Transitional Safeguarding
Transitional Safeguarding is an emerging discipline that seeks to provide an approach to safeguarding practice for adolescents crossing into early adulthood (defined as aged between 10 and mid-20's). Traditional models of children's safeguarding do not adequately recognise that adolescents need to experience an element of risk enablement but instead offer protection and mitigation whilst adult safeguarding models assume that adolescents moving into early adulthood are able to exert choice and control in their situation and have achieved a certain level of maturity in decision making.
Through the FACT Partnership, it has been agreed that relevant partners will commit to developing, trialling and evaluating new ways of working with a defined cohort of young people/adults who are most vulnerable in the context described above as well as looking at how we might achieve wider whole system change related to Transitional Safeguarding.
The cohort is defined as:
- Young people/adults aged 16-25 who are known to be engaged in, or are highly vulnerable to, criminal and / or sexual exploitation who are unable to access services or where the current support plan provided by services is not achieving a positive change, reducing risks or meeting identified outcomes.
- Young people/adults aged 16-25 who display highly chaotic, risk taking behaviours and who are unable to access services or where the current support plan provided by services is not achieving a positive change, reducing risks or meeting identified outcomes.
The partnership will be applying a 'Proof of Concept' methodology during the period Autumn 2021 to Spring 2023 to develop and test ways of working.
Family Help
Wiltshire is developing it's multi-agency Family Help arrangements to enable children, young people and families to access the right help at the right time through a co-ordinated approach to prevention and early intervention through:
- a co-ordinated approach at a whole population/universal level to prevent needs from arising and to build resilience across all residents
- a robust multi-agency approach to spotting any additional needs at the earliest point and providing effective joined-up support that prevents the needs from escalating further
There is a planned rollout of Wiltshire wide developments including training and development opportunities as well as further developing the Wiltshire Together platform with Wessex Community Action. A pilot will also be carried out from Autumn 2022 to Summer 2024 in a defined geographical location to understand needs and improve outcomes and social mobility for children, young people and families.
Further information will follow as the project gets underway.