SEN Transport, Head of SEN & Wiki’s (again) 16th April 2015
Dear All Richmond SEND Family Voice is a community group (and now a registered charity). We are all parent volunteers and one of the reasons we spend our time doing this is because we believe that the change in law (the SEND Reforms) can make a positive difference to the lives of parents, carers, children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). News follows… SEN Transport- some Facts As a Family Voice, we are asked about SEN Transport on a fairly regular basis. Currently, there is concern about the future of SEN Transport in Richmond. So, using the ‘Document Pack’ from the Kingston & Richmond Joint Committee for AfC (held 13th April 2015), we did some digging, and spoke to the commissioner. The following is factual and accurate as of today (sometimes dates move, because of unexpected complexities)… Both Kingston & Richmond councils are currently negotiating the inclusion of the management of SEN Transport in Richmond as part of the Achieving for Children (AfC) contract. Nothing has been signed, nor can be deemed as ‘official’. SEN Transport for Richmond is currently managed by Adult & Community Service (ACS) Directorate of Richmond Council, but funding by AfC. The plan is that the responsibility for the Richmond SEN transport will move to Achieving for Children (AfC) from June 2015. This unites the management and the budgets under one organisation. There will be a statutory consultation with staff and the plan is that there will be no redundancies; all staff will be offered the option to move to AfC under their current terms and conditions. The current provision will continue under the current policy until September 2016; therefore there is no immediate change to the policy. All medically trained PA’s will continue until at least September 2016 and changes will only be made after consultation. Consultation on policy will take place from September 2015. This consultation will be aligned between both Kingston & Richmond councils and will be offered to all parents, carers and young people through a variety of media (eg meetings, surveys etc). The consultation will be an honest, thoughtful conversation. There is to be one team managing & planning the services and therefore an expectation of one policy across both commissioning councils – if possible. If this is not workable, then different policies in each borough could be retained.
There is a deliberate intention and advantage to delaying the introduction of any new joint policy until September 2016 – and that is because it allows time for parents and other key interested groups to be fully consulted. If you have any queries on the above, please reply to this e-mail. Open Meetings – Head of SEN Our programme of Open Meetings begins tomorrow… 10am @ The Castlenau Centre in Barnes. Anna Chiva, Head of SEN Services is planning to attend every meeting with one of her Principals. Tomorrow, Anna will be there with Wendy Bolsover, Principal SEN Case Manager, Richmond. Wikis (again) I’m a big fan of Wiki’s and I’m aware the Young People’s Champions rather like them too… so it’s really good news that AfC have decided to invest in these. As soon as there is more news about their implementation across Kingston and Richmond, I’ll let you know! Here’s the link to Ajay’s (public) Wiki again: https://www.klikin.eu/page/view/cat/1035 The Local Offer Below is the current link to the draft Home Page for the Local Offer… just so’s you can see how it’s going. http://clients.thisisfocus.co.uk/afc/v5/preview-home.html The page is a static draft and is open to comment now; and more importantly also when the site is ‘live’ after 1st May. We will be encouraging as many families as possible to contribute to its ongoing development. It’s there to be useful to and for us! As ever, should you have any queries at all, please ask and I'll do my best to find an answer. With best wishes, Romany www.richmondsendfamilyvoice.org Tel: 07469 746 145