Looked After Children
Patricia Nicholl
Phone: (028) 9052 8229
Secretary - Phone (028) 9052 0625
Key areas of responsibility include:
- professional responsibility for and providing input to policy development with regard to:
- Looked After Children, including residential care, family placements and foster care;
- care planning and review;
- leaving and aftercare;
- representation of children and children's rights; and
- schemes for the delegation of statutory functions;
- providing preliminary professional assessment of referrals to the statutory list in relation to Protection of Children (POC);
- screening assessment of need for and securing access to secure accommodation, in particular for children under 13 years;
- providing professional input, as required, into the evaluation of:
- case management reviews;
- serious adverse incidents; and
- business cases;
- providing input in relation to policy development and professional issues with regard to:
- family support services, including early years and childhood fund;
- school aged mothers;
- teenage pregnancy;
- sexual health strategies; and
- emergency planning;
- professional advice to Policy Branches, other Government Departments, Agencies, statutory, voluntary and private sector organisations, where appropriate; and
- representing the OSS in a number of DHSSPS and external groupings related to the above areas of work.
