Wolverhampton Advocacy Service Annual Report Web viewWolverhampton Advocacy Service Annual Report....

Wolverhampton Advocacy Service Annual Report 2016

WAS: a One Voice Service | 2

Foreword

One Voice has run advocacy services for disabled people and their families for many years.

In 2015 One Voice won a contract with City of Wolverhampton Council to deliver advocacy services for disabled people, older people, family carers, and people with drug and/or alcohol misuse issues. The contract runs from 2015/16 -2017/18.

We decided – with City Council agreement – to call it the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service so that people knew it was a new service and was not just a service for disabled people.

This annual report outlines and examines the work done by One Voice on the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service in its first year as an expanded service.

The report measures our progress and achievements in relation to Key Performance Indicators and other targets agreed with the City of Wolverhampton Council in the contract for service delivery.

The work plan targets and our performance against them are listed in the tables on page 5 & 6

Karen RyderManager, One Voice



Table of Contents

Page 4 - Introduction

Part One – Service provision & Feedback

Section 1 : Service Targets and Performance Page 6 - Phase One: April 2015 – September 2015 (tabular)

Page 7 - Phase Two: Annual Targets (tabular)

Page 9 - Key Performance Indicators (tabular)

Section 2 : Advocacy ServicePage 11 - Service Provision

Page 14 - Publicising the Service

Page 15 - Recruiting and Training of Advocates

Section 3 : Service User FeedbackPage 16 - what our users said about us (sample)

Page 18 - User suggestions for improvement

Part Two - Equality Monitoring

Page 20 - Equality Monitoring user statistics

Part Three - Appendices

Page 26 - Publicity Materials & Publications

Page 27 Example of poster to advertise a drop-in

Page 28 Service leaflet refresh

0 Comments, Compliments and Complaints form

Plus attachments



Introduction

In the first 4 years that One Voice had contracts with Wolverhampton City Council to provide a peer advocacy service for people with long term physical and sensory impairments; subsequently we were asked to provide an ad hoc service for other groups of disabled people – people with mental health issues, and people with learning disabilities, and others.

From 2015-2018 we are contracted with City of Wolverhampton Council to provide an advocacy service for:

Disabled People Older people People with substance misuse issues Family Carers

This report concerns our first year as the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service (WAS).

We chose this name so that Wolverhampton citizens who wanted advocacy services would not be confused about it being run by a disabled people’s organisation. We wanted all of our user groups to feel welcome, and understand that it is their advocacy service.We have enjoyed developing our client base, as it has helped our advocates to develop valuable experience, knowledge and expertise in more areas. This help to contribute to our efficiency and capacity.

Sections One and Two cover the service objectives required by item 19 of our contract with Wolverhampton City Council.

If you need a copy of this report in Large Print or on audio cd, please email us:[email protected] you can download a copy of the report on the downloads page of our new advocacy website, here:

http://wolvesadvocacy.uk/downloads/

mailto:[email protected]


Section 1: Service targets and performance


WAS Service delivery Plan Targets PHASE ONE:

April 2015-September 20151. Publicity and Outreach

category detail target achievedPrint/publicity self-help materials in easyread

self-help materials in audio cdprint publicity sent to orgs

50%100%20

N (deferred)YY (27)

Event Publicity Attending relevant events - YWebsite Dedicated website up and

runningIn 1 week Y

outreach Groups to receive outreach info and service

6 Y

2. Form letters and self-helpDebt self-help Debt self-helf pack In 6 months YComplaints self-help Complaints letters self-help In 6 months YBenefits/tribunals self-help Benefits self-help pack In 6 months Y

People request self-help letters/packs

100 Y

3. In-service Training ProgrammeAdvocacy refresher training Every advocate can attend - -Safeguarding training Every in-service advocate must

attend and pass testall Y

(compulsory)Care act training Every advocate can attend - Y All in-

service advocates

Debt Every advocate can attend - Y – 5 advocates

Benefits Training (in house) Every advocate can attend - Y External courses Every advocate can attend and

will be supported- Y

4. Recruitment & SelectionRecruitment of staff member Outreach and encouragement to

external user groups about the vacancy

6 Y – 20 groups contacted

Recruitment of Advocates Outreach and encouragement to groups supporting service users

