1. How do you currently accommodate care leavers/young people (16-24 years
old) within your borough?
Devon Care leavers who require support with accessing accommodation post 18 can – in addition to support from their Devon County Council Personal Advisor – receive support from the Homelessness Prevention Worker/Young People’s Housing Officer in their District Council. This could include support and advice on how to access private rental or social housing, or if this is not an option young people can be referred to supported accommodation via the Homelessness Prevention Panel for their area. If there are no appropriate options available via Homelessness Prevention Panel, and the young person cannot either live independently or live with family or friends then other options will be sought depending on the needs of the young person – this could include temporary accommodation offered through a District Council while longer term options are explored or bespoke options spot purchased by Devon County Council if this is required to meet the needs of the young person.
2. How do you currently provide floating support to 16-24 years old within your borough?
For care leavers not in supported accommodation, but who require floating support to live independently support can be accessed via Homelessness Prevention Panel, who can refer to commissioned floating support. For some young people other options may also be available, e.g. if a young person has care or support needs that meet the threshold for Adult Services they may qualify for an enabler.
3. Can you explain your commissioning processes for the following in respect to 16-24 years old:
a) private accommodation,
b) private accommodation with support
Private accommodation with no support attached would not usually be commissioned by Devon County Council, but would be accessed via Devon Home Choice (for social housing) or private sector landlords (for private sector lettings). Care leavers age 18+ who require support or advice with accessing private accommodation can be supported by their PA and/or a Homelessness Prevention Worker/Young People’s Housing Officer via the District Council.
c) floating support providers
The majority of accommodation with support, including floating support into houses of multiple occupation (HMOs) managed by the support provider, is commissioned via the Homelessness Prevention block contract. This includes a range of provisions, some larger provisions where support is available 24 hours a day through to some smaller HMOs with visits from floating support. There is a separate lot for floating support that is not attached to any property but can be used for young people in e.g. temporary accommodation, private accommodation or family mediation. Some bespoke support may be purchased via spot contract for young people who are not able to access the block contracted options, this is done via spot purchase on a case by case basis.
Do you spot purchase, have framework contracts/agreements or block contracts for these services?
Most commissioning is via the Homelessness Prevention block contract, with occasional bespoke support purchased via spot contract. For 16-18 year olds who are children in care then they will be living in one of the following placement types dependent upon their need.
Semi-Supported Accommodation
Fostering
Children’s homes
For all 3 of the above placement types Devon have a framework contract in place and spot purchase where this is necessary.
4. Do organisations need to go through the tendering process to accommodate and/or provide support for 16-24 years on a spot purchase basis?
Organisations will need to go through Quality Assurance checks and have contracts put in place before they provide a service to care leavers via spot contract. At present quality assurance and contracting for care leavers happens on a case by case basis where this is necessary.
5. For 16-17 years old do you require accommodation and/or support providers to be Ofsted registered?
Semi Supported Accommodation is not required to be registered with Ofsted.
Fostering and Children’s homes are required to be registered with Ofsted.
6. Please specify the number of 16-24 years old you have accommodated in private supported accommodation on a spot purchase basis within the last 12 months? Please break this down between 16-17 and 18-24 users.
16-17 year olds: 28
18+ year olds: 4
7. Do you operate an approved providers list of private accommodation and/or support providers?
Yes, via our framework agreements or Block contract in the case of accommodation based homelessness prevention services.
8. How many 16-17 years old are currently in private supported accommodation? How many are in private accommodation with floating support provided?
We can confirm that as of April 2021 there were 40 young people in this type of placement.
We do not hold further details other than to say that where 16-17 year olds are in what is referred to as Semi supported accommodation or Supported lodgings then there will be a mixture of floating support or full time support which may shift depending on a young persons needs.
9. How many 18-24 years old are currently in private supported accommodation? How many are in private accommodation with floating support provided?
As at the 31st March 2021 there were 43 care leavers age 18+ in supported accommodation via the Homelessness Prevention, Housing and Support in Adulthood contract, 2 who were in supported accommodation, and 3 care leavers age 18+ receiving floating support in private accommodation.
There are 20 young adults 18+ who remained in a Semi Supported accommodation normally used for those that are between the ages of 16-17 years.
10. Please specify the type of support provided for each category in the two questions immediately above – 1) housing support only or 2) housing and personal support or 3) housing with personal support and personal care.
The support provided to the young people mentioned above will be a combination of housing support and personal support. None of them will be receiving personal care.
11. What is the average weekly cost of placing 16-17 years olds in private supported accommodation? Please split the cost separately between the cost of support and the cost of accommodation.
12. What is the average weekly cost of placing 18-24 years old in private supported accommodation? Please split the cost separately between the cost of support and the cost of accommodation.
In response to both questions 11 and 12, disclosure of this information may impact upon the ability of Devon County Council to negotiate future terms and arrangements. Whilst we acknowledge the need for transparency it is not in the public interest to restrict the ability of the council to make the most effective use of public funds in making commercial arrangements. This information is therefore exempt from disclosure pursuant to s.43 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
13. How can a private residential care/private supported accommodation or a floating support provider approach the council when wishing to introduce their service – who is the specific point of contact?
In the first instance to make contact with the Children’s Commissioning team via
childrens commissioning secure – mailbox childrenscommissioningsecure-mailbox@devon.gov.uk
14. Who should be approached within the council to discuss commissioning, service provision, rates, and referrals?
Please see our response to question 13 above.
15. Please can you provide me with a list of all of your top 5 suppliers for private supported accommodation in respect to 16-24-year olds?
16. Please can you provide me with a list of all of your top 5 suppliers for floating support in respect to 16-24-year olds?
In response to questions 15 and 16 an interpretation of “top” would require an opinion rather than data, contrary to s.1 of the Freedom of Information Act. Please feel free to re-submit the questions with specific definitions and we will re- consider the request.