The Supporting Families Programme is based on the principle of a whole family approach, providing support to all members of the family, including children, parents and grandparents. The programme’s holistic approach helps families to address and overcome multiple challenges they might be facing relating to unemployment, housing, education and health.
Hertfordshire County Council is proud of the Supporting Families programme’s successes over the last 10 years.
Our infographic highlights some of the key achievements made in supporting families, programme milestones and feedback received throughout the programme.
In Hertfordshire all early help services work together in partnership under the name "Families First" and our Families First Assessment (FFA) is the term used for early help support plans. Here are some of our key statistics:
- Over 16,000 Hertfordshire families have been supported (over 36,000 children and young people) through Supporting Families
- Of those supported, 7214 families who meet the criteria for supporting families have achieved positive outcomes
- 73% of Families First Assessments are closed with successful outcomes
- Families successfully supported through a Families First Assessment on average save the public sector £15,029
- 6230 children and young people have been supported by our targeted early help teams (Intensive Family Support Team)
- 927 Families supported by our Homeless Prevention team
- 3771 practitioners across the partnership trained on our case management system (Early Help Module)
Parent - “We are very grateful for all the help and support we have received to turn things around for us.”
We have a shared vision that strong partnership working is a key component to our early help system. One of the ways we help to foster this shared sense of vision across the partnership is through a pledge that we and all partners sign up to.
Our pledge explains Families First and the commitment of the council and our partners to families and how we will work with them.
- Be empowering and trauma-informed, focusing on building resilience and drawing on family strengths
- Promote personal responsibility, rather than dependency
- Be flexible in the way we support families, adapting our delivery depending on the needs of the family
- Work holistically with the whole family, including fathers and other family members
- Leave parents, children and young people feeling that the situation has improved for them
- Involve families in decision-making and activities which shape the support they receive
- Continue to develop a localised approach to understand the most important issues and opportunities in our communities, to make the biggest impact at a local level
- Work together to provide seamless support, reducing the risk of duplication
- Develop opportunities for sharing knowledge and experiences
- Measure the impact of our approach to ensure that what we do is making a difference and a good use of resources
To support partnership working and workforce development across the county, Families First co-ordinate and organise:
- Practice Forums
- Case management system training
- Working together in early help training events
- Workforce shadowing
- Partnership group meetings
- Regular newsletters and communications on training offers
- Sharing news updates and training offers from partner agencies
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