Agenda and minutes

There were no Declarations of Interest made at the meeting.

There were no members of the public and present at the meeting.

-              LSCB Audits.

-              Work Programme – 23^rd March, 2016.

Caroline Webb, Senior Adviser Scrutiny and Member Development, reported on the following:-

(a)  LSCB Audits

Initial discussions had taken place with the Chair and Councillors Hoddinott and Ahmed following concerns raised at the Select Commission previously in relation to CSE and LSCB audit process.  The work programme in terms of the audits would be shared and factored into the Select Commission work programme to ensure that there was appropriate Member involvement in the process.  Consideration would be given as to how those pieces of work could inform the 2016/17 work programme to inform Members’ wider understanding of Safeguarding processes.

(b)  Work Programme

The next meeting of the Select Commission, scheduled for 23^rd March, was the last in the 2015/16 Municipal Year. At the November meeting, it  was agreed that the March meeting focus on CSE.  It was suggested that a small group of Members meet to discuss the scope of the meeting, attendees, particular areas of concern etc.

Resolved:-  That Councillors Ahmed, Astbury, Pitchley, Rose and M. Vines meet to plan the format of the 23^rd March Select Commission meeting.

The minutes of the previous meeting of the Improving Lives Select Commission held on 16^th December, 2015, were considered.

Resolved:-  That the minutes from the previous meeting of the Improving Lives Select Commission be agreed as an accurate record.

The Chair introduced Christine Cassell, Independent Chair of the Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) and Jason Harwin, South Yorkshire Police (Vice-Chair).

Councillor Jepson expressed his concern regarding the format of the report.  This was endorsed by other Members of the Commission.

Christine apologised for the formatting of the report which had been due to an IT issue.  She undertook to provide Members with a correct version of the document and took on board the comments with regard to the general layout of the report.

The report had been produced by the previous Independent Chair, Steve Ashley, and was the annual report for 2014/15.  It was very late in being submitted to the Select Commission but future reports would be submitted in a more timely fashion.

Christine highlighted the following:- 

Purpose and function of the Board

-         To co-ordinate what was done by each person or body represented on the Board for the purposes of Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children in the area

-         To ensure the effectiveness of what was done by each such person or body for those purposes

-         It was neither a delivering or commissioning Board; other Boards carried out those functions

2015/16 Report will comment on areas of improvement that were identified as priorities for the coming year i.e.

-         Effectiveness and Early Help

-         The effectiveness of the response to neglect and domestic abuse

-         Experience of Looked After Children

-         Effectiveness of multi-agency response to CSE

-         How the LSCB influences improvement across agencies and effectively challenges performance

-         Co-ordination and strategic commissioning activity

-         Hearing and acting upon the experience of others, particularly children and young people

-         Ensuring all the issues informed learning and development across the agencies

Priorities the Board would be working on included:- 

-         Strengthening the understanding of performance

-         Quality of safeguarding services

-         Engaging with young people

-         Ensuring that  was alignment with the priorities being identified and commissioning decisions

-         Communicating more effectively the work that the Board undertakes

Discussion ensued on the report with the following issues highlighted/clarified:-

·         The LSCB and the Children’s Improvement Board had been working to improve the quality of data and performance information available. This would enable better challenge and scrutiny of services provided by agencies across the board..  Forthcoming annual reports would contain much improved information

·         Within the document the section outlining the LSCB Statutory Framework required more explanation as to the role and function of the Board in an easy to read format

·         There has been a lot of work done around Looked after Children (LAC) but there was still improvements to be made.  The Improvement Board examined individual plans with particular focus on LAC to ensure that outcomes were no worse..  In line with the rest of the country,  LAC outcomes were still poor although work was taking place to make improvements.

·         Over the last 18 months, the LSCB has had a greater emphasis on scrutinising how services take  ...  view the full minutes text for item 43.

Jean Imray, Interim Deputy Strategic Director, Children and Young People Services, presented the third quarter (December, 2015) performance report for the key areas of Safeguarding Children and Families Services.  Appendix A of the report took into account direction of travel on the previous month, comparison against national benchmarking data and, where applicable, analysis against locally set targets.

This was the first specific performance indicator monitoring report presented to the Commission regarding Children’s Social Care since the outcome of the 2014 Ofsted inspections.  Since the inspection, performance management arrangements within the Service had undergone significant improvements and would continue to develop over time.

A number of performance improvements had been achieved in the last twelve months including:-

-         A more robust and responsive multi-agency front door service (MASH) with the proportion of referrals with timely decision making consistently in the high 90%s – 98.6% in December against a low of 36.7% at the end of 2014

-         A reduction in the number of children on a Child Protection Plan for excessive periods of time – at the end of December only one child was subject to a CPP for over two years compared to eighteen in April

-         Almost all Rotherham’s vulnerable children now had up-to-date intervention plans in place and recorded.  With 100% children subject to a Child Protection Plan, 96.9% of Looked after Children (LAC) and 90.3% of Children in Need with up-to-date plans compared to performance at the end of 2014 of 80%, 82%and 32% respectively

-         Children were now being seen by their Social Workers more regularly – 96.2% of Looked after Children were receiving statutory visits on time with national standards and 95.0% of children with a Child Protection Plan had been visited in the last two weeks (local standard)

-         Caseloads for Social Workers had been reduced and averages across all teams were now consistently within agreed limits of eighteen-twenty-two cases

The report also set out current key improvement areas.

Discussion ensued on the report with the following issues raised/clarified:-

·         Due to the number of CSE operations and the possible children involved, there had been an increase in Section 47 investigations.  However, a number, when investigated, had found the concerns to be unwarranted.

·         All adoption agencies had their pool of adopters so not only would the Authority “buy” adopters (pay a fee to an adoption agency) but Rotherham’s adopters were adopting by way of other authorities/agencies.  Currently there was a shortage of adopters so the Authority was having to place more children with out of authority adopters and having to pay a placement fee.  A recruitment campaign was to be launched in the same way as there had been for foster carers.  This was a national problem.  There was work that could be done to improve the situation and the Authority was doing what it could.

·         Anybody who was an approved adopter would have been through a very rigorous adoption assessment whether it was by a local authority or private adoption agency.  The Authority would  ...  view the full minutes text for item 44.

Resolved:-  That the next meeting of the Improving Lives Select Commission take place on Wednesday, 23^rd March, 2016, to start at 1.30 p.m. in the Rotherham Town Hall.