ADD2686 Maintenance of the Healthy Schools London and Healthy Early Years London programme websites

1.1.    The Mayor’s Health Inequalities Strategy (HIS) 2018-28 sets out an approach to tackling London’s health inequalities. An updated Implementation Plan for the Mayor’s HIS was published in December 2021. Integral to delivering this statutory strategy is action to address the social, economic and environmental factors that drive health inequalities – known as the wider determinants of health. 
1.2.    The current HIS sets out a 10-year vision to make London a healthier, fairer city, where no-one’s health suffers because of who they are or where they live. The Mayor is acting on these root causes of health inequalities by including health in all his strategies and policy development, from housing to economic development to transport. The HIS has five themes: Healthy Children, Healthy Minds, Healthy Places, Healthy Communities and Healthy Living. 
1.3.    The Healthy Early Years London (HEYL) and Healthy Schools London (HSL) programmes primarily support the first of these themes. However, they act as a key mechanism for supporting all five themes in relation to child health specifically. 
1.4.    The Mayor of London’s HEYL programme was established in 2018. It is a key ambition of the HIS, and is targeted at London’s 13,000-plus childcare settings. It has the aim of setting a new industry standard and tackling health inequalities across the city at the earliest opportunity in a child’s life. 
1.5.    The Mayor of London’s HSL programme was established in 2013. It provides a framework for schools to address health and wellbeing issues; and supports London schools to create an environment and culture that helps their pupils to be healthy. All schools across every borough are eligible to join the programme. To date, over 2,500 have signed up (representing 89 per cent of schools in London).
1.6.    In February 2023, the GLA appointed the National Children’s Bureau (NCB) as the delivery partner for both HEYL and HSL until March 2024 (MD2974). The NCB is working closely with the GLA to refresh and align the two programmes, supported by existing regional partnerships including the Office of Health improvement and disparities (OHID) and Associate Directors of Public Health London who represent  Directors of Public Health (DsPH). The refresh has a number of aims including better alignment between the two programmes, to reflect priorities of with wider health partners and to embed Mayoral priority programmes; including water only schools and support for mental health and wellbeing. The programmes will relaunch in autumn 2023 with refreshed content, ensuring they meet the aims of the Mayor and regional partners.
1.7.    Working with the NCB, the GLA aims to ensure the HEYL and HSL programmes are running as efficiently and effectively as possible; and to embed the programmes into wider regional initiatives to support health and tackle child health inequalities across London. 
Healthy Schools London and Healthy Early Years London website maintenance.
1.8.    Currently HSL and HEYL have separate websites, which provide the main source of information for boroughs and schools/ early years settings. To apply for awards for their schools and early years  settings, borough leads use the websites to submit webforms, providing key information and evidence.
1.9.    In spring 2022, the GLA commissioned a rapid review of both programmes by the Health Education Partnership, which recommended a website redesign. This included simplifying the webpages, making them easier to navigate; and improving the way data is collected and analysed via the webform. 
1.10.    In April 2021, Mayoral Decision (MD2974) approved £261,000 to manage future delivery of HEYL and HSL; and to build a new single web portal across 2022-24 (£163,000 in 2022-23 and £98,000 in 2023-24). This budget was used to understand functionality of the current website and investigate how user experience can be improved. This work was completed in collaboration with the GLA digital team and supported the development of a brief to maintain the site in the short term. Long term insight will be used to inform a future rebuild of the websites. 
1.11.    The external technical support provided for the HSL and HEYL sites needs to be extended to cater for extended product timelines, as it runs out (for different aspects) in November 2023 and February 2024. Beyond these points, support fees are required for external providers to maintain the old systems until both websites can be rebuilt within the new system. 
1.12.    The rebuild of both websites is being scoped in tandem with ongoing refresh of the programme content. A proposal will be developed in partnership with NCB and the GLA digital team.  In order to maintain the websites on their current system until the rebuild proposal is complete, a monthly fee will be required to provide standing support and hosting fees for both sites. This support will cost £1,536 for both sites from November 2023 until March 2024 and £2,304 from April – July 2024. Fifteen per cent contingency has been included in the final expenditure to cover any emerging costs common with website development and support. 
1.13.    In addition to maintaining the current system several functionality bugs have been identified. £5,400 is needed to commission developer time to fix existing bugs and put in place any maintenance required affecting the functionality of the website. 
1.14.    Fixing the bugs and maintaining the current system will ensure borough leads, schools and early years settings are able to use the websites and progress through the awards until the website rebuild is complete. 
1.15.    From November – April 2024 risks associated with the current website will increase. To formally review these risks and any emerging issues a development sprint will be conducted in this financial year. This development sprint will cost £10,200 plus fifteen per cent contingency and will allow mitigating action to be taken ensuring the current websites work well until the rebuild is complete. 
1.16.    From July 2024 the rebuilt site will be launched on the new system, removing the need for ongoing monthly fees to provide both sites with standing support and hosting fees.
1.17.    A one-off expenditure of £8,000 to provide extended support for the version of the scripting language (PHP) that these sites are built on and reached the end of its support-life in Nov 23 (£4000 per website for 12 months).
Summary of expenditure and activity
1.18.    The table below provides a breakdown of the approval being sought under this MD for 2023-26 expenditure:

