Equality Impact Assessment
When completed, please forward to your Directorate Equality Action Group (DEAG) for feedback
and sign off. DEAG contact details can be found on our Equality and Diversity pages or
please phone 01872 322223 if you cannot access Cornwall Council’s intranet
Directorate:
Service:
Name of Officer/s completing assessment:
Date of Assessment:
Name of service/function or policy being assessed:
1.
What are the aims, objectives, outcomes, purpose of
the policy, service change, function that you are
assessing?
Children, Schools and Families
Supporting Families
Alexa Gainsbury – Teenage Pregnancy Coordinator
10th January 2013
Reducing Teenage Pregnancy and Support for Young
Parents Strategy and Action Plan
The Reducing Teenage Pregnancy and Support for Young
Parents strategy underpins the Local Authority and NHS’s
commitment to continuing to reduce the rate of under age
conceptions to 50% of the 1998 baseline (a reduction o 40
births per 1000 15-17 females to 20 births per 1000), to
increase the percentage of young mothers engaged in
employment, education or training to 40% and to improve
the outcomes of children born to teenage parents.
The accompanying Reducing Teenage Pregnancy and
Support for Young Parents Action Plan 2012-15, sets out
planned work and actions in order to implement the
Reducing Teenage Pregnancy Strategy and the
commitments within it. It does so under key priorities:
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Early intervention for those most at risk
Effective use of data
Access to contraception and sexual health
services
Access to Relationships and Sex education for
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2.
Who implements or delivers the policy, service or
function? State if this is undertaken by more than one
team, service, and department including any external
partners.
parents, carers, children and young people
Improving outcomes for teenage parents and
their children
Supporting a skilled workforce
The strategy and action plan is delivered by the Local
Authority, the NHS Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly and a
number of providers, including:
 Brook
 The Health Promotion Service
 Family Nurse Partnership
 WILD
 Cornwall College
 CLEAR
 Careers South West
 Young People Cornwall
 Cornwall Healthy Schools
 Royal Cornwall Hospital Trust
The action plan sets out the planned actions to be
undertaken by the Local Authority, the NHS and service
providers.
3.
Who will be affected by this proposal? For example
who are the external/internal customers,
communities, partners, stakeholders, the workforce
etc.
Employees of Cornwall Council and the NHS, contractors of
Cornwall Council and the NHS and service users.
The following cohorts of service users are most likely to be
affected by the proposed strategy:
 School aged children and young people, up to age
18
 The parents and carers of school aged children and
young people
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4.
Teenage mothers and fathers and expectant
teenagers.
What are the likely positive or negative impacts for the
 School aged children and young people, up to age
group/s identified in (3) above? What particular
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groups are affected more than others and why?
Positive: The Strategy and Action Plan sets out a
commitment to provide sexual health services and
education to young people in Cornwall alongside early
intervention for those identified as at risk of poor sexual
health and teenage pregnancy. As the strategy and
accompanying action plan sets outs out positive support
for these cohorts of young people it is envisaged that the
impact will be positive.
The key objectives for this cohort is that:
 Young people have access to contraception as
appropriate to age and Fraser Competence
 Young people have access to positive relationship
and sex education
 Young people who are at risk of poor sexual health
or risky sexual behaviours are given early support.
The plan sets out universal access for all young people and
takes into account the need to provide services that are
accessible for all. This should have a positive impact on
minority groups and those whose geography may leave
them isolated.
Some young people are more vulnerable than others.
Research has highlighted the following as key ‘risk factors’
in terms of early parenthood:
• Daughter of a teenage mother
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Currently a teenage parent
Having experienced repeat terminations
Looked after child/ Care history
Early onset of sexual activity
Poor / inconsistent contraceptive use
Alcohol & substance misuse
Low educational attainment
disengagement from school/NEET
Low educational aspirations/parents with low
educational aspirations
Living in a deprived area
Involved in Crime
Poor emotional Wellbeing
Negative: If no strategy and action plan were in place this
would have a negative impact on all young people as a
driving force to ensure cohesive, integrated services would
be missing. However those whose experiences feature the
above characteristics, and hence may already be
‘vulnerable’ are likely to experience the greatest negative
impact.
