Children and Young People Programme round up 2023

The Children and Young People Programme continues to raise awareness of Getting It Right For Every Child (GIRFEC).

Following on from previous years, the programme has a remit to ensure disabled children and young people or those with long term conditions, their families and carers have increased understanding of their rights and improved wellbeing and the organisations who support them. Following the Scottish Government’s national refresh on Getting It Right For Every Child (GIRFEC), the beginning of this year provided an opportunity for the team to refresh their current GIRFEC training offer and supporting resources. With new training launched in April, the team has seen an increased reach across Scotland that helps empower professionals and volunteers to engage in the GIRFEC approach. All resources, including easy-read guides, BSL animations and training videos can be viewed on the ALLIANCE website.

We continued our work as part of a sub-group of the Disabled Children and Young People’s Advisory Group which was established to consider in more detail how disabled children and young people whose needs are complex and whose voices are rarely heard, and their families, should be engaged to influence and inform the design and development of the National Care Service and the National Transitions into Adulthood Strategy. Our learning report ‘Seen, Heard, Included’ aims to provide a summary of what is required to carry out meaningful engagement with this group of young people.

We continued our engagement in key representation platforms, such as the Children’s Sector Strategic and Policy Forum (CSSPF), the GIRFEC Advisory Group, the Disabled Children and Young People Advisory Group (DCYPAG), and the Engagement sub-group of the DCYPAG, the Scottish Physical Restraint Action Group (SPRAG) and we joined the National Transitions to Adulthood Strategy, External Strategic Working Group.

The Programme was delighted to launch the Children and Young People Community of Practice this year. Created as a safe space to bring together professionals and volunteers within the children and young people sector with a shared interest to learn, collaborative and network with one another.

In August, the ALLIANCE in partnership with Together (Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights) held a panel discussion as part of the Being Human Series, ‘UNCRC: Beyond Incorporation’. The event provided an opportunity for participants to hear more about recent developments in children’s rights; including where we are with incorporation and to gain a greater understanding of how to implement UNCRC in practice.

This year, we worked with The International Foundation for Integrated Care (IFIC), contributing to their ‘Integrated Care Matters Webinar Series’ by speaking at the child and family centred approaches webinar. In addition, we co-hosted a virtual roundtable titled ‘Integrated care for children and young people and transitions to adult services’.

Moving into 2024, the programme aims to increase membership of our Community of Practice and continues to deliver our refreshed GIRFEC training programme across Scotland. Overall, to continue to increase opportunities for disabled children and young people, their families and carers and the third sector organisations who support to engage with, inform and co-produce the policies which affect them.

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