1 Introductory Summary

1.1 Under the national teenage pregnancy strategy, each top-tier local authority is required to establish a local multi-agency partnership and local strategy in order to meet the twin goals of reducing teenage pregnancy and supporting young mothers back into education, employment or training. The performance of each Partnership is assessed annually by a regional panel on behalf of the national Teenage Pregnancy Unit. The assessment panel has representatives from key programmes including Sure Start, Connexions, Healthy Schools and includes input from those with performance management responsibilities in Strategic Health Authorities, Housing and Social Services.

1.2 Hampshire achieved a good overall performance in 2003-4 and was commended for a good forward action plan. Praise was given for the commitment by many agencies to the local teenage pregnancy strategy and for the strong leadership provided by the Partnership. Details of the assessment are given in the report for each area of the Partnership's work

2 Objective

2.1 The Committee is asked to note the contents of the report and the progress of the Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership.

3 Background

3.1 The United Kingdom has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in western Europe and following a report into the social outcomes of teenage pregnancy by the Government's Social Exclusion Unit in 1999, a ten-year national strategy was developed with the twin goals of halving teenage pregnancy by 2010 and providing better support to teenage parents.

3.2 The strategy forms part of the Government's overall approach to reduce social exclusion, linking particularly to the actions taken to reduce childhood poverty, reduce the number of young people not in education, training or employment and inequalities in health. There are natural links to the developing national strategy on sexual health - a Government White Paper on Public Health is due to be published in Autumn 2004 and is likely to give impetus to this aspect.

3.3 Initially the former health authorities were responsible for local implementation of the strategy. Upon their abolition in 2002, the responsibility was transferred to each top-tier local authority which was required to establish a multi-agency teenage pregnancy partnership and to ensure there were effective arrangements for local co-ordination. Hampshire established its Partnership in late 2002 and appointed a strategic service manager in January 2003 to provide coordination.

3.4 The Government provides a specific grant to each top-tier local authority to support this work until March 2006. Hampshire County Council's excellent Comprehensive Performance Assessment rating means that this grant is no longer ring-fenced. However, in recognition of the effective partnership approach being undertaken locally, the Cabinet agreed to continue to fully passport the funding to the Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership in 2004-05.

3.5 The national Teenage Pregnancy Unit set three targets for Hampshire taking into account that the conception rates in Hampshire County Council were already below the national average in 1998:

3.5.1 A 45% reduction in the 1998 under-18 conception rate by 2010 with an interim 10% reduction by 2004.

3.5.2 Establishing a firm downwards trend in the under-16 conception rate by 2010.

3.5.3 60% of young mothers aged 16-19 to be in education, employment or training by 2010.

3.6 National research has indicated that Children Looked After and Care Leavers are groups that are particularly vulnerable to teenage pregnancy. The Partnership's work contributes towards efforts to improve PAF indicators on the health of Children Looked After and the education, employment and training of Care Leavers.

3.7 These targets are shared by the South Central Connexions Partnership which covers Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. The target for reducing the under-18 conception rate is included in the corporate performance review, best value and Social Services Department's star rating assessment. It is also included in the performance assessment of the Primary Care Trusts.

3.8 The Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership's membership includes representatives from: Social Services (which currently hold the chair), Education, Youth Service, Early Education and Childcare Unit, Connexions, each Primary Care Trust, Housing Officers, Supporting People, voluntary organisations, colleges, Learning and Skills Council, Youth Offending Team and the chairs of the eight local multi-agency teenage pregnancy implementation teams around the county.

4 2003-4 performance assessment

4.1 The assessment is broken down into a number of sections covering aspects of the Partnership's work.

5 Local context

5.1 The effectiveness of the Partnership in using available data to plan developments was rated Very Good.

5.2 There was praise for building a comprehensive local picture of teenage pregnancy and that data was used to target developments.

6 Local co-ordination arrangements

6.1 Local coordination arrangements were rated Very Good.

6.2 Good work had continued throughout 2003-4 and the forward action plan was commended, especially the inclusion of teenage pregnancy issues in the various strategic and community plans and the developing links with the Children and Young People's Strategic Partnership.