It is important to note that the law states1 that a young
person under the age of thirteen cannot consent to sex.
Consequently contraceptive services are not available to
young people twelve and under and safeguarding
procedures are followed.
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1
The parents and carers of school aged children and
young people
Sexual Offences Act 2003.
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Positive: The Strategy and Action Plan identifies the need
to support parents and carers in their role as educator and
carer, supporting young people in making positive choices
about sexual activity. National research has highlighted
that parents are young people’s preferred source of
information yet less than half (40%) receive information
from their parents.2 Local research has also identified that
parents are not talking to their children about relationships
and sex. The strategy and action plan is designed to
benefit parents and carers by supporting them to increase
their knowledge and skills in engaging young people in this
area, in turn this will support positive relationships
between parent/carer and child and increased health and
wellbeing. Research carried out by Cornwall Council has
shown that parents feel more confident and knowledgeable
following support.
The key objective for this cohort is:
 Parents and carers are supported and encouraged to
support and develop their children’s understanding
of healthy relationships
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Negative: if there were no strategy and action plan then
parents would not be offered this opportunity to work
together with services in order to support their children
and promote positive futures for their families.
Consequently they may not know where to turn to for help
and advice which could undermine their confidence and
leave them feeling unsupported.
2
National Youth Agency, (2010) What Young People think about Advice Information and Guidance, National Youth Agency.
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Teenage mothers and fathers and expectant
teenagers.
The plan also sets out additional support for young
parents, a cohort that are disadvantaged in their own right
and can often feel marginalised from universal services.
Due to the factors often present in young parent’s lives,
highlighted above, young parents may already be
disadvantaged by their prior experiences and current
situation, for example, deprivation and poor emotional
wellbeing. Again this strategy aims to deliver a positive
impact for this group of young people by providing services
that mitigate the impact of this disadvantage.
They key objectives for this cohort are:
 Additional support and interventions are in place
that support parents to achieve positive outcome for
parents and child
 Ensure that young parents can access timely
specialist and universal support
 Support young fathers to play a positive and active
role in their child’s life
Negative: Without a strategy and action plan outlying the
specific and potential additional needs of this cohort, young
parents and their children will not be supported to
overcome difficulties that may already be present in their
lives and achieve comparable outcomes to their older
peers.
Specific consideration needs to be given to whether age,
sex, sexual orientation, disability, race, ethnic background,
religion or belief, gender reassignment status, marital or
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civil partnership status, pregnancy and maternity status
impacts on one’s access to services. This Equality Impact
Assessment has highlighted the need to ensure that all
the services we commission consider this and consequently
all new services providers will be required to complete an
Equality Impact Assessment of their service provision.
5.
Have the impacts indentified in (4) above been
assessed using up to date and reliable evidence and
data? Do you need to engage or consult with any
identified group/s? If in doubt ask the Community
Intelligence Team for guidance.
The strategy and action plan has relied on a number of
sources of data to identify the needs and potential impact
of this strategy and action plan for the above groups. This
includes:
 National data provided detailing the number of
conceptions on a quarterly basis. This information is
provided by the Office for National Statistics
 Local NHS data. Detailing the number of conceptions
across Cornwall. This data is local and usually
contains very small numbers so we are unable to
share the information publically.
 Information collected by Careers South West
detailing the percentage of young mothers and
young fathers engaged in education, employment or
training.
 Care to Learn Data provided by the Department of
Education detailing the number of young parents
accessing childcare funding. This data allows us to
track our progress against other local authorities.
