North Somerset Council has pledged to extend its welfare support and set up family hubs in children's centres this year.
Cllr Catherine Gibbons, executive member for children's services, has outlined how the authority is planning to invest in children's services after setting its budget on February 23.
She said: "The past year has brought tremendous challenges to the education sector, and I want to pay tribute to all parents and carers for taking on the role of teachers, as well as our schools for the support they've provided and all the work going on behind the scenes.
"I'm so pleased we've extended welfare support so parents can continue to receive free school meals for their children outside of term-time. No child should go hungry. I was also so delighted when we achieved the Unicef gold standard for breastfeeding and infant care, as giving children the best start in life is really important.
"We're also showing our commitment to improving outcomes for youngsters by investing an additional £150,000 into our children’s improvement plan. We'll be developing family hubs at our children’s centres including the additional resource of the Carlton Centre to serve families living in Central Weston, to make them more suitable for activities for children, young people and families.
"We’ll maintain the momentum of increasing the number of in-house foster carers – we’ve been successful during the pandemic and have reduced reliance on external foster placements.”
Cllr Gibbons also said the council will continue to use the Mockingbird Family Model of delivering foster care.
Cllr Gibbons added: “Developed by the Fostering Network, the model provides respite care, peer support, regular joint planning and training and social activities. The council will also improve support to our care leavers so that we see an increase in the number supported into employment or education as a result of developing a bespoke mentoring and support offer."
In addition, Cllr Gibbons said other initiatives include continuing to improve services for children with additional needs and their families; providing additional capacity to work with education providers across North Somerset and focussing on the most vulnerable children and young people. This is as well as investing in schools, including the Winterstoke Hundred Academy and the Baytree expansion at Clevedon.
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