York's Model of Joint Partnership working (co-production)

Joint Partnership has been talked about and used in different ways for many years across the spectrum of public services and private enterprise and industry. The initial concept of engaging individual groups in developing services and products, was developed as a way of understanding what is required, how to meet the needs of those who will be using the service or product and as a way to ensure high levels of satisfaction.

An easy way to describe this for example is to consider how manufacturers develop a new product or adapt an old one, by inviting users to contribute in active consultation, testing and measuring satisfaction of experiences in buying, after care and support when using the product or service.

Within public services there is now wide recognition that effective Joint Partnerships can significantly improve the quality of experiences for individuals accessing advice, support and care that will have a positive impact on short, medium and long term outcomes in their lives. The Children and Families Act 2014 also sets out the statutory responsibilities that commissioners and services must enact to improve the lives of with children, young people and families who have Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). This must include ensuring the voice of the child or young person is heard and is central in planning all aspects of support that affects them both from an individual perspective and how services are configured, delivered and improved across the system.

To embed and normalise Joint Partnership and responsibilities as a way of working with children and families, York has come together as a partnership to work with children, young people and families to develop a strategy and model that is recognisable and consistently used across all services when working with individuals and also in service development. This partnership includes:

• children and young people
• parent carers
• voluntary sector
• City of York Council - education and social care
• Early Years Settings, schools and academies
• health services (Healthy Child Service, York Teaching Hospital Trust – paediatrics, therapies and nursing and Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service - Tees, Esk, Wear Valley)
• elected members

Furthermore to evidence our commitment towards this approach, the York Partnership will embed an ongoing cycle of audit across education, health and social care to formally record and monitor the effectiveness of Joint Partnership as a quality standard. This will form part of the multi-agency integrated data dashboard.

A Joint Partnership approach includes valuing assets, celebrating contribution and reciprocal working. It also includes:

• increased child and parental confidence
  • higher self-esteem
  • stronger development
  • improved communication with service users
  • higher motivation
  • wider communication networks
• higher staff well-being
  • more rewarding way of working
  • staff feel inspired
  • increased motivation for project when directly seeing impact
• improved community relations
  • young people and parent carers are involved in decision-making about their lives
  • stronger relationships between services and public
  • improved working across agencies
• a better service
  • a more attractive service who is "in touch" with its users
  • improved services that benefit from children and parent carers being involved
  • not seen as a last resort or to tick a box, but embedded