Twenty Questions

 

The question I was trying to answer in my fellowship is what does best practice in public care look like? I came to California, not to provide an answer to this endlessly large and ideological question, but to get a fresh perspective on a shared problem.

I came to understand how they make law and policy, and to understand how this translated into a significant set of reforms known as CCR, and termed as a ‘re imagining of the care system’. I had so many questions, about policy, practice and outcome. Did I expect to get answers, well yes probably- I like black and white outcomes, but its not really just about what it ‘looks like’, it’s about understanding how an environment was created to enable and to allow a quite radical shift in the provision of care.

Something about America is that the kindness of the people, or at least the people I work with; it knocks you over like a force. I’ll put it down to the sunshine, or maybe their new found desire to learn all about Wales, but to be here in this very new environment remains a pleasure every day, where I am learning, sharing and taking everything in.

I may sound a little repetitive- it’s great here, I’m sure you get the point, but it’s great because I have stepped out of my life, and my comfort zone to experience something quite different. It’s not something easy or even possible to do, to log off, leave your office and family and just relocate for a couple of months.

I have though, and I’m doing what I call ‘pretend work’, in that for the first time in as long as I can remember I’m not accountable for anything, not running to stand still, and not trying to keep plates spinning. What I am doing, is re setting my brain from its ‘welsh’ norms, its usual processes, and its ‘palatable’ responses to problems.

I’m getting a fresh perspective, this sounds like excellent rhetoric. What I mean is, I am getting a full on frontal onslaught of new processes, new politics, new structures and new leaders. They speak a totally different language, operate in a very different way, and propose solutions and outcomes, which in some cases are just completely new. It is an absolute pleasure.

I’m fairly sure I could now pass the ‘what are we talking about’ exam. My language is changing, as I speak, and I now understand the overarching structure, priority and delivery agenda for DSS. To a reasonable extent of course, but its striking when in this new context, how prominent it is that my thinking and problem solving is rooted within the specific welsh context. It’s not unexpected, but it makes me see, how much better I will be at problem solving, analytical thinking and developing new policy solutions and programmes, just by experiencing ‘another way of doing business’.

I’m fairly competent now on what the Californian Continuum of Care for children looks like. It’s truly not that different to ours. Everyone wants to provide responsive wrap around care, which delivers improved outcomes for looked after children and care leavers.

Where the Californians have developed a range of really innovative tools to support local practice, that we in Wales could really value- they have not yet developed their outcomes framework, and are now actively looking at the welsh one for those with a care and support need.

Where the Californians have reframed the concept of therapy, and short term intensive therapeutic models, we in Wales could learn a lot.

Where they are focusing on strengthening their early intervention and prevention services, our Welsh Integrated Family Support services, have been of real interest.

So there is a wealth of shared learning, shared practice and problem solving that across the two sides of the Atlantic, can be used, shared and developed for our mutual benefit.

But whilst something are different, and others the same, the really important learning for me, is around the achievement of the Californian’s to create the space, the support and the political will to ‘re imagine care’.

But whilst this sounds like clever rhetoric, through the leadership within DSS, and some evident political will, they have prioritized reform of the care system. This is a generational reform, it’s something that will still be quoted in 20 years, and it is seismic in what it intends to do.

They have staked a claim, on developing a moment in public policy reform that will stay for years to come, and that ‘in 2017, we changed things’. They did the heavy lifting, and have turned things on its head in a bid to provide a system more conducive to focusing on the wellbeing of a child.

What I bring back to Wales, in terms of policy and practice will be of real interest, in considering what our response should be to tackling ACE’s in those children who will always need care from the state. It is right that early intervention and prevention are prioritized, but unless we create radical change, then the experience of children in care will continue to put them at a disadvantage in life, and lead to harmful behaviors as adults, on which the ACE’s argument is predicated.

But the answer, that is the most critical, and perhaps which I hadn’t expected- is how, through collective leadership, the Californians have developed the space, the support and the will, to create a reform agenda which has been able to tackle head on system failures, to answer some very difficult questions both professionally and politically, and to be brave enough to drive forward with this incredibly ambitious programme of statewide reform.

It’s not nearly done, in fact it is only just beginning, and there continues to be a varied pace for agreement, support and delivery amongst the large and complex audience of ‘stakeholders’ as you would expect. Yet there is something special about CCR, in part I’m sure because of the drive and respect that the leadership team here is very clearly able to command, but because everyone recognizes that something had to change, and the ‘will’ was there to make that change.

If we want to improve outcomes for looked after children, there is a need to be brave in our self-scrutiny, to be clear what issues we are trying to tackle, and to develop a new route map, driven by the catalyst provided by the ACE agenda, and new legislation.

In doing this the ability of senior leaders in Wales to come together from across the sectors, is so important, and something that is far easier than in many other parts of the world- including somewhere as large and diverse as California.

We must maximize to our advantage the shared will, trust and desire to improve, reform and reframe, using international knowledge and practice, so that in ten years’ time, we can reflect that we too led a generational reform that really did make a difference.