DCSF produces consultation on children’s trust guidance

The Department for Children, Schools and Families has published its long-awaited consultation on children’s trust guidance and the new Children and Young People’s Plan regulations (CYPP).

Publication of the guidance was held up because the DCSF wanted to wait for the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning (ASCL) Act 2009 to become an act of parliament, which it did on Friday.

According to the guidance, the act will strengthen children’s trusts by requiring every local area to have a children’s trust board which will take on the responsibility for producing and reviewing the CYPP. Schools, academies, non-maintained special schools, further education and Jobcentre Plus will now also be statutory partners within children’s trusts.

The guidance includes advice on commissioning that says each children’s trust board should agree a common process that all partners can recognise and in which they can participate.

It also states that service users should be involved in all stages of commissioning, ideally becoming co-designers and producers of the outcomes.

Early intervention is also highlighted in the guidance as a priority for children’s trust boards.

The consultation was launched on 13 November and will close on 29 January 2010.

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