6 5 completed training

Advocates available to service at any time

10 8-16 depending on health



WAS Service delivery Plan Targets PHASE TWO:

Annual TargetsCategory Details Target achieved

1. Ensure reach and balance of service to all user groupsAdvocacy Service will be taken up across user groups

Gaps in provision identified and acted upon

- (y) see equality monitoring & user monitoring

Publicity accessible to user groups Website updated weekly 52 pa (y) updated 56 times(plus Directory 184 articles ported from 1voice website)

New/updated publications[Nw = new; U = updated]

6 (y) Care Act (Nw)Debt self-help pack(U)Benefits Pack (N)Complaints pack (N)Service Leaflet (Nw+U)ESA pack (NW)Moving Home (Nw)DoLs (Nw)Into Work (U)Medical Assessment(Nw)

publications downloaded[N.B. server app records top 10 publication downloads from website per month, so these figures are the minimum verified downloads]

200 (Y) Tot:670

57 care act55 benefits pack31 Debt pack 151 wills79 service leaflet78 Which Benefit leaflet59 PIPs points140 Into work9 Disability Hate Crime11 Complaints pack

Also 270 hosted leaflets from other organisations

2. Form letters and self helpLetters and self help packs in debt& money management, benefits, complaints

Form letters/packs available online & in print and audio by request

100/yr D/L: 97Print: 42Audio: 7

Intro to advocacy skills Half day courses offered to community groups

5 in lifetime contract

(N) deferred

3. In-service Training ProgrammeAdvocacy refresher training Every advocate can attend all (Y )

3 courses in yr, all working advocates attended 2 or more

Benefits Training (in house) Every advocate can attend - (Y) 3 courses 26 trained

External courses Every advocate can attend and will be supported

- (Y) - 8 advocates completing mental health NVQ

4. Advocacy Service ProvisionExpanded hours and venues for service to suit user need

Services users can have appointment between 9-7 weekdays and on Saturday mornings

- Y

Advocate Groups Advocates will meet to access in house training, share good practice and difficulties

4/year Y 10

5. Monitoring, Evaluation and Development



Output Target Performancehours of service delivered to

individuals

Average

12hrs or fewer

12hrs or fewer

297 closed cases:196 <12 hours (c9hrs 45 mins)101 >12hrs: (c 23 hrs 20 mins)Care Act, Child Protection, Duke Street, people with learning disabilities:

297 closed cases average: 10hrs 50minsOpen cases excluded

Number of people expressing satisfaction with service

95% 100% of those returning compliments and complaints sheet

Number of Advocacy Training Courses p.a,

1 1

Number of people per advocacy course

6 6 (5 completed)

Number of local people reaching Level 2 advocacy p. a.

6 5

Minimum no. peer advocates available in pool (by 1/4/16)

10 15 (varied between 8-16 through year)

Individual Plan 10 working days

99.5% within 10 days0.5% outside target by client choice

Individual Plan Review 3 months/When circumstanceschange

Reviewed for circumstance change at each meeting

Advocacy Support Group 4+ p.a. 9 in yearService review incl user satisfaction survey

25% of usersAt least once a year

Reviewed 4 times in yearUser survey completed by 161 people (

Quality Standards (WCC) Monitored by WCCQuality Assurance

Targets in Quality Assurance report met

Key Performance IndicatorsThe contract we have with City of Wolverhampton Council includes a list of targets to assess how we progress in terms of measureable performance targets. These are called Key Performance Indicators. They are listed below along with the targets set by the Council for us to achieve during the lifetime of the contract. Our performance so far is listed also.



Outcome Indicators Indicators/methodology performance1. individuals are able to plan their own goals and support

100% of individuals have appropriate advocacy support plan

Support plan contains SMART objectivesreviewed @ change or 3 months accessible formats of plans

Y insofar as possibleY @ each meeting

Y2. Individuals are involved in decisions about service delivery

Can express opinions appropriately & with confidence

Individuals attend meetings taking opps for service/org development

Feedback from professionals “across the table”

Individual Feedback

Y see feedback forms

Some advocates initially service usersService users invited to other things (eg meetings, consults)

3. Individuals understand their rights

Individuals understand rights & responsibilities re service

Feedback from individualsFeedback from stakeholdersEvidence from advocacy planEvidence from 3 C’sNumber of safeguarding referrals

Y

Partnership agreementY3 made directly (no further action taken)

4. Individuals are achieving their own goals

Individuals are involved in shaping their advocacy support plan goals.Individuals accesseducational, social or community activities.

