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| Ormiston Families | |
|---|---|
| Name | Ormiston Families |
| Formation | 2013 |
| Type | Charity |
| Headquarters | Suffolk, England |
| Region served | United Kingdom |
| Purpose | Family support, fostering, children’s services |
| Leader title | Chief Executive |
Ormiston Families is a British charity providing fostering, family support, mental health services, and children’s wellbeing programmes across England and Wales. Founded from the merger of regional social care providers, the organisation operates alongside local authorities, health trusts, and education providers to deliver interventions for vulnerable children, carers, and families. Ormiston Families works in statutory and voluntary sectors, engaging with non-profit organisations, corporate funders, and philanthropic foundations.
Ormiston Families traces its origins to independent fostering agencies and family support organisations active in Suffolk and Norfolk before the 2010s, reflecting trends seen in the consolidation of third-sector providers such as Barnardo's, NSPCC, Save the Children, Action for Children, and The Children's Society. The formal establishment in 2013 built on antecedents similar to mergers between entities like Family Rights Group and regional charities influenced by policy shifts following the Children Act 1989 and inquiries such as the Munro Review of Child Protection. Early activities mirrored initiatives promoted by the Department for Education and partnerships with clinical services exemplified by collaborations between NHS England trusts and local authorities like Suffolk County Council and Norfolk County Council. Over the following decade, Ormiston Families expanded services, adopting models of practice compared to those used by Coram and Turn2us and participating in sector coalitions with organisations such as Local Government Association and regional health bodies.
Ormiston Families delivers fostering services, family hubs, perinatal and maternal mental health support, and early intervention programmes similar to those run by Home-Start, Family Action, Place2Be, MIND, and YoungMinds. Its fostering provision serves looked-after children interacting with agencies such as Ofsted and regional fostering networks, while its family support programmes operate alongside children’s centres connected to the Sure Start initiative and local clinical commissioning groups formerly under Clinical Commissioning Group arrangements. The charity provides therapeutic services influenced by models used by Anna Freud Centre and The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, and runs parenting courses comparable to those from Triple P and Incredible Years. Ormiston Families also engages in youth services similar to projects by Barnardo's and The Prince's Trust, and delivers community-based interventions aligned with policies from the Cabinet Office on social investment.
Ormiston Families is governed by a board of trustees drawn from sectors including social care, finance, and law, akin to trustee boards at Shelter, Cancer Research UK, Macmillan Cancer Support, and Oxfam. Executive leadership includes roles equivalent to chief executive, finance director, and operations director, comparable to senior teams at Save the Children International and British Red Cross. The charity operates regional teams working with statutory partners such as Metropolitan Police Service safeguarding units, local safeguarding children boards formerly modelled after Local Safeguarding Children Boards, and education providers including Department for Education-funded academies and maintained schools. Regulatory oversight is provided through bodies like Charity Commission for England and Wales and inspection by Ofsted for fostering and children’s services.
Income stems from a mix of statutory contracts, charitable grants, fundraising, and corporate partnerships, following patterns used by Age UK, Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and other large charities. Major statutory partners have included local authorities such as Suffolk County Council and healthcare commissioners aligned with NHS England regions. Grantmakers and philanthropic supporters in the sector include trusts in the manner of National Lottery Community Fund, Paul Hamlyn Foundation, and Esmee Fairbairn Foundation. Corporate collaborations and matched-funding initiatives have resembled partnerships with companies similar to Tesco, Barclays, and John Lewis Partnership in their charitable work. The organisation has also participated in consortia bidding for funding alongside charities like Coram and consultants similar to KPMG and PwC on social impact measurement.
Ormiston Families measures outcomes using tools and frameworks comparable to those employed by New Philanthropy Capital and What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care. Evaluation includes quantitative indicators such as placement stability, school attendance, and mental health screening measures used by NHS services, and qualitative feedback from families and foster carers akin to reviews by Ofsted and user-survey methods used by Citizen's Advice. Impact reports highlight reductions in crisis interventions, improvements in family functioning, and increased foster placement sufficiency, echoing findings published by think tanks like Institute for Public Policy Research and Resolution Foundation on social care interventions. The charity engages in external evaluations and academic partnerships similar to collaborations with universities such as University of East Anglia and University of Cambridge.
Notable initiatives include regional fostering recruitment drives, family hubs development projects aligning with national pilots promoted by the Department for Education, and perinatal mental health programmes reflecting priorities of NHS England and the Maternal Mental Health Alliance. Campaign work has involved awareness drives around foster care and family support in partnership with media outlets and stakeholders such as BBC regional services and local MPs from constituencies in Suffolk and Norfolk. Collaborative projects have included multi-agency pilots with local authorities, health trusts resembling Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, and voluntary-sector coalitions comparable to those led by Children England.
Category:Children's charities based in England