Support planning café

What we did

North Tyneside Council has set up a Support Planning Cafe' for adults with learning disabilities. The cafe' runs from a local community centre one day a week. The Planning Cafe' was established through a steering group made up of carers, service users, voluntary sector organisations and the council learning disability team. A voluntary organisation experienced in support planning was commissioned to run the Planning Cafe' in partnership with the council. Agreement was reached to provide a 'community navigator' role, whereby the café could call upon its members to find out information about local community resources. A senior social work practitioner experienced in personalisation was also based there in order to give the council an opportunity to see how the cafe' worked at first hand and to learn from an experienced support planner from the voluntary sector. People can use the support planning service by appointment or drop in.

Why we did it

The cafe' was set up in order to give people a choice about who supports them to plan using their personal budget. The council also wanted to 'test out' whether planning with someone different to a social worker produced better outcomes for people, as it was recognised that, although people received a personal budget, the support they receive mostly continued to make use of traditional commissioned services.

Outcome

A review of the cafe' was undertaken after six month and evaluated after nine months. This found that the support planners working at the café had a positive attitude to change and had truly embraced the concept of person-centred planning with a focus on community based resources and universal services. Most of the people accessing the service self-referred and there were more carers than service users. Few referrals were made by the council's learning disability social work team. It was also found that many of those seeking help were below the council's eligibility criteria for services and were seeking advice on how to achieve independent supported living. This was a more complex level of advice, which the support planners were able to provide. The cafe' has not replaced social work support planning, but has provided a valuable alternative and is continuing to be developed.

Contact details

Nicola Price, Business Support Manager, NorthTyneside Council, nicola.price@northtyneside.gov.uk, Tel: 0191 6432413