Council approves up to £140 million spending on emergency placements and support for children in need in Nottinghamshire

The council has approved a new framework to award contracts to providers of support to children and families in crisis.

The framework will include a list of vetted organisations that the council can quickly turn to when emergencies happen.

This includes emergency placements for children, who need a place on short-notice – and other support services for families with children at home.

The council’s lead member for children and families, Coun Tracey Taylor, has signed off the framework following a report on the issue.

Although the council has contracts in place to place children in care, it doesn’t have any framework for emergency situations – when arrangements need to be made in crisis situations.

This includes hiring agency workers quickly in a crisis, or providing support inside the family home to prevent a child — especially one with disabilities — from being taken into care.

When these situations arise, the council would need to approach providers to provide support through ‘spot contracts’.

However, these ‘spot contracts’ can be costly and can vary in quality.

This decision means the council will now set up a framework to streamline providers offering emergency placements.

This will also be “cost-effective” improve the access and quality of services to young people and families, documents say.

Providers would join the framework through an online tendering portal and complete questionnaires to assess their quality and financial viability of care.

The framework will only be used when a placement is not available through other current contracts.

The framework would be in place for a minimum of 5 years with option to extend it up to 10 years.

The maximum cap on the framework would be £140 million plus VAT (£168million) over the 10 years – spending of up to £14 million per year, documents say.

Coun Tracey Taylor (Con), Nottinghamshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Children and Families told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: ” “It’s business as usual for us at the council, this is not a new initiative but a continuation of the ongoing work we’re doing to support children and families in Nottinghamshire.

“This framework is in place to help children who let’s say need a foster place at 10pm on a Friday night. It’s for emergency placements and we need providers who are able to cater for these situations.

“We have initiatives in place to care for the welfare of children in Nottinghamshire, but we also need a framework for emergency situations.

“We’re taking a proactive and reactive approach to supporting children and families and these contracts will enable that.”

A report on the issue reads: “Establishing a Framework for Emergency Placements and Support will increase the number of providers that can offer safe supportive quality provision in an emergency and reduce reliance on Spot Contracts.

“Providing a competitive market of cost effective, local, compliant provision. Giving children, young people and their families access to appropriate support in an emergency in their local area.

“The requested Framework will provide benefit to children, young people and their families by increasing choice and access to local quality assured provision in times of crisis and will contribute to cost avoidance and cost efficiency including in the Placements budget.”