Office of the Children’s Commissioner representatives visit Wakefield District

Representatives from the Office of the Children’s Commissioner for England recently visited services across Wakefield District which support the emotional and mental health wellbeing of children and young people.

The Office of the Children’s Commissioner is an executive non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Department for Education, promoting the rights, views and interests of children in policies or decisions affecting their lives. They particularly represent children who are vulnerable or who find it hard to make their views known.

The two-day visit, showcasing the Wakefield Emotional and Mental Wellbeing Offer, enabled the representatives to find out about the joint and collaborative working taking place across the Wakefield system.  This was followed by visits and opportunities to find out more about a range of services including Compass, Young Lives Consortium, Young Healthwatch, WF-I-CAN, young people in supported living, CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services) and the crisis support offer.

They also met with the Mental Health Ambassadors, who are graduates of the Future Selph programme. This has been developed and hosted by Conexus on behalf of the Wakefield Primary Care Networks and is provided by a small number of VCSE organisations including The Youth Association, St Georges Lupset, SMaSH and Rycroft Leisure.  It is funded through the Mental Health Alliance and supports young adults across the Wakefield District.

The Prince’s Trust also had the opportunity to pitch the WF-I-CAN Van community project to both representatives from the Office of the Children’s Commissioner and various Wakefield support groups.