Number of individuals achieving identified goalsNumber of individuals on education/training sessionsNumber of individuals maintaining employment or voluntary work.Individual Feedback

Some goals cannot be met eg “keep my children” win my court case “get my benefit”But we record the goals identified by the client and the input the advocate will have

5. Individualsincrease inconfidence,motivation andanxiety levelsdecrease

Individuals try newtasks.Individuals trustsupport staff.Individuals set theirown goals.

Feedback from individuals.Feedback from stakeholdersEvidence of individuals setting goals in advocacy support plan.

See user feedback

Partnership agreement

6. Individualsindependenceincreases.

need for support decreases.Individuals have clear exit strategies in support plans.

Number of individuals no longer requiring advocacyNumber of Individuals requiring reducedadvocacy supportNumber of advocacy support hours reduces over time.

7. Wolverhamptonnon statutoryAdvocacycontract holdersAdvocacy supportNetwork

Wolverhamptonadvocacy supportnetwork in place Organisations canshare training & if appropriate cross refer

advocacy cases.

Progress towards achievement of singleservice modelOrganisations share information, advocatesand advocacy support materials for thebenefit of clients.• Organisations share

No progress.West midlands model now in operation



Section 2 : Service Provision

In our first year at the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service, we have provided advocacy for 401 people. This is 216% of our previous year’s total, and is in excess of the sum of previously contracted advocacy services in the city. Of these cases, 297 were started and finished within the year, 104 continue largely because we are providing advocacy around an issue that requires intermittent support – such as helping a person with a learning disability to come to a decision about supported housing.

To ensure that we were reaching new groups we provided drop-in advocacy sessions bi-monthly at community venues visited by our service user groups.

We provided a drop-in service for people with drug or alcohol dependency issues at Aquarius 24 times in the year;

Once the new Creative Support hub for people with mental health issues was up and running we provided regular fortnightly drop-ins – 12 of these in 2015/16

We provided 10 drop-ins at Access for Independence.

The graph below shows the breakdown of referrals, open and closed for the 2015 – 2016 project term.

0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450

cases opened & closedcases still openusers

Referrals/users: 401Cases still open at end of year 104Cases opened & closed in year 297



The graph below shows the breakdown of where our referrals came from and the number of cases from different providers:

self-referralsocial workersDEAsCreative Supportadvocatescare homesAge UKPenn HospitalAquarius/Recovery near youHealthy MindsSENCOsCouncillors (WCC)Heantun HousingWomens wellbeingWVSCLife DirectAccess to BusinessVoiceabilityMencap Direct PaymentsWolverhampton UniversityWelfare RightsSCOPEChildren's societyaction for kidsAutism West MidlandsNavjeevanHealthwatchP3shared lives

The majority of referrals are self-referrals or referrals from social workers.



Service AreasService users engage the advocacy service for a wide range of issues, but they can be grouped into the following general headings:

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

care actbenefitschild protectionhousingNHSdebtlegal advicesafeguardingtransition servicescourtsDirect Paymentsasbo/policemobilitycounciladaptationsemployment



PublicityThe increase in user groups we serve in the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service has – as expected – greatly increased the number of service users we are able to work with.

More groups know about us, and more agencies and officers refer people to our service.

But we realise it is important to make ourselves known in Wolverhampton’s communities, in order to ensure the maximum number of people know about our service and how to access it.

We have attempted to address this by increasing the mode and number of our promotional activities in the following ways:

Visiting community/user groups to talk about our service, Regular drop-in service at venues that our client groups use, Attending events to publicise our service, Word-of-mouth of current/past service users Listings in online and print service directories

We do regular drop-ins at the Creative Support Hub, Access for Independence, Aquarius, Carer’s Support, and irregular and one off drop-ins at other groups as requested.

