HAMPSHIRE County Council is to push on with plans to develop a new integrated family support service, designed to save £8.5m by combining children’s centres, early help hubs and the youth support budgets into a single service aimed at the most vulnerable families.

In East Hampshire, services will no longer be provided from Chase at Bordon and Heath at Petersfield, leaving Bushy Leaze in Alton as the family support service hub for the district – one of 11 across the county from which outreach services will emanate.

It will mean big changes for Bushy Leaze which has, over the past 20 years, become a haven for parents with babies and toddlers seeking vital early years support.

It will also see the loss of services and the culling of a staff team which provides a lifeline for many struggling to rise to the challenge of parenthood, as part of the 180 jobs to be lost across Hampshire with effect from early next year.

But Bushy Leaze is determined not to lose services without a fight. Although “extremely disappointed that no significant changes have been made as a result of the consultation process”, head of centre Patti Snook is keen to reassure parents that services will not cease straight away.

The message on the website reads: “In the light of the recent decision by Hampshire County Council concerning children’s centres, we would like to give clarity and reassurance to parents that while some of the services at Bushy Leaze will be affected the nursery school will continue to operate as now. There will be no immediate changes to any of the services offered at the centre.

“In the short term, we will be working closely with services for young children at Hampshire County Council, our partner agencies and the new family support service to continue to offer as much support as possible to our families and the community at all levels.

“In the longer term, we have set up a new charity called Bushy Leaze Community Support Fund. The aim of the new charity is to raise money to run as many services as possible in the future.”

Luath Grant Ferguson, who was Bushy Leaze’s first headteacher when it was launched in 1983, is a trustee of the new charity.

He is appalled at the decision, announced by the county council’s executive lead member for children’s services, Keith Mans, at his decision day last Friday to go ahead with plans to develop a “modern” family support service.

Mr Grant Ferguson said: “That Hampshire should dress up this desperate slashing of so much of its early years provision as making way for a new, innovative programme giving wider benefits for children and families is shameful. It not only destroys at a stroke the authority’s reputation as a respected leader in the field of early years provision, it also reveals a new-found willingness to mislead and to ride unfairly on the achievements of creative teams who deliver the services.

“There is nothing new about the so-called family support service other than that Hampshire is putting it together in this form for the first time, and then only under enormous pressure from central government to save money. Belgium, Holland, Germany and the Scandinavian countries were creating such services on a national scale over 30 years ago, and little Alton has had its wonderful Alton Buckle team and network brilliantly showing the way on a local scale with very limited resources for several years.

“But, most bizarre and remote from any kind of professional justification, however, has been the proposal to site the inevitable hub – a communications base for teams working across the full age range which could be located straightforwardly elsewhere – in tiny Bushy Leaze. Do they think it doesn’t matter to displace facilities and expertise second to none anywhere? If the current proposal is carried through in anything like its present form, it will be a backward step. Much, much more thought is needed.”

But Mr Mans takes a different view, saying: “In the face of ongoing profound reductions in central Government funding, we are determined to maintain essential services, particularly services for those with high levels of need of our help, care and protection.

“In order to do this we have to develop ways to do things differently. I have taken into account a number of factors in making my decision – the response from our public consultation on the family support service proposals, the changes in the way people are increasingly accessing information, advice and support services, the additional and complementary support that is now available to families within the community, and the financial context within which the county council is operating.

“This decision has not been easy but I am satisfied that this new service will support those who are most vulnerable and in need of help but who do not meet the threshold for statutory social care, while ensuring that comprehensive information, advice and signposting is provided for all.”

He added: “The new integrated family support service will come in at a time when the number of health visitors in Hampshire has significantly increased, and when working parents of three and four year olds will be able to access 30 hours of free childcare with a nursery, pre-school or a registered early years education childminder.”

Targeting help specifically to vulnerable families with children (aged up to 19) who have multiple needs, often requiring the involvement of more than one agency, the service will offer tailor-made support at a local level, with one point of contact, removing the need to go to different early help services, as is currently the case.

It is in children’s centre services that the main changes will be seen. Activities that are currently available to all families, for free, will no longer be available to families that are not in need of early help support. Those families will be directed to other community groups providing services.

As is currently the case for early help, the family support service will continue to work in partnership with midwifery, health visitor and school nurse services, as well as other health and community services.