Minutes:
The 2023/24 Q1 work of the Domestic Abuse Improvement Programme is as follows:
· Phoenix – this new service will provide information, advice and guidance to children and young people across the borough and provide a wellbeing and therapeutic offer for school age children affected by DA.
· Support 2 Safety – the model was given approval for full formal launch in May by the Children’s Operational Delivery Group and the MASH Partnership Improvement Board. There have been significant successes and learning within the soft launch phase, and the new service is now open to all DA risk levels and model referral pathways.
· AVA's Women's Homelessness Programme - is a survivor lead programme of work which aims to improve housing pathways for survivors of gender-based violence and homelessness. AVA has recruited Experts by Experience across the 4 London Boroughs who are part of the pilot programme.
· Health pathways – activity has been underway to map health partners against CQC KLOE relating to safeguarding/vulnerable responses. This activity is to identify any gaps in responses and pathways, as well as gaps in related service offer.
· MOPAC funded pan London interventions – MOPAC made a pan London bid to the Home Office Perpetrator Intervention Fund to roll out Drive. The approach aims to increase victim safety and reduce the perpetration of domestic abuse either changing perpetrator behaviour, disrupting perpetrator behaviour, or both. As part of the EABCU, LBBD will be part of the first wave of roll out of this service. It is predicted there will be between 25-30 places per annum for the EA BCU LAs to access, so less than 10 for LBBD. In LBBD, we are seeking to build into our Support 2 Safety model and add Drive to the toolkit of interventions available
· Learning and development sessions have taken place across Quarter 1, and include:
- Delivery of session to NELFT staff engagement group
- Promotion of system offers to the Healthy Schools Partnership
- Promotion of Refuge service offer to Probation, Community Hubs
- Lunch and Learn session at the Town Hall – Cranstoun and Refuge
- DA Awareness Session to all LA staff, LBBD Adult College, Early Years
- Practitioners, LGBTQI+ Staff Forum
- Cranstoun has provided working with perpetrators training
· Funding – a funding paper has gone forward to the Council’s Executive on the long-term funding implications of the DAIP.
To date, the DAIP has ensured the basics are in place and LBBD has a new service offer in place (which will need maintaining in the long term). There is still ongoing need for new responses across the system (unfunded projects within the DAIP).
Cllr Worby notes that LBBD work in partnership with NELFT and the ICB and that in the long term Angela can put forward a funding paper in relation to proposing an increase in funding to sustain health pathway activities in line with neighbouring boroughs. Cllr Worby added that by putting this paper into the system, she will be able to escalate this and get a commitment to close these gaps in safeguarding/vulnerable response pathways.