Agenda and draft minutes

There were no declarations of interest made at this meeting.

Agreed:- That the minutes of the previous meeting of the Looked After Children Scrutiny Sub-Panel, held on 2nd December, 2009, be approved as a correct record.

Consideration was given to a minute of the meeting of the Cabinet Member and Advisers for Children and Young People's Services, held on 10^th March, 2010, concerning the Local Authority Business Growth Incentives (LABGI) scheme which gives local authorities a financial incentive to encourage local business growth by rewarding qualifying business growth with a non-ring-fenced grant.

The minute stated that a LABGI funding allocation of £30,000 was agreed in August 2009 to support developmental work and activities for Looked After Children. The proposals for allocation of this grant funding were listed in the minute, as follows:-

(i) transfer £10,000 LABGI funds to the Looked After Children Trust, with the remainder of the monies divided between:-

(ii) sessional youth work;

(iii) The Pledge (wallet sized version);

(iv) Quarterly Magazine ‘Magazina’ – published by the Looked After Children Council; 

(v) Ministerial Stock-take and visits to meet young people in other authorities;

(vi) Looked After Children Council celebration day and entertainment;

(vii) Young people’s resource publications;

(viii) Developmental work;

(ix) Purchasing rooms, refreshments, children’s payments for the Looked After Children Council.

Agreed:- That the use of the grant funding, as detailed above, be noted.

Consideration was given to a report presented by the Looked After Children Service Manager concerning the LA duty to support vulnerable 16 and 17 year olds.

The previous report had detailed information about potential demand for this provision but it was still unclear what the overall level of demand would be.  However since the beginning of November 2009, 6 young people aged 16 and 17 had presented to Key Choices as homeless and were deemed to require a joint assessment.  Of these, 3 were fleeing alleged physical or emotional abuse or domestic violence; 2 had been evicted by parents and one had been living with friends and could no longer stay there.  Immediate accommodation had been provided for 5 of the girls, one found her own accommodation with a friend.  Three girls were placed in crisis accommodation with support form the tenancy support staff; one placed in a refuge and one in a hostel.  Since then two had returned home and one had moved into hostel accommodation.

During the same period 4 young people aged 16-17 had been accommodated under S20 by the Local Authority and the Leaving Care Service was supporting 8 people who were seeking asylum.

A multi agency task and finish group were established in November 2009 to ensure all agencies worked together to develop a clear strategy and they had met on 3 occasions. A sub group was currently meeting to refine the process map and develop a joint assessment framework.

Information on the implications of this ruling had been shared with all teams within Children’s Social Care and Housing Services and interim guidance stated that the team approached by the child would provide immediate direct support to the child and liaise with other teams as relevant. This would ensure that Children aged 16 and 17 were not passed from one service to another. An immediate assessment would be undertaken and the young person would either be accommodated under S20 or supported accommodation would be sought. Where the child was accommodated under S20, primary responsibility would be held by Children’s Social Care and where the immediate assessment identified that the young person was able to live in supported accommodation, Key choices would liaise with housing partners to ensure appropriate supported accommodation was provided. A child in need assessment must then be completed by the Children’s Social Care locality team responsible for the locality in which the child’s parents or person with parental responsibility lives.

A number of other working groups also contributed to this agenda and to the work of the 16 and 17 year old Homelessness task and finish group.

A full needs assessment and strategic review of Care Placements was also in progress, which aimed to ensure sufficiency of accommodation for Looked after Children and to develop appropriate preventative strategies, including work with children on the edge of care and young people at risk of homelessness through family breakdown.

Neighbourhoods and Adult Services were also reviewing the feasibility of the development of differing accommodation  ...  view the full minutes text for item 35.

Consideration was given to a report presented by Martin Smith concerning training to Designated Teachers and Governors.

Statutory Guidance to school governing bodies of maintained schools in England was issued under Section 20 of the Children and Young Persons Act 2008.  Within the guidance the role of the designated teacher became statutory.  It informed the governors that they must appoint a designated teacher who was:

• A qualified teacher of Head teacher or Acting Head teacher; or
• A person who was taking steps to become a qualified teacher (2012) and had undertaken a role of promoting the educational achievement of Looked After Children (LAC) for at least 6 months.

The Guidance stated that designated teachers must have training in emotional, psychological and the social impact of separation from the birth family, reasons for separation, a broad framework of the care system and the likely impact on education outcomes,

The Government had allocated a small amount of grant to support training and this was held by the Get Real Team.  Training had also been offered to Designated Governors on their role in supporting the Designated Teacher and this had been undertaken at different times of the day to allow governors to attend at times convenient to them.

The training for Designated Teachers had been provided in three parts:

• The role of the Designated Teacher in addressing the underachievement of Looked after Children including an overview of the care system and its impact on education
• Attachment training
• The Designated Teachers Role regarding the Personal Education Plan and contribution to statutory reviews

The Designated Governors training covered:

• Roles and responsibility (supporting the designated teacher and reporting mechanism)
• An understanding of the care system and its impact

The report detailed the attendance at training sessions by Designated Teachers and Governors in Primary, Secondary and Special/Short Stay Schools.

Those schools who had not attended training to date were targeted for future training.

The training was to be delivered next year with further developments in the areas of resilience, loss and bereavement and a support group meeting was to be established.

A discussion ensued and the following issues were raised:-

• Links with early years education and sixth form and further education colleges – how do we ensure that teachers and governors are aware of issues around educational attainment of looked after children and young people?  It was reported that training had been undertaken in Children Centres and Early Years settings.

Agreed:- (1) That the content of the report be noted.

(2) That the development of links with local Colleges through Local Authority nominated Governors be supported.

