Council pilots survey asking children and young people across Surrey what matters to them

Surrey County Council is piloting a new way of consulting children and young people in Surrey on what is important to them.

The survey, intended to run annually, will provide a benchmark of what key things young people understand, care about, worry about, and are interested in, in relation to their community, health and happiness. This will guide a piece of work for the Surrey Safeguarding Children Partnership and inform the future strategy of delivering certain services for children and young people.

Patricia Denney, Director of Quality and Performance for the Children’s Service at Surrey said:

“We’re putting children and young people at the heart of everything we do, but this is the first time we’ve consulted them in such a widespread and comprehensive way. We want as many children and young people to engage with this survey as possible to help us understand what matters to them and give them a forum to have their voices heard. It’s important for us to understand the different age demographics and how the needs of children and young people may evolve so that our services can adapt with them.”

Surrey’s User Voice and Participation team work with all children and young people across Surrey to ensure their voices are heard. This includes those accessing emotional health and wellbeing services across Surrey – including SEND, Looked After Children and Care Leavers.

The User Voice and Participation team will be engaging with children and young people at youth groups and schools across the county and promoting the survey to professionals and partners who work closely with young people, such as Surrey Youth Focus.

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For more information contact Catherine Payne, Senior Communications Officer on catherine.payne@surreycc.gov.uk 07970311912

Notes to editors

How to take part

Part of this engagement exercise is an online survey. We’re asking if parents and guardians can help children and young people to fill it in so we get to hear the voices of as many young people in Surrey as possible. It should only take 5-10 minutes to complete.

The closing date for the online survey is 18 April 2020.

All primary age children

All secondary age children through to young adults

The surveys specifically for children and young people with experience of being in care are available to complete online here:

Care leavers aged 18-25

Looked after children aged 7-17

You can follow the progress of the survey on twitter and Instagram – @ourvoicesurrey