We continue work on the draft National Standards for Children’s Social Services, with the draft standards submitted for Ministerial approval.
Taking a child-first approach, the standards aim to support staff in individual social services, as well as foster carers, to understand how they can achieve the best outcomes for children at risk or in the care of the State.
The standards have been informed by a review of national and international literature on children’s social services, as well as extensive engagement with stakeholders. We met with over 340 children, young people, families, foster carers, advocates staff and policy-makers, drawing on their expertise and experience to inform the development of the standards. Work on these standards is now complete and the draft standards were submitted to the Minister for Health, and Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, for approval in December 2021.
From the outset of the project, we recognised that additional supports would be required to support services to implement the standards fully. Over the past two years, we have worked extensively with stakeholders to understand the potential barriers to implementing the standards in practice, and to identify what tools and resources, within HIQA’s remit, could be developed to address these.
Based on this work, we are developing tools and resources that will build on the good practice already happening in the sector. Some examples of support tools developed to support the implementation of previous sets of national standards include e-learning courses, information leaflets for staff and people using services users, decision-making flowcharts, and explanatory videos.
You can keep up to date with our work on national standards by following us on social media, or by emailing us at standards@hiqa.ie.