6.3 Whist the assessment panel felt that the Partnership had developed clear priorities and was making good progress, they also felt that there was still a long way to go to reach the targets and that the Partnership must continue its work. There was a danger that the momentum could be lost and it was the role of the Partnership to ensure that strong leadership continued.

7 Media and communications

7.1 The Partnership's work on media and communications was rated as Good.

7.2 The panel felt that there was good general work around informing young people and professionals about teenage pregnancy issues but more needed to be done to target children looked after, black and minority ethnic communities, travellers, young people not attending school and other groups of vulnerable young people.

7.3 The protocols for joint working with the media across the agencies involved were praised.

8 Sex and relationship education in school settings

8.1 Work to improve sex and relationships education within schools was rated Very Good with evidence of good progress and delivery with a very clear direction.

8.2 The commitment of both the Local Education Authority and the County Healthy Schools Co-ordinator was acknowledged.

8.3 The improved quality of training for teachers was praised, along with more clearly targeted work with specific schools.

8.4 The assessment panel agreed with the Partnership's plans to do more in developing work with parents to better communicate with their children about sexual health and relationship issues.

9 Sex and relationships education in non-school settings

9.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area.

9.2 Initial work on developing a sexual health and education policy within the social services department and plans to develop sex and relationship education policies within the Youth Service, Connexions Service and Youth Offending Team were commended.

9.3 The appointment of a training coordinator for sex and relationships education for non-teaching staff working with young people and the development of a comprehensive training programme for these staff was praised. It was suggested that the accreditation of this training be explored.

10 Contraception, advice and information services

10.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area.

10.2 The development of the multi-agency sex and relationships training was highly commended as a way of ensuring that if a young person is in contact with any professional, they will be able to get appropriate information and advice.

10.3 The panel remarked that whilst there was a lot of work under-way, more needs to be done to include the development of services into the Local Delivery Plans of Primary Care Trusts and commissioning processes under local sexual health strategies.

10.4 The development of school-based health services, (including access to contraception and sexual health services) was encouraged by the panel.

10.5 Primary Care Trusts covering Test Valley, Winchester, East Hampshire and Rushmoor districts were asked to examine why there was lower than national average percentage for access to abortions within the first thirteen weeks of pregnancy by those young women under 18 who had decided that this was their option. Forward action plans to cover this issue were requested.

11 Housing

11.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area. Steady progress had been made on a complex issue.

11.2 Comment was made that the Partnership clearly understood the barriers and had put plans in place to address these. Progress had been made in co-ordinating work though better links need to be developed with the Supporting People District Inclusive Forums.

11.3 The panel commented that more attention needs to be given to providing linked accommodation and support for lone young parents with the most complex needs.

11.4 The developing links with the range of professionals offering support to lone young parents was commended.

12 Education, employment and training for teenage parents

12.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area with clear plans for the future.

12.2 The development of guidance to schools on how to support pregnant pupils and school-age parents was welcomed.

12.3 Comment was made that the Education Other Than At School (EOTAS) service would need to pick up the excellent work of the Austen Unit, (which provided education for pregnant pupils and school age parents alongside childcare) when it closed in July 2004. The number of hours of tuition provided by EOTAS to those pregnant pupils and school-age parents unable to attend school was commended.

12.4 The commitment of the local Connexions service and the Learning and Skills Council in working with the Teenage Pregnancy Partnership to develop appropriate education and training opportunities in those areas where there were more teenage parents work was noted.

12.5 The two joint-funded specialist Connexions Personal Adviser posts for teenage parents were welcomed but comment was made that it was necessary to offer consistent support to all young parents to access education, employment or training across the county.

12.6 The "Best practice guidelines for young parent groups" that had been produced by the Partnership was felt to be useful and it was recommended that the publication be shared with other areas.

13 Childcare

13.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area, commenting that a lot of progress had been made over the last year with good plans identified for 2004/5.

13.2 The role of the Early Education and Childcare Unit in taking the lead was acknowledged and their continued support would be necessary to complete the plans in 2005/6.

13.3 The Partnership's plans to map wards with high numbers of teenage parents against childcare provision for 0-2s were felt to be useful.

13.4 The panel agreed with the need to maintain or to develop strong links with the Early Years Centres.

14 Support for pregnant teenagers and teenage parents

14.1 The assessment panel rated work Good in this area, noting steady progress.

14.2 The development of some designated health visitor and midwife posts to work with teenage parents was acknowledged but more were needed across the county.

