Social Work Resources - Resource Plan progress

Social Work Resources - Quarter 2 progress

Progress reports on the Resource Plans are provided at the mid-year point (Quarter 2).

Our performance management reporting system IMPROVe uses a traffic light format with the following definitions to give a status report on each action or performance measure:

Status	Definition
Blue	Project complete
Green	The timescale or target has been met as per expectations
Amber	There has been minor slippage against timescale or minor shortfall against target
Red	There has been major slippage against timescale or major shortfall against target
Report later	The information is not yet available to allow us to say whether the target has been reached or not. This will be reported when available.
Contextual	Included for "information only", to set performance information in context.

The overall summary of Resource Plan progress to date is as follows:

Status	Statistical measures	Project measures	Total	%
Blue	0	0	0	0%
Green	12	5	17	71%
Amber	0	0	0	0%
Red	3	1	4	17%
Report later/Contextual	1	2	3	12%
Totals	16	8	24	100%

Data as at 15 October 2025

Key achievements to date against each of the six Connect Outcomes are summarised below:

Connect Outcome - Communities and environment

Since 1 April 2025, there have been over 75 individual submissions of people’s experiences within Justice Services shared on Care Opinion. The stories highlight the impact interventions and relationship-based practice has had through their journey in justice services. This feedback is being used as part of developing Justice’s Outcome framework in partnership with Matter of Focus later in the year.
Additionally, South Lanarkshire University Health and Social Care Partnership’s blog on ‘The power of lived experiences in Justice Services’ appeared on the national Care Opinion website. The blog spotlights the innovative work underway across the partnership in Justice Services, with the dedication to listening and learning truly prevalent. The blog speaks volumes to how important it is to champion Care Opinion, with the “strong, proactive network of Care Opinion Champions, who play a pivotal role in encouraging and supporting staff” being integral in this success.

Connect Outcome - Health and wellbeing

MAPPA (Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements) Lanarkshire aims to minimise the potential risks posed by serious violent and sexual offenders. To ensure the safety of the public and reduce the risk of harm, MAPPA can use a variety of safeguarding measures such as surveillance, curfews, electronic tagging, and sexual offence prevention orders. MAPPA Lanarkshire is delivered through a partnership between South and North Lanarkshire Councils and is one of 10 areas across the country which were each established in 2007. Each MAPPA area works with a number of different organisations including Police Scotland, the Scottish Prison Service, and the NHS.
The team at MAPPA Lanarkshire won the title of Outstanding External Partner at the Police Scotland Lanarkshire Excellence Awards at a ceremony held on Tuesday 6 May within the Hamilton Town House.
Take Control, the commissioned Support for independent advice and information on Self-Directed Support, has now established a base within one of our local offices. They continue to bring service users and carers together in the provision of specific topic information such as recruitment of personal assistants, independent living funds, and managing direct payments.
Lanarkshire Carers is celebrating 30 years of Caring in Lanarkshire. During Carers Week, June 2025, a range of activities were undertaken to raise awareness to carers supports and services. South Lanarkshire University Health and Social Care Partnership raised awareness to Carers Week (Caring in the workplace) with the flag raising ceremony, information sessions for staff, and publication of a carer’s information booklet.
The Decider Skills Groupwork Programme for men in South Lanarkshire Justice Services was launched in July 2025. This groupwork is based on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and Dialectical Behavioural Therapy and focuses on mental wellbeing and emotional regulation. The skills are designed to help people identify their own thoughts, feelings and behaviours and thus enable them to be more resilient, resourceful, responsible, mindful of their actions and as such support the development of more pro-social behaviours. This has been implemented within the Hamilton/Blantyre locality team and to date 6 groups have commenced. There have been 51 referrals in total with 32 people engaged and continuing to attend.

Connect Outcome - Children and young people

South Lanarkshire Family Connections Team established the Birth Roots support service in August 2025 to support birth parents whose children have been adopted. The service is due to launch in October 2025 and offers a safe understanding space where parents whose children have been adopted can talk, take part in group activities, or just spend time with others who have been through something similar. There is no pressure, the team want to listen and walk alongside participants and offer one to one support; group sessions; peer support; support with letterbox contact; practical support; support with access to other health and wellbeing services; and support and advice on dealing with trauma and loss.

In addition to working towards the Connect Outcomes, we will continually aim to improve and ensure effective and efficient use of resources, and that business will be conducted with integrity and transparency and will operate to the highest standards. In order to monitor and report progress against these values, Resource outcomes have also been identified, under the heading Delivering the Plan and achieving Best Value. Related achievements to date are summarised below:

Landlines in the UK are going digital. The existing analogue technology (the PSTN - Public Switched Telephone Network) which has supported phone, broadband and community alarm services for decades is being retired and switched off in January 2027. In advance of this the Council embarked on a large-scale programme to replace over 7,000 community alarms with new digital-ready devices and to implement new digitally ready Alarm Receiving Centre software, replacing outdated systems with a more resilient cloud-based solution. This work was completed over the summer of 2025 and offers efficiencies through flexible working, better data access and improved response to service interruption through the introduction of enhanced monitoring capability.

Progress to date against the full suite of measures is contained in the Resource Plan progress report, presented to the Social Work Resources Committee

Measures that have been classified as ‘red' (major slippage against timescale or shortfall against target) are noted below, together with reasons and management actions being taken, and the management action now being taken, where applicable.

