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Assessment and support for kinship carers of looked after children

Scottish Government interim guidance to local authorities on assessing the capacity of a child's relatives as potential kinship carers for a looked after child and the support they will require.

The assessment process should help kinship carers to feel more involved and consulted and able to identify the kinds of supports they believe they need to look after the child safely and in a way that promotes the child's best interests.

Take up the challenge: the role of local services in increasing take up of benefits and tax credits to reduce child poverty

Ministers asked the Take Up Taskforce to develop ways to help local services to support parents to access all their relevant benefit entitlements, in order to help tackle child poverty.

Many poor families are not taking up all of the financial support to which they are entitled and there are particularly low rates of take up by families where at least one parent is working. Lack of awareness of available in-work financial entitlements can present a barrier to parents entering and sustaining work.

National standards for Scotland's youth justice services

This report by the Improving the Effectiveness of the Youth Justice System Working Group describes the characteristics of effective local management of youth justice services and outlines a set of standards to improve delivery.

The group was asked to develop a strategic framework of national objectives and standards for Scotland’s Youth Justice services, to help achieve the national target of reducing the number of persistent offenders by 10% by 2006.

Preventing offending by young people: a framework for action

Scottish Government publication aimed at preventing offending by young people. It outlines a shared ambition of what the government and its partners want to do to as national and local agencies to prevent, divert, manage and change offending behaviour by children and young people - and how they want to do it.

The framework is broad in its scope, spanning prevention, diversion, intervention and risk management, with reference to the individual, the family and the wider community. It reaches from pre-birth and early years to the transition to adult services.

Protecting children today and tomorrow: a multi disciplinary review of child protection measures across Scotland

This review is part of the government's response to the recommendations of the Hammond Report following the tragic death of a 3-year-old child, Kennedy McFarlane. The aim of the review is to promote the reduction of abuse or neglect of children, and to improve the services for children who experience abuse or neglect.

Supervision and reflective practice : reflections on supervision

This learning object is one of a set of exercises and activities taken from the book 'Modern Social Work Practice' written by Mark Doel and Steven Shardlow. Reflections on supervision is a trigger to encourage both practice teacher and student to examine their expectations about the content and functions of supervision.

The practice tutorial (supervision session) is the linchpin of the student's learning and the assessment of their practice abilities, yet it is has complex purposes and may reflect very different understandings of these purposes.