Doing It For The Kids!

Ealing named Council of the year for Children's Services

‘Children and Young People Now’ magazine named Ealing as Council of the Year at its annual national award ceremony on Thursday, 22 November.

The award was given to Ealing for making the greatest progress in shaping its services to become more child and young person centred. The judges looked in particular at where and how children or young people have played a genuine part in shaping services designed for them.

Achievements over the last year include the launch of the Young Apprenticeship Scheme to get more young school leavers into work. The scheme is already on track to get 100 Ealing young people into real local jobs this year.

Together the young people and the Council have achieved year-on-year improvements in education and nationally Ealing has the highest number of children leaving care who are supported by the borough to go on to university.

The Powerful Voices Conference is held each year to give vulnerable children and those with special educational needs a say on key issues, while The Ealing Youth Action Group, a consultation forum of young representatives from right across the borough, decides priorities for a £200,000 budget to be spent on initiatives for young people.

Councillor Ian Gibb, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services, said: “This is a great achievement, and reflects the hard work of the Council to involve young people, and continuously make our services more child and young person focused. It confirms that services are improving, and we are giving children and young people a powerful voice in the borough and shows we’re starting to achieve our vision of making Ealing a great place for every child and young person to grow up.”

November 29, 2007