13th October 2014 –It may have been a cold and blustery day, but with our big woolly NWG road trip hat on we drove south to Birmingham. Navigating Birmingham’s new road systems is never easy but luckily this project was in the North of the city making it an easy drive from Derby.

We were welcomed by two project workers who had been working at the Space for a few years.  One of them delivered direct work with young people and the other CSE training across the Birmingham region as well as heading up a parent and child partnership service (FCASE).  They both had exciting ideas about helping young people affected by CSE and  spoke passionately about what is being doing in Birmingham and where the hurdles are. It was a joy to spend time with two people that had a clear over view of their area and how passionate they both where about making a change on ground level for the people who experience CSE.

The Birmingham Barnardo’s project has been going since 1998. Currently they are expanding across the local area and have moved from having 4 workers to 10 in the last few years, extending to 13 across the West Midlands. This is great news considering the 151 referrals they received last year. Some of the 13 are working with the Young Offenders in the city and others are working with the alcohol and substance misuse teams meaning their CSE knowledge can filter through to other areas.

They also run the FCASE project, which supports families and young people at risk of CSE for 6-8 weeks. This project holds a 2 strand approach of working separately with parents and children, and then brings them together to discuss an plan of action at the end. FCASE is currently coming to the end of the 2-year funding from the DFE and we look forward to hearing the outcomes of, what sounds like, necessary early intervention work.

The team also utilises connections with other teams in the area and work closely with the counselling service in their building as well as the sexual harmful behaviours team. They are clear on where their expertise end and have meetings to ensure that the young person is accessing the right service at the right time for them.

Lovely to meet you all

Cheryl our Network Coordinator and Nikki our Youth Participation Officer