Short breaks offer disabled children and young people aged 5-19 years in Lambeth, opportunities to have fun, socialise, and learn new skills at afterschool clubs, weekend activities, or holiday programmes.
It also provides parents and families with a break from what can be demanding caring responsibilities.
We want to hear what you think about our four options for our future short breaks service. Our challenge is to make sure we do not put any pressure on already squeezed council budgets.
1.Stick with what we’ve got
We continue to fund play, holiday, and sport short break activities, ensuring we meet the needs of children and young people with the highest and most complex needs.
2. Provide extra short break activities for more disabled children and young people
We could increase the range of short break activities for children and young people with the highest and most complex needs, through to those with a lower level of need; some families would need to pay for the session in advance.
3. Create a more flexible direct payments offer
For families of disabled children and young people, direct payments are typically provided to families to arrange and pay for cost of carers. This option proposes to provide families with more flexibility over what they can use their funds on, such as paying for a short break activity, paying for a babysitting service, or pooling direct payments to pay for a carer to accompany a family on a trip away.
4. Do both – design a new combined short breaks service
Both option 2 and 3 have appeal. We could commission a wider range of short break activities and develop our direct payments offer.
Have your say now at Lambeth’s Short Break Consultation.
The Consultation closing date is 11 November 2018. We look forward to hearing from you.
