Agenda item

One of the outcomes of the meetings between the Children’s Select Committee’s Chairman and the Executive Members in 2019 was for the committee to receive performance monitoring reports on the overall service, likely to be June (to consider the year-end data from the previous year) then January meetings.

This was to enable the committee to consider actions taken by the council towards continual improvements, which could be reflected by achieving an 'outstanding' Ofsted rating in children's services.

Due to streamlining of Overview and Scrutiny activities during the Covid-19 pandemic, it is the first time the committee is considering the attached Safeguarding Dataset Exception Report (Quarter 4), as presented to the Performance & Outcome Board on 18 May 2021.

The committee is invited to consider:

·       If the dataset provides the information required (and if not, what would be more appropriate);

·       If it wishes to receive the dataset at its 5 January 2022 meeting.

Tamsin Stone, Head of Performance Outcomes and Quality Assurance for Children’s and Adult Services, provided an update to enable the Committee to consider actions taken by the Council towards achieving an 'outstanding' Ofsted rating in Family and Children's Services. It was noted that the previous report in January 2021 lacked comparative data, so this was the first full report.

It was explained that the far greater use of data in recent years had enabled the Council to highlight instances of where results did not fall within expected permeameters. A traffic light system (red, amber, green) was in place to help identify areas of concern. Overall, the Council was seen to be in a strong position, comparing favourably on most benchmarking indicators, with relatively few red cases. However, to move from a good to outstanding position, it was noted that a laser focus was required on the red areas. Areas of concern identified were:

·       The number of referrals within 12 months of a previous referral.

·        The growing demand for family key workers in relation to the number of support cases open.

·       A reduction in the number of cases coming forward during Covid-19 meeting ‘Child in Need’ criteria, those in need of local authority services to maintain a reasonable standard of health, prevent further harm or are disabled. It was noted that numbers were starting to creep up as lockdown measures were eased.

·       The percentage of assessments completed within 10 days was off target due to the increasing range and complexity of cases coming through.

·       An increase in the number of children subject to a Child Protection Plan with fewer cases being closed.

·       The low number of children looked after (CLA) with a small percentage of children placed in residential care homes, hostels and schools.

·       The recording of CLA annual health checks.

During the course of the discussion the following points were made:

• The Committee praised the usefulness of the traffic light (RAG rating) system and noted that red scores were exception reporting identifying areas which needed attention but were not necessarily evidence that something had gone wrong.
• Concerns were expressed at the lack of young people on child protection plans and the number of potentially hidden cases. It was noted that auditing had been undertaken and found that the correct decisions were being made. It was also explained that certain types of cases, such as neglect, take longer to come through. The hypothesis that preventative measures taken to reduce the number of cases being referred may also have had an impact. 
• Discussion about the presentation of the data and the expected changes to the data as a result of new initiatives took place. It was announced that a more user-friendly software package was being adopted.
• Given that the number of children looked after was below the anticipated range but the number in residential homes was above the anticipated range, it was asked if capacity would be available were the number of children looked after to increase to the expected level. Officers noted that they shared this concern and explained that the increased level of need associated with complex cases did make it hard to find suitable placements for some children, especially as the independent fostering agency marketplace had contracted. It was explained that work was ongoing to see what could be done to grow the number of fostering placements in order to avoid unnecessary residential placements in children’s homes.

Resolved:

To delegate authority to Chairman and Vice-Chairman to meet with officers to:

1. explore the information available and the format in which it could best be presented to CSC in future.

2. Set pre-meeting briefings on Performance Data.