Publications

Effective, high quality early years provision makes a difference to young children, helping to break the cycle of disadvantage to give them a good start in life. It is a key element of early help and leads to better developmental outcomes and readiness to learn.

When problems first arise in families, early help is not only beneficial for children but essential for making the best use of resources.

Early help means providing support as soon as a problem emerges at any stage in a child's life. The aim is to ensure problems do not escalate to become more acute, and more costly, to the detriment of children and families.

‘Personalisation' is the term used for an approach to personal care and support which treats people as autonomous individuals and responds to their personal needs and wishes.

This guide is a follow-up to the guide by the Local Government Association (LGA) and the Association of Democratic Services Officers published in 2013, as health and wellbeing boards (HWBs) were being set up. Now that boards are fully operational, their emphasis is on being as effective as possible in their statutory and influencing roles.

How do we make the most of each and every opportunity to help people improve their health and wellbeing? Making every contact count (MECC) is an approach to improving health and reducing health inequalities developed by the NHS and local government.

The Care Act 2014, together with a range of regulations and statutory guidance, is the base upon which social care will develop over the next few decades.

Since then we have consulted widely with children and young people and with partners in the public and voluntary sectors, and have now set out a clear set of shared ambitions for children that we would seek to deliver in the context of ‘rewired' public services.

This publication shares some of the experiences and opinions of local government officers, elected members and others who have participated as peers in the LGA Corporate Peer Challenge Programme. The contributions featured show that the benefits are wide, varied and sometimes personal. But there are some common themes that emerge from many of the experiences shared.

2013/14 has been a busy and challenging first year of operation for all Health and Wellbeing Boards (HWBs) and their local systems. There is an overwhelming sense – articulated in a number of independent reports published in late 2013 – that the transfer of public health has gone well in all 152 areas, and that all HWBs have made a strong and enthusiastic start.