The Children's Trust
About the Children's Trust, part of the Health and Wellbeing Board.
Who we are and what we do
The Children’s Trust Board brings together the public, private and voluntary sectors to improve outcomes for all children and young people who live in the county.
The board's objectives are to ensure that agencies work together effectively and strategically across children’s services.
We want to ensure that the voice of children, young people and their families contribute to these arrangements and decision-making.
Our purpose
The purpose of the trust is to:
- oversee key areas of multi-agency strategic planning for children and young people
- improve outcomes for children in relation to being successful, keeping safe, staying healthy, and being supported
- drive the integration agenda where there is evidence that integrated working will improve outcomes for children and young people
- champion the involvement of children, young people, parents and carers in partnership working with senior managers and politicians
- ensure the Health and Wellbeing Board and other partnerships are sighted on the key challenges facing children and young people in Oxfordshire.
Children’s Trust Board Meetings
The trust reports to the Health and Wellbeing Board and influences and supports the board's work to improve outcomes for children and young people and their families.
The Children's Trust meets four times a year.
- 22 February – 5pm - 7pm
- 18 May – 5pm - 7pm
- 6 September – 5pm - 7pm
- 8 November – 5pm - 7pm
The chair of the board is the Council's Cabinet member responsible for children's services.
Children's Trust membership
Children's Trust membership is drawn from the following agencies or organisations.
- County councillors
- Senior officers of Oxfordshire County Council
- Oxfordshire Clinical Commissioning Group
- City and district council members
- Thames Valley Police
- Oxfordshire Safeguarding Children Board
- Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
- Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust
- Safer Oxfordshire Partnership
- Representation from schools and colleges
- Three representatives from the Voluntary and Community Sector
- Healthwatch ambassadors
- Representatives from the Voice of Oxfordshire’s Youth (VoXY)
Our vision
We want Oxfordshire to be a great place to grow up and have the opportunity for children and young people to become everything they want to be.
To achieve this vision for children and young people, we have four areas of focus:
- be successful
- be healthy
- be safe
- be supported
The work of the Children's Trust is set out in the Children and Young People’s Plan.
We are delighted to launch the Oxfordshire Strapline for how we work with Children and Families as developed by you. This is our commitment to how we want to work together to help children, young people, and families
Please rise to the Big Challenge from OSCB and the Children’s Trust Board to make sure we are all making a difference in outcomes for children, young people and families in how we work together and behave. Please use the strapline, together or individually as appropriate to your organisation and where possible in meetings, relevant strategies, presentations, policy documents, training materials, resources etc, and promote it at all levels in your organisation. The Big Challenge is how we now all use this and model it in a meaningful way to change our practice and really have an impact on the lived experience of children, young people and families. This represents a key part of how we hold ourselves and each other to account for how we work together with children and families.
Children and Young People’s Plan priorities
The Children’s Trust’s work priorities are decided annually by the board and contained within an implementation plan.
In 2018-19 and 2019-20, the board priorities were as below. In June 2020, the Children’s Trust Board agreed there was a need for all agencies to focus on the COVID-19 recovery and that the original areas of focus continued to be the top priorities for the Board for 2020-2021:
- children not engaged in education
- social, emotional, physical and mental well being
- protect children from domestic abuse