Early intervention for children, young people and families in Solihull is led by the Early Help Board on behalf of the Children’s Trust.

The local vision is to make Solihull an ‘early help place’ by helping families at the earliest point, improving children and young people’s life chances and reducing demand for crisis services. Solihull’s vision is built on five principles: causes not symptoms; families and communities can deliver earlier help; lives not services; early childhood help; and not all help is equal. Particular strengths include early intervention through schools, and community-focused and led activity. A new coordinated approach to early help is in the process of being developed as of summer 2015.

EIF support & advice

• EIF have supported a review of existing early intervention systems using the Early Intervention Maturity Matrix, leading to the development of a new Early Help Strategy and action plan.
• EIF reports and workshops helped inform the design of new approaches to early years and mental health services locally.
• EIF has supported the design of an overarching outcomes framework for Solihull’s new Early Help system, which will enable tracking of how successful Early Help is in impacting outcomes.
• EIF have helped with the design of web-based Early Help Assessment approaches, which will improve targeting and the ability to measure success, and influence future commissioning.