Healthy Schools London and Healthy Early Years London website maintenance.
2.1.    Purpose of funding
To ensure the current website functionality is improved and that mitigating measures are taken to ensure positive user experience during the interim period before the rebuilt website is launched.
2.2.    Expected deliverables and outcomes
•    Improved functionality and user experience of the current websites. This will reduce the risk of users disengaging with the programme due to challenges relating to the website. User experience will be explored via existing networks with borough leads, schools and early years settings.
•    Reduction in support requests made from users relating to website errors. This will reduce capacity pressure on both GLA and NCB teams who currently address these requests.
•    Reduction in risks associated with poor functionality of the programme such as lost data or reporting challenges.
2.3.    The table above gives a breakdown of deliverables for the above work programmes, and the decisions being sought for proposed 2023-24 expenditure. 

2.4.    Expenditure will take the form of contracts for services to external developers, which will be procured in line with relevant GLA procedures, including the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code, as set out below.
 

3.1    Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010 (the Equality Act), as a public authority the Mayor must have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation, and any conduct that is prohibited by or under the Equality Act; and to advance equality of opportunity, and foster good relations, between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.

3.2    Child obesity is a huge challenge in London, where over 38.8 per cent of Year 6 children are overweight or obese. This can have profound impacts on the health and life chances of children. There is a strong relationship between deprivation and obesity. Supporting evidence from the National Child Measurement programme (NCMP) demonstrates that the effects of deprivation can be seen at ages 4-5 when children start school, and in year 6 when children are 10-11, and they widen with age. Significant differences in overweight and obesity in health outcomes, including weight, also exist between ethnic groups in London, some of which will be due to the confounding factor of deprivation. Due to the strong links between deprivation and overweight, HPHW mission activities are prioritised in areas that fall in the bottom 30 per cent in the indices of multiple deprivation, and/or areas with particularly poor health-related outcomes. A principle of the mission is that communities should be central to its design, and work should promote community-centred and culturally competent best practice.
 

4.1    Key risks are detailed below:

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities
4.2    The proposed activities will contribute directly to the following strategies:
•    the Health Inequalities Strategy, which identifies the importance of support to parents in the early years, and the impact that quality early-years provision can have on a child’s development and school readiness.
•    the London Vision for Health and Care was signed by system leaders across London demonstrating their joint ambition to make London the world’s healthiest global city, and the best global city in which to receive health and care services. This work is a key part of the Mayor's role in demonstrating action to support child health.
•    the Skills for Londoners Strategy, which focuses on education and skills with the aim to ‘empower all Londoners to access the education and skills to participate in society and progress in education and work’. 
•    the Economic Development Strategy, which identifies the importance of early years and childcare, with access to high-quality early-years education and childcare providing a ‘world-class education – which gives every child the best start in life’.
•    the Mayor’s ‘Inclusive London’ Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy.
•    the Mental health and Wellbeing London recovery mission which seeks to support Londoners where they live, work and play. 
4.3    Activity directly contributes to the London recovery missions, particularly Good Work for All, Building Strong Communities and A Robust Safety Net.
4.4    Tackling child obesity has been a long-term priority for the Mayor and is reflected in the HIS and the London Food Strategy; and in development of the HPHW mission. In 2018 the Mayor established the LCOT to give every child in London the chance to grow up eating healthily, drinking plenty of water and being physically active. The LCOT has now transitioned into the Mayor’s Advisory Group on Child Healthy Weight. In this guise, it continues to provide expert advice to the Mayor on delivering against the LCOT’s ambitions.
4.5    Reducing child obesity is one of the 10 areas of focus for pan-London collaboration for London’s health and social care partners. The work of the mission is included in the Every Child a Healthier Weight Delivery Plan, to which the Mayor is a signatory.
4.6    There are no conflicts of interest to declare for any of the officers involved in the drafting or clearance of this decision form.
 

5.1    Approval is sought for the expenditure of £31,555 from the Early Years and Convening and Partnership programme budgets within the Children and Young Londoners team. Expenditure breakdown across the financial years 2023-24 and 2024-25 is itemised below.

5.2.     This financial year:
•    expenditure of up £5,400 to commission developer time to fix existing bugs affecting the functionality of the website.  
•    expenditure of up ££1,536 to provide standing support and hosting fees for both sites from November 2023 until March 2024.
•    expenditure of up £10,200 to conduct a development sprint to test functionality and reliability of both websites.
•    one-off expenditure of £8,000 to provide PHP support for the subsequent 12 months
•    plus, fifteen per cent contingency of £3,770.
5.3.    Next financial year:
•    expenditure of up £2,304 to provide standing support and hosting fees for both sites from April – July 2024
•    plus, fifteen per cent contingency of £345.
5.4.    Funding for future financial years is subject to the annual budget setting process. Any contracts that commit the GLA in the future years are subject to appropriate break clauses.
5.5.    The award of funding to delivery partners will be subject to satisfactory financial due diligence.
 

6.1.    The schedule for this project is detailed below: