"Children should receive good quality care and wherever possible, grow up in a positive family setting". (Planning for Children's Services)The Children and Families section of Social Work Services provides a range of services to children and young people and their families or carers. Primarily services are provided to young people up until they are 18 years old, however some services continue to be provided beyond this due to the specific needs of these young people.
Social Work Services are delivered locally from two Area Teams, each of which has a Children and Families sub team. These teams have responsibility for the assessment of need and the co-ordination of care and support packages. Duties include child protection, services to the Children's Hearings, looked after and accommodated children and support to vulnerable families in areas such as addictions and mental health.In addition to the main teams, there is also a Children and Family Support Team in each Area Team, which provides more intensive support to children, young people and families affected by addiction issues.
Within each locality there is also a Groupwork and Family Support Team which works with children and young people between the ages of 8 and 18 years. Most of these young people are subject to a supervision requirement. They will have a range of issues including family relationships, low self esteem, school related problems and often offending and drug/alcohol misuse.
Some of the staff in these teams work within or provide support to schools and are involved in Joint Assessment Teams (JATs). These JATs are part of an initiative to retain young people within the mainstream school system.
There is a West Dunbartonshire Children With or Affected By Disability Team. The role of this team is to co-ordinate provision of a range of services to support differing levels of need to enable every child in West Dunbartonshire who is affected by disability to achieve their potential. Services provided/commissioned include:
- Dedicated home care support
- Leisure and recreational programmes
- Out of school care/respite care
- Transitional care planning
There is a centrally located Child Care Team which has responsibility to recruit, assess, support and review foster and adoptive carers. This Team is also responsible for the management of shared care, children's units and the co-ordination and monitoring of residential school placements.
There is a small hospital based multi disciplinary team which provides support for vulnerable women throughout their pregnancy. The team targets women where issues such as addictions, mental health, learning disabilities and domestic abuse place them and their children at risk. Parenting support is accessed through the team for as long as is required.
There is an authority wide Throughcare Team which works with young people leaving care to support them with housing, training or employment issues in order to develop independence.
The specialist childcare teams link when appropriate with other Social Work Teams including Mental Health, Criminal Justice, Community Care and Learning Disability.
There are five residential units for children and young people within West Dunbartonshire providing 36 places.
