Families First Partnership Programme
The Families First Partnership (FFP) Programme is a UK government-led initiative by the Department for Education to transform children's social care.
The 2026 guidance is newly aligned with the updated Working Together to Safeguard Children 2026 and the refreshed Children’s Social Care: National Framework. This aligns to York’s Meaningful Measures and Building Brighter Futures Practice Framework.
It shifts focus toward early intervention, prevention, and seamless multi-agency collaboration, to support families before crises escalate.
All local authorities are set to implement the reforms by March 2027.
The FFP Programme focuses on the following key pillars and structural changes:
Family Help
A non-stigmatising, community-based service that integrates early help and child-in-need systems. It provides a single point of access and assigns a lead practitioner to coordinate tailored support. York will have five Family Help Teams based in North, Centre, West and East, aligning to the Education Clusters. Teams will be co-located at SEND Central, Hob Moor and The Avenues.
You can find out more on the Raise York website.
Multi-Agency Child Protection Teams
York have agreed there will be one Multi-Agency Child Protection Team (MACPT) to provide consistency across York. This will be launched on 1 October 2026 with core membership including Social Work qualified Lead Child Protection Practitioners, Police, Health and Education, as well as multi-agency peripheral members providing decisive child protection intervention.
The Team will offer case consultation to the wider Family Help system for families receiving support.
The Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) will continue as York’s integrated front door.
Family Group Decision Making
An approach that empowers the wider family network to actively participate in decision-making and planning to keep children safe at home. There is increased focus on having trained facilitators and York will retain its Family Group Conference Coordinators. York will provide a graduated offer with partners being supported to promote family networks through new guidance, tools and training. York has developed its offer for Family Network Support Packages to provide financial support to keep families together.
The ultimate goal is to provide the "right help at the right time" by breaking down siloes between agencies, thereby keeping children safe and reducing the reliance on statutory interventions.
Workforce development
Local areas are required to have a system-wide workforce development plan.
York have created a Families First induction programme and are reviewing skills to ensure partners are supported to access development opportunities, including briefings, training, resources and group supervision.
Please look out on MyLo and search ‘Families First’.
Updated policies and procedures
Early Help and Family Help
The Continuum of Need / Threshold Document has been updated by the City of York Children Safeguarding Partnership in line with the Families First Programme.
The aim of Families First is to ensure that every family can access the right help and support when they need it, with a strong emphasis on early intervention to prevent crisis, this supports our vision within the city of York.
This document sets out family support and what intervention may be needed to support children and their families, while ensuring children are protected from abuse or neglect.
The Early Help Tool has been developed with families and practitioners. It is now called "Our Family Support Needs and Plan", focused on the strengths, networks and promoting wellbeing.
The Early Help Practice Guidance seeks to support partners to meet the expectations set out in the Working Together to Safeguard Children 2026 statutory guidance that stipulates universal services and community-based early help will ‘improve a family’s resilience and outcomes or reduce the chance of a problem getting worse’. This states partners need effective ways ‘to identify problems and potential unmet needs’ and know ‘what action to take to support early identification and assessment’.
We know that navigating Children’s Services can be complex therefore the Local Assessment Protocol has been developed to aid practitioners understanding of what happens when a child is referred into Children’s Services.
Family Group Decision Making
The Partner Practice Guide covers the inclusion of the family network as integral to the support for a family and the facilitation of a family network meeting.
This inclusion of the family’s network is a part of York’s continuum of Family Led Decision-Making
Multi-Agency Child Protection
The Child Protection Guide for Parents and Carers is a guide to the Child Protection process for families, parents and carers, outlining the meeting, rights and supports available.
If a Section 47 for your child has been undertaken and this is progressing to a Child Protection Conference, families can request support from a parent advocate.
Thie Parent Advocacy Programme brochure outlines the support available
The Procedures for Child Protection Conferences and Core Group Meetings outline the processes and expectations for Child Protection Conferences and Core Group Meetings for all multi-agency professionals.
General
The Escalation Practice Guidance sets out how concerns about professional disagreement, decision‑making, threshold application, or safeguarding practice are escalated within the City of York Children Safeguarding Partnership to ensure children’s safety and timely, effective intervention.
The Group Supervision Guidance provides a shared understanding of Group supervision definition and purpose, circumstances in which group supervision may be helpful, what to expect at a group supervision and participant roles and responsibilities when taking part.
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