Decision details

The County Council has a statutory responsibility to provide a variety of accommodation and support services for children, young people and young adults. These obligations arise in relation to those young people who are at risk of entering care and those leaving or who have left care. In some cases the duty can continue until the age of 25 when the young person is in receipt of training or education. This statutory responsibility also extends to unaccompanied asylum seeking children (UASC).

Whilst the County Council provides some of these services it currently relies on purchasing the majority of accommodation and support from the private and voluntary sector to meet the needs of these young people.

Within the Children’s Commissioning Strategy for Complex needs 2018-2021, the County Council has committed to the introduction of a range of alternative accommodation models which ensure the availability, affordability and quality of the accommodation and support required for these young people. This includes the introduction of individual units of training accommodation – that is accommodation with support specifically designed to enable young people to move to independent living.

This report seeks approval to explore the feasibility of the County Council purchasing property to develop into ‘training accommodation’ for this group of young people, with a view to working in partnership with the market to support the pathways to independence. A proposal would then be progressed to a full business case to be considered within the County Council’s capital programme governance.  Should this result in the development of a proposal that meets the criteria for either an Officer or Cabinet Member key decision it will be subject to the appropriate key decision process.

The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People has :-

1)      Endorsed the proposal to identify options for acquiring and developing units of accommodation to support young people in moving from being looked after into independence.

2)      Approved the preparation of a business case to identify whether such a proposal is both feasible and economically viable for consideration via the County Council’s capital programme governance process. 

None