 Qualitative research consisting of in-depth
interviews with the Young Mums Will Achieve cohort
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In the developing the strategy and action plan
consultation was carried out with the following services
and service user groups:
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Cornwall’s Teenage Pregnancy Partnership
Board. Which includes representation from:
• Cornwall Councillor
• NHS Cornwall and Isles of Scilly
• Cornwall College
• Careers South West
• Family Nurse Partnership
• Supporting Families
• Integrated Youth Service
• Schools and Achievement
• Social Work and Psychology
Service
• NHS Commissioning
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Children Schools and Families Directorate
Young Mums Will Achieve service user group
WILD young parents
Young Father’s project
Brook
Young people via Cornwall Council Take Over
Day
Cornwall Health Promotion
Cornwall Healthy Schools Plus
Cornwall CLEAR project
Cornwall SAFE project
Cornwall Learning Partnership
Council of the Isles of Scilly.
6.
Are any of these identified groups considered to be
vulnerable? If so have you engaged with or plan to
engage with any relevant representative organisation.
For example if the impact is likely to affect people with
National research has highlighted that the most common
factors related to becoming a teenage parent are:
• Daughter of a teenage mother
• Currently a teenage parent
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a disability have you engaged with Disability Cornwall?
If staff are affected have the unions or staff forums
been involved?
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Having experienced repeat Terminations
Looked after child/ Care history
Early onset of sexual activity
Poor / inconsistent contraceptive use
Alcohol & substance misuse
Low educational attainment
disengagement from school/NEET
Low educational aspirations/parents with low
educational aspirations
Living in a deprived area
Involved in Crime
Poor emotional Wellbeing
These risk indicators show that the young people most at
risk of poor sexual health and unplanned teenage
pregnancy are vulnerable.
We also know that young parents, and the children of
young parents face poorer outcomes than parents, and
children of parents who conceive later. These include:
• Teenage mothers are less likely to finish their
education and are more likely to live in poverty.
• Teenage mothers have three times the rate of post
natal depression of older mothers and a higher risk
of poor mental health for three years after birth.
• Teenage parents are at increased risk of
homelessness
• Teenage mothers have higher incidences of
relationship breakdown and are more likely to be
lone parents
• Aged 30, those who were young fathers are twice as
likely to be unemployed.
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Aged 30, those who were young fathers are less
likely to be currently living with, or have ever lived
with their children.
The infant mortality rate for babies born to teenage
mothers is 60% higher than for babies born to older
mothers.
Children of teenage mothers are at increased risk of
poverty, low educational attainment, poor housing
and poor health and have lower rates of economic
activity in adult life
Children of teenage mothers are more likely to be
teenage parents themselves
Qualitative research via in depth interviews has been
undertaken with the Young Mothers Will Achieve groups in
order to gain feedback regarding their experiences and
views of services in order to support service development
in the future. Information is still lacking in regards to
fathers’ experiences and views. To address this the action
plan details plans to extend this research to include young
fathers.
The Teenage Pregnancy Partnership Board has also
contributed to, and will use the outcome of, s Health and
Wellbeing questionnaire due to be rolled out to schools
across Cornwall in Spring term 2013, to gather the views
of young people and direct future service provision.
7.
What plans do you have in place, or are developing,
that will mitigate the likely identified negative
impacts? For example what plans, if any, will be put
in place to reduce the impact?
Negative impacts were identified for not having a strategy
and action plan that brings together work to support young
people, parents, carers and young parents.
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The strategy and action plan has been developed to
mitigate the identified negative impacts by:
 Providing both universal and targeted support to
children and young people
 Ensuring all young people have access to
information, education, advice, guidance and
contraceptive services
 Ensuring those who need the support most, due to
factors that make them vulnerable, are identified
and provided for
 Supporting parents/carers to develop positive
relationships with the children they care for
 Ensuring different areas are working together to
deliver one cohesive plan
Services currently being commissioned reflect the need to
support young people as a homogenous group, but also
address inequalities and key vulnerabilities that have been
highlighted by data analysis, service user feedback and
research in the area.
The Action Plan details how we will continue to provide
services that attempt to mitigate the negative impact that
geography, background or circumstance may have on
young people’s access. A key example of this is the young
people’s mobile sexual health bus which has been
commissioned to mitigate the negative impacts isolation
can have on service access.
All new providers will be required to complete an EIA
against their service delivery plan in order to monitor the
impact of the service and strategy on outcomes for young
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people, young parents and their children and identify
opportunities to further reduce the impact of inequalities in
partnership.
