Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Twenty-Seventh Report - Evaluating innovation projects in children’s social care
Public Accounts Committee
HC 38
Published 23 November 2022
Conclusions (14)
1
Conclusion
Acknowledged
On the basis of a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, we took evidence from the Department for Education (the Department), including its Chief Social Worker for Children and Families, about the Children’s Social Care Innovation Programme (the Innovation Programme). The Department has overall policy responsibility for children’s social …
Government Response Summary
The government agreed and will promote a culture of evaluation through evaluation of new proposals and funding for a children's services What Works Centre, including initiatives looking at areas such as Family Help services, and children looked after placements.
7
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Department concedes there is further to go to embed the culture of evaluation it wants to see in children’s social care. The Department and the sector have learned that quality evaluation is expensive and can take a long time to do.19 However one evaluation provider told us that robust …
Government Response Summary
The government agrees that it should continue to promote and nurture a culture of evaluation and will continue to fund the newly merged WWEICSC as well as assess the development and delivery of proposals through a programme of rigorous evaluation where appropriate.
8
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Department intended the Innovation Programme to achieve replication of successful new approaches, better life chances for children receiving help from the social care system and better value for money across children’s social care. The Department funded 94 projects through the Innovation Programme, before selecting six it considered to be …
Government Response Summary
The department published Children's social care: Stable Homes, Built on Love on 2 February 2023, setting out the purpose and principles of practice, along with the outcomes that should be achieved with children and families. A draft Children’s Social Care National Framework and Dashboard for consultation were published alongside the strategy.
9
Conclusion
Acknowledged
We agree with successor programme evaluator Coram, that the key measure of success for the Department’s Innovation Programme must be what has changed for children as a result.25 The Department told us that it cannot yet report any ‘perfectly causal line’ between the programme and improved outcomes for children. The …
Government Response Summary
The department published Children's social care: Stable Homes, Built on Love on 2 February 2023, setting out the purpose and principles of practice, along with the outcomes that should be achieved with children and families. A draft Children’s Social Care National Framework and Dashboard for consultation were published alongside the strategy.
10
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Care Review, while recognising the role the Innovation Programme has played in creating stronger practice, asserts that the impact of its scale and spread approach is limited in the absence of more fundamental change. The Care Review considers the evidence backing its own recommendations is already ‘compelling and comprehensive’, …
Government Response Summary
The National Framework has been produced with the support of the department’s National Practice Group and informed by the Innovation Programme and Care Review. The National Framework will embed the use of evidence and learning across local authorities.
11
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The lack of high-quality data was one of the significant challenges and common limitations identified in the Department for Education’s (the Department’s) independent assessments of evaluations of Innovation Programme projects.31 We share the Department’s view that systems that give better information to everyone involved can contribute to a culture of …
Government Response Summary
By improving the quality and transparency of data collected, the department will have a stronger evidence base to improve policy design and evaluation and quicker identification and resolution of sector-wide issues. Sharing local authority data more widely will help embed a culture of learning and evaluation.
12
Conclusion
Acknowledged
There are particular data challenges where evaluations of small-scale innovations make it statistically difficult to understand the impact of schemes on particular population groups. We received evidence from the Traveller Movement, a population disproportionately represented in children’s social care, highlighting risks that lack of precision in monitoring impact on the …
Government Response Summary
By improving the quality and transparency of data collected, the department will have a stronger evidence base to improve policy design and evaluation and quicker identification and resolution of sector-wide issues. Sharing local authority data more widely will help embed a culture of learning and evaluation.
13
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Department could point to examples in other work where it has used technology to reduce the burdens of data collection, and shared data back with front line organisations in ways that incentivise local use.35 The Independent Review of Children’s Social Care (the Care Review) also reported on encouraging good …
Government Response Summary
The government hopes to embed a culture of learning and evaluation by improving the quality and transparency of data collected, giving a better understanding of the impact of policies, and the short and longer-term outcomes for children and families.
14
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Innovation Programme was intended to both improve outcomes for children in the social care system and produce savings. The Department accepts that residential care in children’s homes can be expensive and it is often a last resort where they do not ideally want children to be.38 The Care Review …
Government Response Summary
The government acknowledges that residential care is expensive and is testing Family Network Support Packages to implement family-led alternatives to care as well as delivering a fostering recruitment and retention programme in the North-East.
15
Conclusion
Acknowledged
We have seen many cases of the potential for better outcomes and potential savings being blocked by inflexibility in the care system. These typically involve the costs of the space required to provide kinship or foster care, or support with the changes to working patterns that providing such care might …
Government Response Summary
The department works closely with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and HM Treasury (HMT) at working and ministerial levels. The government will test how to optimise implementation of Family Network Support Packages in local areas, alongside reforms to Family Help and child protection, through an end-to-end Families First for Children Pathfinder and will be delivering an initial fostering recruitment and retention programme in the North-East Regional Improvement and Innovation Alliance.
16
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The Department told us it wants the care system to be more flexible, and accepts the system is currently not very good at adapting to innovative or usual requests. The result is that the child will often end up in care settings that cost more than the adaptation might have …
Government Response Summary
The government acknowledges the importance of flexible funding and is testing Family Network Support Packages in local areas, alongside reforms to Family Help and child protection, through an end-to-end Families First for Children Pathfinder. They are also delivering a fostering recruitment and retention programme in the North-East.
17
Conclusion
Acknowledged
Having started out in 2014–15, the delivery phases of the Innovation Programme and its successor schemes are approaching their end. Programme funding is expected to finish in March 2024, with the remaining evaluations reporting by 2027.46 The Department stresses that ring-fenced funding streams for innovation and learning are not indefinite, …
Government Response Summary
The government is committed to supporting the benefits of innovation and evaluation by publishing the National Framework and Dashboard for consultation and continuing to fund the What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care.
18
Conclusion
Acknowledged
The phasing out of dedicated funding for evaluation comes at a time the Department accepts is challenging for local authority budgets.50 The Department described how the Innovation Programme has helped both the Department and the wider sector understand that quality evaluation is expensive, but we share the Department’s view that …
Government Response Summary
The department is committed to supporting local authorities and other departments to recognise and realise the benefits of spending on innovation and evaluation. They highlight the Stable Homes, Built on Love strategy, the National Framework and Dashboard, and continued support for the What Works Centre.
19
Conclusion
Acknowledged
We would not want to see financial pressures making it harder for local authorities to make the case for building evaluation and learning into their future ways of working.53 The Local Government Association stresses the need to build on the success of the Innovation Programme as councils deal both with …
Government Response Summary
The government is committed to supporting the benefits of innovation and evaluation by publishing the National Framework and Dashboard for consultation and continuing to fund the What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care.