Delivering the plan and achieving Best Value

Resource Outcome: Embed sustainable development across services

Measure	Comments/Progress	Action by Manager
Recycle and reuse community alarms	The Technology Enabled Care (TEC) team aims to identify and recycle 60 alarms per month; this target has not been achieved for the reporting period. To date, 273 alert alarms in total have been reused, saving £46,200 and contributing to environmental sustainability. In quarter 2, there was a total of 82 alert alarms recycled and reused, contributing to savings of £13,776.	O2 is switching off the 2G network, which means the service needs to replace around 3,000 older digital alert alarms with newer 4G models. Unfortunately, the old 2G alarms cannot be recycled, which has temporarily affected the recycling performance. Once all the new alarms are installed, the service expects the recycling performance figures to return to normal. This situation is outwith South Lanarkshire Council’s control.

Delivering the plan and achieving Best Value

Resource Outcome: For those who have committed offences, safely and effectively support them to reintegrate into the community and realise their potential for the benefit of all

Measure	Comments/Progress	Action by Manager
The percentage of people on CPO unpaid work requirement seen within five working days by their case manager	To date, 69% (203 out of 296) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Work requirement were inducted within 5 working days. In quarter 2, this has decreased to 67% (81 out of 121) from 69% in quarter 1.	To date, 39% of orders imposed were Level 1 orders (orders where there is no justice social work report requested by the court prior to the order commencing and therefore the service is unable to engage with the service user before court appearance).
The percentage of people starting their placement within seven days of a CPO's unpaid work	To date, 68% (200 out of 296) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Requirement commenced within 7 working days. In quarter 2, 65% (79 out of 121) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Requirement commenced within 7 working days, which is a decrease in performance from 69% in quarter 1.	Both Level 1 and Level 2 orders saw a decrease in performance from Q1 to Q2. Level 1 orders: 58% (23/40) inducted within timescale in Q2, down from 63% in Q1. Level 2 orders: 73% (58/80) inducted within timescale in Q2, down from 74% in Q1. The average days from the order imposed to Social Work receiving notification is: Level 1: 0.8 days Level 2: 1 day The service is actively monitoring these metrics to identify and implement improvements following notification. In response to the growing number of people who receive unpaid work who, for health or other reasons, are not able to attend or fully engage with such an order, the service has introduced a new assessment tool at the justice social work report stage. The primary aim of this assessment is to help the report author evaluate, through engagement with the unpaid work service, whether unpaid work is an appropriate disposal option for each individual. This will ensure more information is provided to the court regarding those who are considered suitable or unsuitable for such a disposal.

Measure

Comments/Progress

Action by Manager

The percentage of people on CPO unpaid work requirement seen within five working days by their case manager

To date, 69% (203 out of 296) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Work requirement were inducted within 5 working days. In quarter 2, this has decreased to 67% (81 out of 121) from 69% in quarter 1.

To date, 39% of orders imposed were Level 1 orders (orders where there is no justice social work report requested by the court prior to the order commencing and therefore the service is unable to engage with the service user before court appearance).

The percentage of people starting their placement within seven days of a CPO's unpaid work

To date, 68% (200 out of 296) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Requirement commenced within 7 working days. In quarter 2, 65% (79 out of 121) Community Payback Orders with an Unpaid Requirement commenced within 7 working days, which is a decrease in performance from 69% in quarter 1.

Both Level 1 and Level 2 orders saw a decrease in performance from Q1 to Q2.

Level 1 orders:

58% (23/40) inducted within timescale in Q2, down from 63% in Q1.

Level 2 orders:

73% (58/80) inducted within timescale in Q2, down from 74% in Q1.

The average days from the order imposed to Social Work receiving notification is:

Level 1: 0.8 days

Level 2: 1 day

The service is actively monitoring these metrics to identify and implement improvements following notification.

In response to the growing number of people who receive unpaid work who, for health or other reasons, are not able to attend or fully engage with such an order, the service has introduced a new assessment tool at the justice social work report stage.

The primary aim of this assessment is to help the report author evaluate, through engagement with the unpaid work service, whether unpaid work is an appropriate disposal option for each individual. This will ensure more information is provided to the court regarding those who are considered suitable or unsuitable for such a disposal.

Delivering the plan and achieving Best Value

Resource Outcome: Digital and ICT services meet the needs of the council and its customers

Measure	Comments/Progress	Action by Manager
Develop a fully comprehensive familiarisation and training plan to support business change processes for the implementation of the Social Work IT system replacement	The implementation of the new system continues to work towards a revised go-live timescale. Whilst the project remains behind the originally planned timeline, significant work is being progressed in relation to final system configuration, data migration, testing and training.	The Project Plan is currently under review with a revised timescale for go-live to be confirmed. There is a number of dependencies to determine a revised date, one of which is the availability of the supplier to support an updated timescale.

Measures in the quarterly progress reports which are not blue, red, amber or green can be assigned a status of ‘report later’ or ‘contextual’. A further analysis introduced to aid scrutiny of performance is to follow up on the measures in these categories from the Quarter 4 2024/25 report.

There were no measures identified as ‘report later’ or ‘contextual’ in that report, so no further action or analysis is required.