14.3 Plans to develop more work with young fathers were welcomed.

14.4 The development of the joint funded Connexions Personal Adviser posts for teenage parents was praised but the panel remarked that they needed to be evaluated and monitored regularly to ensure that links are being made to other professionals supporting the young people.

15 Overall rating

15.1 The Partnership's performance and progress overall was rated as Good, which places it in the second from top category within the National Teenage Pregnancy Unit evaluation framework.

15.2 Hampshire was commended for submitting itself for a performance review this year although it was not technically required to do so as an excellent rated authority.

15.3 The panel felt that Hampshire has a strong Partnership with very obvious commitment from a range of agencies. The local teenage pregnancy implementation teams were working well within their areas.

15.4 The comprehensive forward action plan for 2004/06 was praised, with the panel offering suggestions for further improvement on performance measures and the inclusion of strategic objectives. A workshop of all partners to which representatives of other key services were invited, was held in early July in order to review the action plan in the light of the comments from the performance assessment.

15.5 The panel recommended it was now time to review progress and to undertake a risk assessment of the future of the teenage pregnancy strategy as in 2006 it is anticipated that the current grant for teenage pregnancy work may be incorporated into global funding for preventative work in Hampshire. However, indications from the Government's recently published spending review and information accompanying the progress of the Children's Bill may signify that specific funding for local teenage pregnancy strategies may possibly continue for a period beyond 2006 until local joint commissioning arrangements for children's services are in place.

15.6 There was concern that the momentum and current strong leadership of the local teenage pregnancy strategy by the Partnership could be lost if plans were not made soon as to how the teenage pregnancy agenda is covered within the wider plans for developing services for children and young people.

16 Performance against targets

16.1 The latest information available for monitoring Hampshire's performance against the three key targets are as follows:

16.1.1 The under-18 conception rate fell 19.5% from 36.8 in 1998 to 29.6 per thousand young women aged 15-17 in 2002 though this is a provisional figure provided by the Office of National Statistics. (The final figure will be confirmed in November 2004.) This compares to a 9.4% reduction nationally in England since 1998 and suggests that Hampshire may meet both its 2004 and 2010 targets, though it is far too early to be confident in projecting success until the 2002 rate is confirmed and rates until 2006 are known.

16.1.2 The under-16 conception rate in 2001 was 6.9 per thousand young women aged 13-15 compared to a national rate of 7.9. Nationally the rate has declined by 10% since 1998 whilst locally the rate was showing a steady downwards trend from 6.2 in 1998 to 5.4 in 2000. Until the 2002 figures are published, (expected in November 2004), it is not possible to state whether the increase in 2001 was exceptional or a reversal of the downwards trend.

16.1.3 The Government estimated that nationally 30% of young mothers aged 16-19 were in education, employment or training during 2002. It has proved difficult to gather the data needed to monitor the situation in Hampshire. The Connexions service database is being used for this purpose and work is under-way to improve the quality of their data and its analysis.

17 The Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Strategy

17.1 Copies of the Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Strategy and 2004-06 Action Plan have been placed in the Members' Room and are available from [email protected]

18 Links to corporate strategy

18.1 The teenage pregnancy strategy links to the following corporate key aims:

18.1.1 Key area one - maximising life opportunities by reducing the social exclusion of teenage parents and their children.

18.1.2 Key area four - building strong and safe communities by helping young people to be better informed about sex and relationships and building their self-esteem.

18.2 Key area five - improving services by making them easier to access and more appropriate to the needs of young people.

19 Race Relations (Amendments) Act

19.1 An Impact Assessment has been carried out as required within the terms of the legislation, and will be included in revisions to the TP Strategy Action Plan 2004-06 in order to ensure compliance.

20 Recommendations

20.1 The Committee is asked to note the report and the progress achieved.

20.2 The Committee is also asked to commend the achievements of the Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership as a positive example of partnership working in the county.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - Background Documents

The Following documents disclose facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and has been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

NB the list excludes:

1. Published works

2. Documents which disclose exempt of confidential information as defined in the Act.

Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership 2003-4 annual report & assessment

Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership action plan 2004-06

Hampshire Teenage Pregnancy Partnership strategy