Local Offer Annual report 2024 - 2025 | Feedback

Local Offer Website

Over the past year, stricter rules on the use of cookies have come into force. Cookies are small pieces of data from each website that remember information about users. Users now have an ‘opt-in’ option to enable cookies, rather than opt out. Should users on the Local Offer (LO) website decline cookies, their data will not be part of any data collection or analytics. Even if users accept cookies, there are additional opt-in check boxes for the allowance of analytics. Therefore, even if a user accepts the initial cookie settings, if they do not turn on analytics acceptance, their data still will not track.

This means that, whilst service users are still accessing the Local Offer site, the numbers we can now report on regarding web data are much smaller.

There were 38,088 page views on the Local Offer this year and 25,796 sessions. Sessions are views and interactions on the Local Offer website. The number of new users (who accepted cookies) was 17,163 across the year.

Local Offer Inbox

The total number of enquiries received via the Local Offer inbox and Facebook is 245. This is up 27% from last year and represents a 75% increase from the start of the contract. The majority of queries this year came from professionals, with approximately one third of contacts coming from parents, carers or young people. Most queries this year were appropriate for the Local Offer inbox, with only 11% being inappropriate. These inappropriate queries were signposted to more relevant services or passed on to the WESAIL duty inbox. Feedback shows queries are dealt with in a timely manner and relevant signposting is given.

Facebook

The number of followers of the Wakefield WESAIL and Local Offer Facebook page is 1,122 an increase of 48% on last year. The reach of the Facebook page is up 42% on last year to 26,700.

Finally, our engagement on Facebook (likes, comments, shares and reactions) is 1,800, representing a 98% increase on last year’s engagement.

We held 61 events (such as meetings and consultations) this year, slightly up on last year.

Whilst the number of parents and or carers involved is down on last year, the number of children and young people (CYP) participating rose significantly. Involvement from professionals rose slightly.

During 2024 – 2025, we have worked in coproduction with a wide variety of teams including; Young Carers Team, Build Our Futures, Shout Out For Change, Preparation for Adulthood Team, West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board, Wakefield Libraries, Castles and Museums, Wakefield Parent Carer Forum (WPCF), Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS), Wakefield 0 – 19 Service, Family Hubs, Wakefield Families Together, FDP, People Places Lives (PPL), SEND Project Team, SENDIASS, Regional Local Offer Network, Irwin Mitchell and various other third sector services listed on the Local Offer.

Our key coproduction themes are below.

This year we have updated various pages across the website in coproduction with the service itself or our key partners. Examples of new information include the Dynamic Support Register, where we supported with adapting the language to make it easier to read, and new sections on Reasonable Adjustments, Transitions and Early Years. We have liaised with our key partners to check about the suitability of new services wanting to join the Local Offer, such as out of area education settings.

We worked in coproduction with the Local Offer Strategic Group (LOSG) to create new templates for Services and Things To Do pages. This will ensure simple, succinct information appearing in search results, and further information when a user click ‘More Details’. The group also supported creating a new ‘Contact Us’ page, to make getting in touch easier.

We also completed an audit and update of service pages. Finally, we worked with PPL to improve the site’s search functionality.

We worked with PPL to create an Easy Read page format on the LO website. This has been made available to other Local Authorities who use PPL’s website platform. We created a new Easy Read section on how to find information on the website. The first part of this, ‘How to Find Education Providers’, has been completed.

We have also converted all previous LO annual reports and SEND Local Offer newsletters into online versions.

We worked with parents, carers, professionals, children and young people on the development of an audio version of WESAIL’s Working Together document. The document is read aloud in chunks by our service users, an accessible alternative to reading it. This coproduced audio is now available at Working Together - Audio | WESAIL Policies and Standards | Wakefield SEND Local Offer

We completed our work as part of the Local Offer Live Task and Finish Group and the event was held in May 2024. We supported attendees with knowledge about the Local Offer, including demonstrations of the website. We spoke to a number of professionals, parents, carers and children and young people (CYP). As a result of conversations at this event, we have updated information to share from CYP for CYP in future newsletters.

LO Champions have also been involved in reviewing the newsletter and ensuring that it is produced to a high standard, with accessibility in mind.

CYP have been involved in producing articles on CYP SEND groups in the local area. Parents and carers have also been involved in generating ideas on SEND-friendly places to go on evenings and at weekends. WPCF also shared their reasonable adjustment tips across two newsletters.

We worked with Family Hubs to create an article on what Family and Youth Hubs offer.

We have also worked with several private and third sector services, as well as council departments, who have produced articles on EHCPs, tribunals and young carers.

Visit the Newsletter section of our website.

Read our You Said We Did for 2024 - 2025

A project has been started to create a Local Offer Manual, detailing tasks that are required.

Commissioners have agreed to change the way the newsletter is distributed. Therefore, we have begun to research a new electronic format for this. As part of this, and improving accessibility, we have also archived old PDF versions of the newsletters and changed these to webpages.

CAMHS – Child Adolescent Mental Health Service

CYP – Children and Young People

EHCP – Education, Health and Care Plan

LO – Local Offer

LOSG – Local Offer Strategic Group

PPL – Public Partnerships Limited

RLON – Regional Local Offer Network

SEND – Special Educational Needs and or Disabilities

SENDIASS – Special Educational Needs and or Disabilities Information Advice Support Service

WESAIL – Wakefield Early Support Advice Information Liaison Service

WPCF – Wakefield Parent Carer Forum

WYICB – West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board

YSWD – You Said We Did