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Families At Risk Review

The Social Exclusion Task Force is leading a cross–Whitehall review on excluded families.

The aims of the review are:

• To set out a vision of an effective family support system for families with additional or complex needs.
• To identify barriers and practical solutions to the provision of a coherent whole family approach for these families. A key focus will be on how adult's services respond to their clients as parents or carers.
• To agree action to better integrate adult, child and community services around the needs of excluded families in order to tackle the drivers of deep seated exclusion.

In March 2007 the Social Exclusion Task Force held three conferences to discuss the key points of the review. We also published new data revealing the challenges in reaching families at risk of social exclusion.

• March 2007 conferences and data publication

Reaching Out: Think Family

Reaching Out: Think Family is the first stage of our Families At Risk Review. This report sets out interim analysis and themes on the multiple problems faced by some of the most excluded families in society.

The report focuses on public services and asks what more can be done to improve the outcomes of the small minority of families who continue to experience multiple problems in their lives. In particular, it poses questions to adults’ services about the extent to which they treat their clients as parents and family members. The report suggests that there are opportunities to build on the logic of integration from Every Child Matters to better coordinate all services (including adults' services) so that they can tackle the root causes of families’ disadvantage.

The report includes:

• Analysis of the opportunities to improve systems and coordinate support better.
• New analysis of families facing multiple disadvantage and parent–based risk factors.
• A look at the systems and services that support families, highlighting key issues including the need for greater integration, better identification and intervention through capitalising on the reach of the public sector and ways to incentivise the system to focus on the most excluded families.

The Social Exclusion Task Force will work with stakeholders and other government departments to develop policy proposals to be published in autumn 2007.

• Reaching Out: Think Family (Summary)
• The Think Families report [PDF 530KB, 78 pages]