Placid One directory, every offer you publish

What you publish now

• A special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) local offer, under the Children and Families Act 2014
• A kinship care local offer
• A care leavers local offer
• Family hubs and early help information
• Childcare and early years information
• Adult care and support information

Most councils hold these on two or three platforms, with the same organisations and services typed in more than once. The directory that most of them run on is the same supplier most other councils use, on a standard template, with a contract that renews without anyone looking at it.

What Placid does instead

• One directory of organisations, services and events, owned by the council, on open source software (LocalGov Drupal). No licence, no lock-in.
• Many sites. The SEND local offer, the kinship offer, the care leavers offer and the family hubs pages are each their own site, with their own design and voice, drawing from that one directory.
• One place to keep it right. A service changes its phone number once. Every site that lists it is correct that afternoon.
• Readable by design. Every page can be checked against the Readability Guidelines with Dawn, our own plain English checker, before it is published. The commonest inspection finding about local offers is that families cannot find their way in. This is half the answer.
• Built with the people who use it. Each site is designed in sessions with its own audience, the parent carer forum, care experienced young people, kinship carers.
• Still edited that way. Calderdale's local offer was designed like this, and the specialist inclusion team now adds content because they find it useful.

What it costs, in shape

The exact figures are public on the G-Cloud pricing page. The directory and first site are a one-off build. Each additional site on the same directory is a design fee once and a small fixed sum a year for hosting and support. The second, third and fourth offers cost a fraction of the first, because the directory is already there.

How it is bought

Through your own low value purchase system or a G-Cloud 15 direct award. Usually no tender. The route, step by step.

What to do with this page

Hand it to your Head of SEND, your head of early help and whoever owns the care leavers offer, and ask them one question. Which of our sites would you rebuild first? That is where we start.