Adults

1. Introduction

As part of the work involved in each local authority producing its Supporting People (SP) Strategy by April 2005, authorities were asked to consider their future strategies in relation to cross authority services. The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) placed Medway in a Cross Authority Group with Kent, Surrey, West Sussex, East Sussex and Brighton & Hove.

2. Achievements to date

Since the Shadow Strategy Statement on Cross Authority (CA) services was adopted we have:

• worked jointly to develop the basis of a model steady state contract;
• established a Value for Money benchmarking group to share information on the relative cost of services;
• developed a common approach and methodology towards provider accreditation;
• shared good practice regarding service reviews.

3. The need for CA provision

Under the SP programme, in addition to ensuring that housing-related support services are available to local residents, local authorities have a responsibility to consider the support needs of people who may move from one local authority to another and to maintain locally-based services which have been designated by the government as meeting the needs of people from a wider catchment area than the host authority.

The groups most affected by cross-boundary working are:

• women escaping violence;
• ex-offenders and people at risk of offending;
• refugees.

A number of support services, primarily those catering for women escaping domestic violence, people with alcohol and/or drug problems and services for offenders or those at risk of offending, have been officially designated as CA projects by the DCLG.

4. Our shared objectives

In taking forward this CA work, we plan to:

• complement other relevant national, regional and local strategic objectives;
• consider the needs of Black and Minority Ethnic Groups (BME) communities and hard to reach groups;
• work in transparent partnership with service providers and other stakeholders and engage them in this strategy;
• develop existing CA services and plan new ones on the basis of an assessment of existing services and gaps in current provision informed by analyses of needs and of service user movement across the CA area and the south-east region.
• cwith service users of CA services to influence the commissioning, planning and review of services;
• promote partnership working amongst providers, stakeholders and administering councils with the aim of providing service users with well-run, relevant, efficient and effective support services.

5. Proposed statement of purpose

Through joint working and sharing of permitted information, members of this group will seek to make the most effective use possible of the SP programme in the sub-region. In the year 2005/06 together we will:

• identify and list all services in the sub-region that routinely serve non-local people;
• produce a map of current supply of services in the Cross Authority Group (CAG) area from 1 April 2005 with a view to identify gaps in provision at a sub–regional basis by client group;
• identify any common areas of particular concern that are shared by members of the CAG (such as migration to the area by vulnerable people from the London region) and seek to take common action on such concern;
• aim to influence the developing regional housing strategy and other regional policies in relation to housing-related support services to ensure that the SP programme plays a pivotal role in the delivery of housing and social care services within the sub-region;
• identify those service providers that are common to two or more administering authorities in the sub-region and explore the possibility of developing further common approaches to value for money, service reviews and other contracting issues for these providers;
• promote with all service providers within the CAG the use of the CORE returns so analysis of originating area maybe undertaken with a view to establishing reliable data on net ‘importing’ or ‘exporting’ of vulnerable people which in turn should influence the allocation of grant (currently according to data from CORE returns analysed by St Andrews University the south-east as a whole is a net importer of vulnerable people);
• assess the feasibility of developing a joint communication network in respect of communication with providers and service users that will maximise administrative resources.

In the future the group wishes to see a stable but flexible SP sector that is open to opportunity. From 2006/07 onwards it will look at the following areas of partnership working:

• developing a joint approach to assessing aggregate need for housing-related support;
• joint commissioning of services where appropriate and the adoption of a shared framework for commissioning, from service specification to the selection of providers;
• developing and adopting joint CAG performance indicators that stress outcomes for clients rather than inputs to a service;
• joint bidding for the resources to develop the sector in the CAG area.

Other CA issues include:

• the Regional Housing Board and capital allocation including criteria for allocating capital;
• dysfunction between capital and revenue for SP services;
• work with local authorities outside the CAG to establish protocols for joint working, reciprocal referral arrangements and funding issues.

Future distribution in SP grant

The final CA Strategic Plan will need to take account projected levels of SP grant for individual authorities. Reductions in funding to individual authorities may mean some services will need to be remodelled or even closed.

Service remodelling to meet unmet CA needs may be a means of ensuring that existing support services and supported housing continue to be used by vulnerable people.

The difficulties in obtaining planning consent for new projects catering for some of the needs groups funded through SP also point to a need to conserve and make the most of existing accommodation resources within the sub-region.

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