When will the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme start and finish? FAQ: When will the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme start and finish? Expand We are in the very initial stages of the programme now (summer 2021), and we expect the project to run for approximately 12 months, depending on when each phase can be completed. We are working with people and services who may experience crisis situations or uncertainty, so we are prepared for some flexibility in the timings. You can visit the "What Phase is the Project in?" section of our website which explains where we are in the programme, and will include video updates from the programme team.
How is the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme being developed? FAQ: How is the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme being developed? Expand This programme is being co-developed with children and young people with experience of inpatient mental health services, as well as their families/loved ones and supporters. We are supporting young people with greater knowledge of their rights and, together, we are mapping the shared issues they face to human rights standards. This will form the basis of the training for staff, ensuring the young people's experiences are at the heart of the learning we deliver. Find out more about who we have worked with so far in the project, and how to be involved, here. We are also working with 2 Experts by Experience to develop and deliver the programme; find out more about these roles, including how to apply, here
How is the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme funded? FAQ: How is the NHSE CAMHS human rights programme funded? Expand This project is funded by NHS England’s Quality Improvement Taskforce for Children and Young People’s Mental Health Inpatient Services. The Taskforce was established in July 2019 as part of the NHS’s long term plan to transform mental health, autism and learning disability services. You can read more about the Plan and the Taskforce here.
What is the NHSE CAMHS human rights project doing and what is it not doing? FAQ: What is the NHSE CAMHS human rights project doing and what is it not doing? Expand What are we doing? Primarily our activities focus on building the knowledge, skills and confidence of staff to make rights-respecting decisions, and for young people and their supporters to frame their concerns and challenges using human rights law. You can find out about the different project activities in more detail here. What is the programme NOT? This is not a quality mark; participating in this programme does not mean services have a human rights "tick". For services, this programme focuses on ensuring there is a base level of knowledge and confidence to make everyday decisions that uphold human rights, whether that means stepping back and not interfering with a child's rights or stepping in to protect rights, or potentially restricting rights but only doing so within the law. The Human Rights Practice Leads Programme (in Phases 2 and 3) will support this embedding of learning. Being rights-respecting is about every day actions that need to be undertaken every day. It is about taking what it learnt and applying that as the standard way of working. Staff and the service must take responsibility for this and NHSE and the commissioner and the CQC as the regulator have vital roles in ensuring accountability.
Who is involved in the NHSE CAMHS human rights project? FAQ: Who is involved in the NHSE CAMHS human rights project? Expand Funding: This project is funded by NHS England’s Quality Improvement Taskforce for Children and Young People’s Mental Health Inpatient Services. The Taskforce was established in July 2019 as part of the NHS’s long term plan to transform mental health, autism and learning disability services. You can read more about the Plan and the Taskforce here. Lead: Theproject is led by the British Institute of Human Rights (BIHR). BIHR is a leading provider of human rights support needed by people working within, and leading, public services, as well as those relying on such services and their advocates. We have twenty years’ experience of working with a range of health, care, housing, and education services, together with advocates, community groups and people directly to use a human rights approach to deliver positive changes that improve individual outcomes, staff relationships, and organisational culture. You can read more about BIHR Development: The project will workwith children, young people and parents/loved ones, supporters, and advocacy and community groups who have experience of NHSE Children and Young People’s Mental Health Inpatient Services. These groups have been put forward by NHS England; however, there will also be open access workshops available for groups who haven’t yet been involved in the project, see participants, below. Delivery: BIHR will be delivering the programme, and we are appointing 2 Experts By Experience to work with us to develop and deliver the programme, including delivery of the staff and open sessions, monitoring and evaluation, including regular review and refining the materials based on our experience and learning during the programme. You can find out more about applying to be an Expert by Experience consultant here. Participants: The project will work with staff and leadership working within NHSE Children and Young People’s Mental Health Inpatient Services, as a key group of beneficiaries from the programme, supporting them to make rights-respecting decisions in their everyday practice. We will also be running parallel support sessions for young people, parents/loved ones, supporters, advocates and community groups. This is to provide people with more knowledge and confidence to both know their rights, and to assert these when interacting with services.
Why are we focusing on working with staff and people accessing services, rather than other important issues such as the system itself? FAQ: Why direct work and not simply work to fix the health and social care system? Expand We acknowledge that a significant amount of change is needed within the health and social care sector in general, and within children and young people's mental health in-patient services. Too often there are reports and exposes on the poor, often traumatic, experiences people face when they should be receiving support. These are often referred to as failings or bad practice; we call these human rights abuses. We see human rights abuses occurring because there are both systemic issues and because of the everyday interactions between staff, patients, families and supporters. Addressing the systems issues is vital, and big work, which we contribute to through our policy work; but whilst this is happening, people are still experiencing poor decision-making and support which impacts their rights. This programme, therefore, will disrupt that decision-making, moving the discussions away from what is "usually done" or whether something is fair, to what are people's rights and the legal duties to meet these through our everyday actions. This programme is not a magic wand, it is one part of the solution. If we want to prevent human rights abuses, we must start from a point that people know what their human rights are, and what their human rights duties to are and what is required to uphold these rights. That is what this programme focusses on supporting.
Why is BIHR working on a new NHSE CAMHS human rights project? FAQ: Why is BIHR working on a new NHSE CAMHS human rights project? Expand Since the passing of the Human Rights Act (HRA) BIHR has worked with a range of public bodies, services and community groups to support the integration and use of human rights in day to day work. We work across the UK and whilst we work on lots of issues we have a particular expertise in human rights and health and social care. In recent years we've been involved in working with a number of advocacy and support groups, NHS Trusts, and NHS England, encouraging them to make better use of the HRA, and through this for services to meet their legal duties and better support a culture of respect for human rights. Based on our experience, we were invited to share our learning with NHS England’s Quality Improvement Taskforce for Children and Young People’s Mental Health Inpatient Services. It became clear that both staff and patients involved in this work saw a significant gap in human rights practice in children's inpatient mental health services, and the potential for human rights practice to help improve the experiences of children and young people (and their families / supporters) in services. NHSE have asked BIHR to develop a programme of human rights learning to support both staff working in children's inpatient mental health services, with parallel support sessions for young people who are or have accessed these services, their loved ones, advocates and supporters. Find out more about the programme in the remaining FAQs or on the project page.