If we really want to make Torbay a healthier, happier and more prosperous place for all, this is going to require a long-term commitment from all.

The council’s business plan that sits underneath this will then describe the actions we will take towards those ambitions over the next four years. This will mean that this new Community and Corporate Plan will be in place across a number of administrations.

The results of the recent Residents' Satisfaction Survey that took place earlier this year have been fed into this plan, as that really helped us to understand what you think of the council, the services we provide and our value for money.

Before we approve this Plan though, because it will be in place for such a long time, we will want to hear from you. In my column next week I’ll share how you can take part in this consultation.

Don’t forget, you can watch the cabinet live as it happens through the Council’s YouTube channel.