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Update 27.3.24

This website and the SPCF Facebook page will be closing on 31.3.24. All previous messages and correspondence from parent carers will be deleted along with the page. Nothing will be passed on to a new Parent Carer Forum. The same applies to our email account, Instagram and phones. 
Our Steering Group have loved their role in meeting and supporting SEND families and being able to help at times has been really rewarding. 
We are pleased that our final engagement will be to attend the opening of  the new playground at Tweeddale Children’s Centre. This project is a perfect example of just what can be achieved with proper co-production.  SPCF and the local area partners have engaged with our SEND familes through SPCF led Focus Groups, trial days and surveys to ensure £250,000 of funding was secured to complete 2 new exclusive, inclusive accessible playgrounds, designed by our SEND families.
Effective co-production improves outcomes for our familes and most importantly for our children and young people.
Sadly, real co-production has become harder to achieve in Sutton, and a relationship based on mutual trust and respect for the Parent Carer Forum and parent carers in general, seems even more difficult to achieve currently.
Making sure that your voices, lived experiences and feedback are heard and influence change has been increasingly challenging over the last 5 years.
One of our major concerns is the attitude to parent/carers as illustrated very publicly in the leaked email from Councillor Marian James in January 2024.  At the last People Committee, the lack of transparency was shown again when questions were raised by members regarding our key concerns , specifically 'the lack of Parent /carer trust in the local area, particularly in Cognus and the elected Administration Members’ attitude to parent carers and them not fully acknowledging the extent of the challenges for SEND families in Sutton', Councillor James refused to answer.  She stated that she had not seen our slides until that day; this is difficult to understand as senior officers had sent them to OFSTED/CQC at least a week before; we are certain that the Chair of the People Committee would have been sent a copy by Senior officers. It is so disappointing to see that such important issues are still being ignored. She also stated that she would meet with the Forum but this has still not happened and we have subsequently only been offered a meeting with Members not responsible for the content of her, extremely distressing, email.
Given recent events, we do not believe that Councillor James is the right Member to chair the People Committee which oversees the provision and decisions made for our SEND families.
We would like to thank all the parent carers who have been a part of the Steering group over the last 15 years!
Thank you also to all of the parent carers who make up the wider forum and the SEND community in Sutton; we wish you and your families all the best and wish the new PCF good luck representing the voice of parent carers in Sutton and working with Sutton Council, the NHS, Cognus and all the other Local Area Partners.
Jane Knowles and Rosemary Stuart
A Community is not a community when it does not include everyone 
 
 19.1.24   Resignation letter     
The Sutton Parent Carer Forum Steering Group are giving notice that from 31st March 2024 we will not be renewing our Parent Carer Participation Grant contract with LBS. We also give notice that all the members of the Steering Group will be leaving at this date and that the current Forum will be formally dissolved.  Since 2016 we have gradually become disillusioned with the lack of genuine co production and trust between the SPCF and the local area and we feel that we are no longer making a positive, effective difference for Sutton SEND families. We have worked hard to engage independently and productively with pan disability SEND families in Sutton, but this is becoming increasingly difficult in a climate where the extent of the lack of parental trust is not acknowledged or understood by the local area’s senior management.  Parent Carer Forums are recognised by the Department for Education, Ofsted and CQC as the “go to” local source of independent information on the parent carer experience to ensure services meet the needs of our SEND families. The role of the parent carers on the Steering Group is to lead this work and listen to the views and experiences of other parents in Sutton to make sure they know what is important to them and to feed this back to the local area. Since 2002 the Forum has been viewed as a valuable, independent resource but recently the relationship has shifted and trying to maintain our independence has become too challenging. We would like to highlight that since 2013 we have brought in £400,000 additional direct funding into the borough from various charities, some of which allowed us to provide much needed peer support. Our funding from Trust for London helped to facilitate support for many struggling families that we would not have been able to do through the parent carer participation funding. This has allowed us to help parent carers apply for DLA, PIP and other funding opportunities which brought in a further £1,000,000 directly to the Borough’s SEND families and economy. A few recent achievements include the Parks and Playgrounds engagement resulting in local funding for exclusive playgrounds for Tweeddale and the Grange which will be ready for Easter, a BSL course to empower parent carers to be able to confidently communicate with the Deaf community, a wide range of training workshops, producing the Sunflower Lanyard awareness film which has been shared nationwide, our ‘What Bothers You’ mini surveys and of course Play and Stay where families tell us it helps them to realise they are ‘not the only one’. As a Steering Group, representing the wider Parent Carer Forum, we all used to find the role fulfilling and productive, but we have not felt valued or respected for some time and this has had a negative impact, both on the Group as a whole, but also, on individual members who feel so upset that they no longer feel able to attend meetings; this has now reached a point where we do not feel we can continue. When we all joined the PCF Steering Group, there was a very different working relationship in Sutton based on mutual trust and respect and the understanding of the benefit of effective parent carer participation; we quote below from previous local area senior management in 2015:  ‘I really have enjoyed working with the Parents Forum in all its different incarnations over the years. As far as I am concerned, having a well run Parents Forum to deal with made my job easier and more rewarding; what you do and achieve are quite special.’ We are all saddened that this is no longer the case and that we will not be the representatives of the Sutton PCF after 31.3.24.
Carole Cook – founding member from 2002.
 Rosemary Stuart – Welfare lead
 Linda Morbin – Social Media lead
 Laura Nicot – Treasurer
 Jane Knowles – Chair
Jane Green - Secretary
 
 19.1.24  Parks and playgrounds update
We are pleased to update that the exclusive playground at Tweeddale will be ready for SEND families to use by the Easter holidays.
 
What is a Parent Carer Forum?
If you would like more information, please contact Lara O'Connell by email at Lara.OConnell@contact.org.uk
A Parent Carer Forum is a group of parents and carers of children and young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). They are recognised by the Department for Education, OfSted and CQC as the “go to” local source of independent information on the parent carer experience. In England there are Parent Carer Forums in almost all local authority areas including the London Borough of Sutton where the Forum has been established for nearly 20 years. Sutton Parent Carer Forum is a member of the National Network of Parent Carer Forums (NNPCF)to ensure that our voices are heard at a local, regional and national level. Forums have a Steering Group of parent carers who lead this work and listen to the views and experiences of other parents in the local area to make sure they know what is important to them; they are keen to hear from as many parent carers as possible and are all pan disability groups.