Birmingham City Council

Supporting Tools


Information sharing: Guidance for practitioners and managers

This guidance is for all practitioners who provide services to children, young people, adults and families, who have to make decisions about sharing personal information on a case-by-case basis. It is also for managers and advisors who support these practitioners in their decision making and for others with responsibility for information governance.

Information sharing: Guidance for practitioners and managers



Integrated Support Plan (ISP) Meetings

To help you organise ISP Meetings you may find the following tools useful:



Quality Assurance Framework

There are two tools available to Managers to support Lead Professionals by looking at the quality and content of a CAF form and can be used in a variety of ways either as part of routine supervision or as an audit of information:



Assessment Tools

Across Birmingham there is a wealth of parenting activity and a variety of programmes, such as 'Triple P', 'Incredible Years', 'Strengthening Families, Strengthening Communities (SFSC)' and others. To help parents and practitioners find out how these parenting programmes are making a difference, the Family and Parenting Support service is recommending the use of a set of questionnaires. Although there are a number of questionnaires available which explore various aspects of child behaviour, parenting style, wellbeing and relationships, in Birmingham there is a recommended core data set:

  • Family Background Questionnaire,
  • Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ), available in over 80 languages and free to download from www.sdqinfo.org
  • Parenting Scale Propose
  • Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS).


These have been collated into an easy to use assessment booklet and you should contact Family and Parenting Support for more details. An electronic scoring tool is also provided. To obtain the Assessment Booklet, the scoring tool, information about training or other aspects of parenting please contact Family and Parenting Support.

Substance Misuse Assessment Tool (SMAT)

The Substance Misuse Assessment Tool (SMAT) is designed to determine the level of substance misuse, associated risk and protective factors surrounding a young person and whether a referral to Lifeline is appropriate and, if so, which treatment pathway the young person is likely to access, either as Targeted or Specialist Treatment. SMAT training is designed to support non substance misuse professionals to appropriately screen young people and their level of risk, and provide practical tools and resources for professionals to use in substance misuse work in universal settings for young people who do not require specialist services. There are three SMAT tools available:

  • Under 13 years
  • 13 - 15 years
  • Over 16 yrs


Please contact Lifeline Birmingham for training and details on how to obtain and use the SMAT forms.

Youth Inclusion Projects (YIP) and Youth Inclusion Support Panels (YISP)

Both the YIP and YISP engage in preventative work with children aged 8 - 19 yrs in Birmingham at risk of exclusion in specified areas and target groups, with a special focus on those at risk of either becoming victims or perpetrators of crime and anti-social behaviour. The YIP and YISP contribute to the Youth Offending Services (YOS) targets to minimise the number of first-time entrants into the Criminal Justice System and to reduce re-offending targets.

YISP Team members will act as the key worker to case manage and co-ordinate services wrapped around the young person and may engage in intensive one-to-one work with the child and family to include the CAF process and targeted interventions in a multi agency setting or on a one-to-one basis.

The Referral will include a pre-CAF assessment or ONSET notification, which is then forwarded to the central CAF team.



Youth Inclusion Support Panels (YISP) operate in 9 areas:

  • Billesley
  • Castle Vale
  • Kings Norton
  • Lozells
  • Nechells
  • Newtown
  • Quinton
  • Sparkbrook
  • Sutton


Youth Inclusion Projects (YIP) exist in 5 areas:

  • Kingstanding
  • Lozells
  • Shard End
  • Sparkbrook
  • Washwood Heath


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