Client: Department for Education
Date: January 2024 – present
Challenges faced by the client:
‘Care proceedings’ is the name for the legal proceedings in family courts. It starts when children’s services – often based in a local authority – make an application to the court because they are concerned that a child has suffered significant harm or is at risk of suffering significant harm.
There is a statutory requirement for a family case to conclude in 26 weeks. In 2023-24, the average duration was 43 weeks. This was driven by an increase in demand with more children coming into the system, behavioural changes due to lack of resource, and the impact of COVID-19 on the court system.
Care proceedings are one of the most profound interventions the state can make in a family's life, with the power to protect children and, in many cases, save lives. However, the process takes too long, and is inherently complex and emotionally charged, leaving a lasting impact on everyone involved. Delays have significant negative impacts. For children, these delays can mean prolonged instability and uncertainty over their futures, which impacts their development and wellbeing.
Or, in the words of a care leaver: “This might be your job, but it’s the rest of my life.”
The Designated Family Judge Area Trailblazers pilot is one of three pilot programmes that aims to address and reduce delays in the family court system. The Department for Education, supported by the Shared Outcomes Fund, committed £10m from January 2024 to March 2025 to test cross-system changes to bring down family court delays, create efficiencies in the family justice system, and enable quicker decisions that makes sure the right children enter the system at the right time.
Support offered
Mutual Ventures was commissioned by the Department for Education to support five Trailblazer areas to design and implement solutions aimed at reducing family court delays, creating efficiencies in the family justice system and enabling quicker decisions to reduce the negative long-term effects on the children and families involved.
The five Trailblazer areas are Wolverhampton, Cheshire and Merseyside, Guildford, Central London, and Essex and Suffolk. All five were provided with grant funding from the Department for Education to deliver their local pilots.
Deep dives
Each Trailblazer has a dedicated coach from the MV team. Each coach supported their area through a ‘deep dive’, combining data analysis with qualitative insights from interviews and workshops, and guiding all system partners to diagnose and agree on their cross-cutting to local issues to develop solutions around them. This focused on developing the ‘right solutions to the right problems’. Coaches then supported each area to cost delivery of their solutions, and submit these costs to the DfE’s grants team.
Coaching support
Each Trailblazer has since received ongoing coaching support from their dedicated coach as they implement their local solutions. This includes:
Weekly check-ins with local project leads and senior leaders;
‘Critical friend’ challenge and delivery support;
Problem-solving and conflict management across system partners; and
Sharing learning and insights from other Trailblazers, and from across the wider system, to enhance local projects.
Trailblazers also have access to our flexible pool of subject matter experts with experience in areas such as data analysis, change management in children’s services, and justice innovation.
Learning programme
Alongside delivery support, we have captured and shared learning and programme feedback with the Trailblazers, the DfE and the wider sector throughout the programme.
This includes:
A dedicated webpage for Trailblazers to access learning materials and share resources with one another:
Monthly thematic Peer Learning Groups for the Trailblazers;
A quarterly Good Practice Guide with case studies of innovation in family justice;
A quarterly family justice newsletter bringing together Trailblazer updates as well as news stories and announcements from across the family justice sector;
A series of ‘case stories’ developed in partnership with Pause, the Cafcass Family Forum and the Family Justice Young People’s Board, to map the journeys of real individuals who have gone through care proceedings;
Webinars, articles and an upcoming podcast; and
A series of upcoming Spotlight Sessions for each Trailblazer, and a National Learning Conference in March 2025 to share learning from the full pilot with the wider sector.
In November, the learning programme was further expanded to include a tailored Guided Learning offer. Guided Learning aims to share the learning from the current Trailblazer areas with an additional 15 Designate Family Judge areas across England: it offers a light touch version of the deep dive phase of the Trailblazers programme to other eligible areas to help them learn from the process.
The impact:
Our support enabled all Trailblazer areas to complete full deep dives, develop and sign off local solutions, and map out 12-month delivery plans and costings within tight programme timescales. Solutions were handed over to the Trailblazers to implement in April 2024 and will wind down at the end of March 2025.
Since implementing the solutions the following benefits have started to emerge:
Cross-system engagement has improved with a stronger, unified LA voice, and existing silos have started to break down.
There have been positive shifts in judicial practices, and pre-proceedings practice is strengthening to prevent court involvement.
Regional leadership are driving meaningful conversations around data collaboration, with enhanced data collections offering more comprehensive regional perspectives.
Case management has improved through enhanced trackers, and system communication has become more streamlined.
Co-produced resources have enhanced engagement with families, and consistency of products provided to families.
To find out more about this pilot and our support, click here: DFJ Trailblazers - Reducing Delay in Family Court | MV
Comments