8.
Do you have plans in place to monitor the impact of
the proposals once they have been implemented? The
full impact of the decision may only be known after
the proposals have been implemented.
The Teenage Pregnancy Partnership Board is a multi
agency strategic group that holds accountability for the
Reducing Teenage Pregnancy and Supporting Teenage
Parents Strategy and Action Plan. The TPP board is chaired
by the Associate Director for Public Health who also chairs
the Cornwall Sexual Health Partnership Group, ensuring
integrated practice.
The TPP board will monitor the impact of the strategy and
action plan using the ‘evidence’ section of the action plan.
This sets out specific actions and alongside required
outcomes to evidence that action. It includes a number of
key targets for 2012/13:
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40% of young parents to be engaged in education,
employment and training by year end 2012/13
Mobile sexual health provision to achieve 720 visits
by year end 2012/13
3000 new registrations to the C Card scheme by
April 2013
CAFs to be offered to 50% of new young families in
2013
6000 unique hits achieved by information website
The strategy and action plan covers 2012-15 and the TPP
board will annually set new targets and direct the work of
the action plan.
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Conception rates and education rates for young mothers
are included in the Supporting Families balance scorecard
and are reported on a monthly basis.
Failure to deliver against the strategy and action plan is
considered in the Supporting Families Service risk log.
All commissioned services are monitored in line with
Cornwall Council’s contract management toolkit and are
monitored against outcomes. This information is then
reported back to the Teenage Pregnancy Partnership
Board.
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What course of action does this EIA suggest you take? More than one of the following may
apply
Outcome 1: No major change required. The EIA has not identified any potential for discrimination or
adverse impact and all opportunities to promote equality have been taken
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Outcome 2: Adjust the policy to remove barriers identified by the EIA or better promote equality. Are
you satisfied that the proposed adjustments will remove the barriers identified?
Outcome 3: Continue the policy despite potential for adverse impact or missed opportunities to
promote equality identified. You will need to ensure that the EIA clearly sets out the justifications for
continuing with it. You should consider whether there are sufficient plans to reduce the negative impact
and/or plans to monitor the actual impact (see questions below)
Outcome 4: Stop and rethink the policy when the EIA shows actual or potential unlawful discrimination
Summary of your proposals (Copy and paste into any report for CLT, Cabinet and Council)
 What are the key impacts – both negative and positive
 What course of action are you advising as a result of this EIA
 Are there any particular groups affected more than others
The Strategy and accompanying Action Plan intend to be positive. The key priorities of the Reducing Teenage
Pregnancy and Support for Teenage Parents Strategy and Action Plan are:
 Early intervention for those most at risk
 Effective use of data
 Access to contraception and sexual health services
 Access to Relationships and Sex education for parents, carers, children and young people
 Improving outcomes for teenage parents and their children
 Supporting a skilled workforce
 Increasing the number of young mothers in education, employment and training to 40%
 Reducing the teenage conception rate by 50% from the 1998 baseline (i.e. conceptions reduced to 20 per
1000).
This is based on key factors the Government has highlighted as effective in reducing Teenage Pregnancy3
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DH and DCSF: 2010.
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Specific Actions arising for the EIA are:

Implementation of the Reducing Teenage Pregnancy and Support for Young Parents Strategy and Action Plan.
 Requirement placed on all new service providers commissioned by the Teenage Pregnancy Partnership Board to
undertake an Equality Impact Assessment
 Increasing scope of forthcoming service user research project to include young fathers.
The focus of the Strategy and accompanying Action Plan is the reduction of teenage conceptions and the promotion of
positive outcomes for young parents and their children. As a result the groups of people most likely to be affected are:
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Children and young people up to the age of eighteen
Parents and carers of children and young people
Teenage parents and expectant teenagers
The children of teenage parents
DEAG Sign – Off
Name: Anna Mankee-Williams
Date: 21 February 2013
Comments/Action Required:
(For Corporate E & D use only) Published date:
When the Equality Impact Assessment is completed send to equality@cornwall.gov.uk for publication
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