Devolved budgets: an evaluation of pilots in three local authorities in England.

This evaluation explored how ‘devolved budgets’ might be used by Children’s Social Care to provide resources to families and reduce the need for care. A devolved budget is a financial resource that is made available to social workers to spend with families. The idea is that social workers and families are best placed to know what help is needed to make sustainable changes and keep children safely at home. Pilots in Hillingdon, Darlington and Wigan offer insights about different approaches to implementing devolved budgets. Hillingdon used the funds to help adolescents, mainly those at risk of extra-familial harms related to various forms of exploitation. Darlington worked with families with children who were at risk of care entry. Wigan used devolved budgets with families where the goal was reunification from care, and families where children were at high risk of entering care. Decision-making about expenditure was devolved to frontline social workers to some extent in all three pilots