Councillor Jane Austen gave a summary of the issues raised in the Corporate Parenting Scrutiny Review.  Caroline Webb, Senior Scrutiny Adviser gave a powerpoint presentation that drew specific attention to:

The presentation drew specific attention to:

• Issues covered within the review
• What was looked at
• 2005 review recommendations
• Questions asked
• Findings
• Recommendations
  • Looked after Children Council and Pledge
  • Governance Arrangements
  • Training and Guidance

• What next?

A discussion took place and the following issued were raised:-

• It was noted that one of the recommendations was to establish a Corporate Parenting Board as a sub-group of the Children’s Board.  The review group mad a further recommendation that if a Corporate Parenting Board was established that the LAC Scrutiny Sub-Panel should be disbanded and the scrutiny responsibilities revert to Children and Young People’s Scrutiny Panel.  A query was raised as to what the difference would be between this new board and the Looked After Children Scrutiny Sub Panel.  It was proposed that the Corporate Parenting Board would have access to agencies and partners who were decision makers.  DCSF guidance suggested that this approach was more effective.
• A query was raised as to who would sit on the Corporate Parenting Board.  The Senior Scrutiny Adviser confirmed that this detail would be included in her draft report which would be circulated to members of the panel in the next few days.
• A comment was made that training would be needed to cover:

o       What a Corporate Parent is

o       What their responsibilities are

The Senior Scrutiny Adviser reported that she would be completing her draft report by the end of the week and be sending it out for comment.  The final draft would then be submitted to PSOC and then to Cabinet for decision.

Agreed:- That the draft recommendations were endorsed by the Panel.

Consideration was given to a report presented by the Looked After Children Service Manager in respect of the overview of inspections of Looked After Children’s Services.

The report detailed actions taken in response to requirements of Ofsted inspections for Fostering Service, Adoption Service and Children’s Homes and action plans were in place to meet all requirements.

Fostering Service

The fostering service received a judgement of satisfactory in June 2009.  The inspection noted improvements across service provision but gave a notice of requirement to improve in three areas:

• Ensure that placements made under regulation 38 meet the regulation that all placements are reviewed at panel within 6 weeks
• Ensure that the service is managed with sufficient care, competence and skill to ensure that the monitoring systems in place are effective
• Ensure that panel minutes provide an accurate record of discussion and decisions made.

Adoption Service

The adoption service was last inspected in January 2008 and was judged to be good.  Two statutory requirements were made:

• Ensure written adoption support assessments are completed
• Ensure that checks are undertaken in relation to specialist workers to make sure they are registered to undertake adoption support work or that employment checks are undertaken by Rotherham MBC.

Children’s Homes

Inspections of Children’s Homes in 2009 identified a number of issues in respect of compliance with the Children’s Homes Regulations and National Minimum Standards.  Some of these areas had not shown improvement over successive inspections.  A comprehensive improvement plan was developed in response and shared with the inspectorate team in November 2009.

• Inadequate staffing within the units was identified as a key factor resulting in an over reliance on Casual and Agency staff
• Management of units was criticised as oversight of compliance with regulations not being sufficiently robust
• Ofsted criticised management decisions in respect of placements of children

A discussion ensued and the following issues were raised:-

• If Ofsted were to visit now, would we be ready for them?  It was confirmed that a visit had been made by Ofsted the previous day and they had recognised improvements made concerning re-matching, decision making and risk assessments.
• It was noted that all the recommendations made by Ofsted during their previous visit had been implemented.
• A query was raised with regard to a previous problem in respect of placement over numbers and whether this was still an issue.  Confirmation was given that this had been rectified.
• Reference was made to the CWDC Training worker post which had been vacant since October 2009 and what steps had been made to fill this post.  The LAC Service Manager confirmed that a review of the service provision was currently being undertaken and it was probable that the post would be amended before being re-advertised.

Agreed:- That the content of the report be noted.

Consideration was given to a report presented by the Looked After Children Service Manager which provided statistical information of placements of Looked After Children in Rotherham together with a glossary of terms.

The information provided concerned:-

• Placement type
• Legal Status
• Ethnic Origin
• Gender
• Age

She reported that the overall number of Looked after Children had increased slightly but that there was no obvious reason for this.  Members of the panel were concerned by this increase and asked that this be investigated and reported back to the next meeting. 

A request was also made that information relating to the areas of the borough where children were more at risk to included in future statistical reports.

Agreed:- (1) That the content of the report be noted

(2) That future reports include information relating to

·         The increased trend in numbers of Looked after Children

·         Areas of the borough which were most at risk.

The following item is likely to be considered in the absence of the press and public as being exempt under Paragraphs 2 and 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972 as amended - information likely to reveal the identity of an individual/information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular individual (including the Council)

Resolved:- That, under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 2 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972, as amended (information likely to reveal the identity of an individual).

Consideration was given to a report presented by the Looked After Children Service Manager, containing a summary of the main issues and events occurring in Children’s Homes during the period December, 2009 to February, 2010. The report referred to the mainstream Children’s Homes which are:

- Goodwin Crescent Children’s Home at Swinton;

- St. Edmunds Avenue Children’s Home at Thurcroft;

- Silverwood Children’s Home, East Herringthorpe (formerly Creswick Road);

- Woodview Children’s Home, Kimberworth Park (formerly Studmoor Road).

A discussion ensued and the following issues were raised:-

• Whether care plans and care pathways plans were completed within prescribed timescales and how were these plans were quality assured
• The fabric of the buildings and capital investment
• What steps were taken to ensure that younger children were appropriately placed in residential units.

Agreed:- (1) That the report be received.

(2) That the Operations Manager continue to undertake the visits and reports under Regulation 33 Children’s Homes Regulations 2001.