We have contacted or done presentations at partner organisations, including Access to Business, Age UK, WFTA, Wolverhampton Homes, Eyes, LGBT, Gender Matters, Voice4Parents, Aquarius, Equality and Diversity Group, and Mental Health Groups.

We attended 25 events – some user-group specific, and some more general community events.

We wrote articles for The Spread, the WFTA newsletter, and Shape magazine about the service.

We distributed over 600 of our leaflets during the year, and refreshed it several times to keep people picking it up.

We produced eye-catching posters which were distributed to community venues or drop-in venues.

Examples of a poster and a leaflet can be seen in the Appendix p27, 28-29

Publications

Over 20 publications are available on our website. The following publications have been created or substantially updated in the year 2015/16. Some were researched and produced in response to service user suggestions from our feedback forms or from our advocacy practice: service leaflet & service leaflet redesign, Moving Home checklist (requested), DoLs (requested), letters of complaint pack, debt pack (updated), Benefits Pack, ESA Pack, Into work, Medical Assessments (requested), Care Act.



Advocates

Recruitment

Over the year, we successfully trained 5 advocates.

These were service users of drug/alcohol misuse services. We considered this a priority, as we did not have any advocates specifically from those user groups, and we believe that our service users should be able to access a peer advocacy service, where people have experience and expertise to understand their issues.

The number of advocates available to the service varied at different periods throughout the year, due to ill health, holidays, impairment-related issues, and advocates moving to another region.We had between 8 and 16 advocates available to support the service at any one time, and always managed to meet our response time targets.

Training

We ensure that all of our NVQ2 practising advocates have refresher training, safeguarding training, and paperwork & policy training.

Additionally, we encourage each of our advocates to come to in-house training at monthly/bi-monthly advocate meetings, to help them expand their knowledge and their usefulness to the service users.

We provided training on the Care Act, capacity, reasonable adjustments and good practice, disability benefits, universal credit, completing forms, using social media.

We also kept our advocates informed of all free external courses, and supported their learning through these courses.

A majority of our advocates are doing various NVQ units on Mental Health Awareness in partnership with the University. Some of our advocates have signed up for a range of Welfare Rights Team courses around Carer’s benefits, Universal Credit, and Child Benefits.


Section 3: Service user feedback


We had 100% positive comments from the service users who filled in our comments, complaints, and compliments form, as well as some really good suggestions, most of which we have now implemented. Here are some of the things users said:

they were excellent.I couldn’t have done it without their help

It was very quick – I now have something to eat

Fantastic Service!Very professional but still friendly

Home visit is very good

Very Happy. They got ...[CEO of another organisation} to ring me and help me solve the problem

i was very nervous about coming to see an advocate. It took me 2 appointment to get here, but i have been met with kindness and understanding and [advocate] is doing the best to help me

Now I can sleep at night – no more worry!

I knew what i wanted to say, but didn’t know how to get it done on paper. They helped me write a professional letter that got results

i am happy with the help as well as the result

they gave me reassurance and peace of mind. I was able to access the service through the LGBT drop-in

excellent research on a very complicated continuing care law matter

helped me to understand what kind of evidence i needed to get

Easy to talk to – very thourough

All i can say is thank you! Keep on doing what you

do



161 users returned their user feedback questionnaire – our Complaints, Compliments and Comments form ( Appendix p30). We think this number can be improved, and we have told all our advocates to requet and encourage users to fill in the feedback form. We hope for an increased percentage/number in the coming years, as a result.

Of those users completing a form, 99.4% were either happy or very happy with our service.1 user left the happy/unhappy question blank but commented “everyone is on the side of housing” and did not get the outcome he hoped for – we have interpreted this as being unhappy with the service, but have not made any changes to the service as a result.

Some comments are posted on our website (http://wolvesadvocacy.uk/what-u-say/ ) and are replicated here on page 16. Here are the other comments written on the form:

“now i can sleep at night” “service is good”

“[another organisation] were not very helpful, didn’t give me enough time and refused to fill out the form with me. I went to one voice and they give me the time i need for my depression so i could do it over 4 sessions.”

