Follow-up Extraordinary Bridge Forum Meeting – Community Mental Health Transformation 9th March

Extraordinary Bridge Forum Meeting

Community Mental Health Transformation

Developing a VCFSE Mental Health Alliance

 Tuesday 9^th March 2022, 1:00pm to 2.30pm, Teams Meeting

Full notes are attached at the end of the post, along with presentation slides and an Expression of Interest form.

1:00 – 1:10   Welcome, Introductions and Purpose – Micha Woodworth

1:10 – 1:25   Recap & Update from first meeting held 12^th January – Mark Trewin, Head of Alliance Building, Community Mental Health Unit, Rethink

• What does this mean for your organisation?
• Update on East Cheshire/West Cheshire Alliance building
• Role of people with lived experience

1:25 – 1:40    Mental Health Asset Grant Funding Programmes – Wirral

• Tomorrows Women
• Journey Men
• Community Capacity Builders
• Next Chapter

1:40 – 1:45    Developing a Wirral VCSE Mental Health Alliance Terms of Reference – Darlene Martin, Community Engagement Manager, Cheshire & Wirral, Rethink

• Why a Terms of Reference?
• What should be included

1:45 – 1:50   Comfort Break

1:50 – 2:15   Breakout Rooms

2:15 – 2:25    Feedback from group discussions

2:25 – 2.30 Next Steps and Summing Up – Mark Trewin, Rethink and Micha Woodworth

Recap & Update from first meeting held 12^th January – Mark Trewin, Rethink
(Powerpoint presentation below; full notes available here)

• This work is happening all over the country – encouraging voluntary sector organisations to work together, build alliances, co-produce
• Experts by Experience are also attending – key principle to try to co-produce with people who use mental health services
• Key question for today: how are we going to form a voluntary sector alliance that could work alongside the local authority and NHS?
• Money for this work is coming from NHS England – the goal is to share it and spend it jointly with local authorities and voluntary sector rather than all within the NHS
• Key principles for Rethink:
  • Rethink are not bidding on any funding or setting up new services
  • Work should be co-produced by those who live in the area and by experts by experience
  • We should wrap care around people
  • We need to shift power away from large organisations to people and communities
  • This is a partnership between primary and secondary care, local authorities, and the voluntary sector
• Can we change the way we procure services? Less competition (which disadvantages smaller organisations), more working together?
• Can we minimize referrals between agencies?
• Alliance-building – looking at a formal alliance that is able to work directly as an equal partner with the NHS and local authority
  • Shared vision
  • Building trust and relationships
  • Governance systems
  • Terms of reference
• Different places are doing different things – using Somerset as an example as they’ve been working on this for 2 years
• CWP are committed to thinking about radical and different ways of working
• Alliance working should also empower the smallest organisations, including those who don’t have capacity to be part of the alliance itself – small grants work

Experts by Experience

Chris

• This is a once in a generation opportunity for people who use services/need services/may feel excluded to have a real say in decision making
• Grew up on the Wirral – it used to feel like things were being done ‘to’ me rather than with or for me – this has started to change in my lifetime
• People with lived experience must have a seat at the table – this money is coming in once, we have to get it right!

Lynsey

• Working with people is very positive – there seems to be a genuine desire for change
• ‘Once in a generation’ opportunity as Chris said

Garrick

• Individuals really have the opportunity to contribute to a better mental health service
• People with a diverse range of conditions/lived experiences can contribute
• The new model should mean that co-production really means co-production
• This has the opportunity to be radical and very positive for the future

Mental Health Asset Grant Funding Programmes – Wirral

• 16 organisations given funding across East Cheshire/West Cheshire/Wirral
• Have asked some of the Wirral organisations to present the work they’re doing and how to access them
• Trying to connect to housing associations also to raise awareness of what’s available

Questions in terms of who was successful/who wasn’t and what opportunities will look like moving forward

• Darlene can send out a list of successful projects
• Transparency is crucial so we can work together moving forward

Developing a Wirral VCSE Mental Health Alliance

Important to understand what’s in it for organisations – what would it mean in practice?

• Benefits in terms of resources, relationships, finances
• We’re all here because we’re passionate about making change, but we need to be clear about the benefits for VCF organisations

Key focus – procurement as a collective

Synergy with existing alliance-building work on the Wirral

Prevention and after-care:

• Age UK Wirral: where is prevention and after-care in this model, as well as support for carers?
• Rethink: prevention isn’t as strong as we’d like it to be. We can strengthen it by having local authorities involved as they have legal responsibility for

NHS awareness of community services

• Wirral Change – will the alliance ensure that patients already within the NHS are directed to community and voluntary services? We’ve had quite a few referrals from junior doctors who have just found out about our services
• People need holistic support with social inclusion as well as clinical support – is there space for us as an alliance to be mentioned by e.g. GPs when people present with mental health concerns?
• Rethink – the point of the alliance is non-clinical services, so alliance working together with NHS should raise awareness of what’s available locally

Capacity and making sure people can get involved:

• Smaller organisations don’t always have capacity to join meetings – how do we ensure everyone is part of the conversation?
• Can send out questions by email and give people more time to response
• Using Healthwatch Wirral and CWP to reach as many people as possible

Gaps – doesn’t cover children and young people

• Koala NW – is it important for us to be involved as we work closely with children and young people’s mental health?
• Healthwatch Wirral – importance of whole family approach – we extended the invitation widely
• Rethink – the framework is focused on adults but we have had a lot of feedback about the need for similar transformation in children and young people’s services
• Transition points are important – moving from children’s services to adult services
• Whole family services should be involved in the alliance

Terms of Reference

Next steps

• Please complete expression of interest form and return to Rethink if you haven’t already
• Next session to focus on terms of reference – looking at May dates
• Connect with other areas who have already set up alliances to find out how they’re doing it/what the outcomes have been

Follow-up Extraordinary BRIDGE Forum – Community Mental Health Transfomation Mar 22 minutes

Expression of Interest

Summary of the Rethink Tranformation Approach March 22 Final C and W