The common assessment framework (CAF) is a standardised approach, applicable in England only, to assessing the needs of children and young people who may need additional help in order to meet the five priority outcomes set out in the Every Child Matters programme. It has been designed for practitioners in all agencies to help them communicate and work together more effectively and plays an important role in providing early intervention.
CAF is particularly suitable for use in universal services such as health or education and is intended to help practitioners working with young people to tackle problems before they become too serious. Once use of CAF becomes established, it is likely that many of the young people coming into contact with prevention services or YOTs will already have had a CAF assessment completed by another agency. However, YOTs and prevention services need to know how to access and use CAF effectively, particularly in cases where multi-agency working is required.
The former Department for Children, Schools and Families (DfES) issued guidance to local authorities about the purpose of CAF, how to complete it and how to share CAF assessments with a young person’s parents/carers and with other organisations. However, it is not within the scope of the guidance to look in detail at the link between CAF and existing specialist assessment tools. YJB and DfES agreed that Asset and ONSET will continue to be the primary assessment tools for use in the youth justice system. Click to read a joint statement [opens in new window, 38Kb Word document] from DfES and the YJB on this agreement.
The Common Assessment Framework, Asset and Onset: Guidance for youth justice practitioners
The introduction of CAF will have an impact on youth justice practice in the areas of assessment and planning interventions.This guidance is intended to help practitioners and managers to use CAF effectively, while continuing to use Onset and Asset as the primary assessment methods for (respectively) young people at risk of involvement in offending or young people who have offended.
Click to order or download the guidance.
For further information or to download CAF documentation, see the Every Child Matters website [opens in new window]. You can also download the CAF guidance documents for practitioners and managers [opens in new window] from the same website.