“i was comfortable with the advocate”

“xcellent service” “easy to talk to”

“open and honest” “one voice is brilliant”

“I knew what i wanted to say, but didn’t know how to get it don on paper. They helped me write a professional letter that got results”

“excellent research and legal knowledge”

“members of staff very helpful”

“everything was explained to me so i understood”

“it [meeting] went well because [WAS] was there to help me”

“I wish i had contacted you earlier. It would have saved a lot of upset”

“very happy with the amount of time taken to sort things out”

“thank you very very much. I would have found it impossible to do without you”

“thanks to the advocate who went through it with me”

“very happy with the info given – i will tell friends”

“i was very happy with the help i got”

“Excellent information and advice about my choices”

“very helpful and reassuring”

http://wolvesadvocacy.uk/what-u-say/



User SuggestionsThe user feedback form gives all users the opportunity to suggest improvements or changes to the service.

Below are the suggestions (bold), and the action taken/planned (italic):

Advertise/promote service more we have increased our leaflet distribution, our electronic reach (facebook, twitter, service website, presence on local aggregate websites), the events we go to – most of which was planned.

1voice doesn’t need to improve

leaflet to explain guardianship papers This has been deferred due to time required, but will be done

Information on DoLs leaflet published

I want one voice to continue coming to my centre we have expanded our drop in service

More people using one voice advocacy achieved, and planned target

leaflet on what happens at PIP medical written and published

funding to continue

more services do drop-ins at LGBT we have promoted the idea of service drop – ins in our meetings with other organisations

info about council tax for pensioners planned for next quarter

website needs a restyle substantial restyle planned and achieved in summer 2016

We keep a running counter on our website of what percentage of our users’ suggestions have been put into operation. It changes as new suggestions are added, so you can check progress at any time. On April 30th 2016 it looked like this

If a user cannot or does not access our website and wants to know of progress on his/her suggestion, we will contact them in the manner of their choice.



This section contains the equality data for service users of the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service for 2015/16

We strongly encourage each service user that we meet face-to-face to fill in our user equality data forms if they are able, or fill it in with them.

This year, of the 402 people seen by the advocacy service, 320 completed equality monitoring forms.

You can see a copy of the form we use in the appendix p30

The breakdown of service users who completed forms is in various equality related charts below.

Sex/Gender Identity of users

malefemaletrans



Race/Ethnic Background

Black BritishBlack AfricanBlack CarribeanBlack OtherAsian BritishAsian OtherWhite BritishWhite OtherOtherRefusal

Impairment/DisabilityI

86%

13%1%

yes no not recorded



Impairments of Users

mental healthlearning disabilityCancer Cardiac/vascularbrain injurymobilityarthritis/widespread painhearingmanual dexterityVisualLong term medical conditionautismcopd/lung

gay/lesbianstraight/heterosexualbisexualnot recorded

Sexual Orientation


up to 1819-3031-4041-5051-6061-65Over 65not recorded


Age Group

Religion or belief system

ChristianMuslimbuddistsikhhindunonenaturalistnot recordedathiestpagan


Marital/family status


Married/co-habitCivil partnershipdivorcedSingle/widowedLiving with familyPrefer not to say/blankResidential facility



AppendicesThe purpose of the Appendices is to include examples of our work, evidencing how our publications and publicity meets agreed targets, any new paperwork we use with our clients and other things that don’t readily fit into the main body of the report.

This year we include the following:

poster advertising drop-ins

WAS leaflet

User feedback (Comments, compliments and Complaints) form.

The following publications are added to this report as attachments:

Moving home

Letter of complaint example

Medical assessments document

DoLs document



Your Postcode ________________________________ Date_________

What help did you want from Wolverhampton Advocacy Service?

______________________________________________________

______________________________________________________

Did you get the help you needed?

yes no

Tell us about it:

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

On balance were you happy or unhappy with the service? Why?

_____________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________

How could the Wolverhampton Advocacy Service improve?

____________________________________________________

____________________________________________________

Would you like us to do something as a result of your comments?

____________________________________________________

____________________________________________________

If you want feedback on your comments, please put your contact details on the back of this form.

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