Agenda and minutes

There were no declarations of interest.

There were no questions from members of the public or press.

There were no communications.

The Chair advised that these would be circulated with the next agenda.

The Chair welcomed June Lovett from the Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board (RSAB) and the Safeguarding Adults Board Manager.

The Care Act 2014 requires each Safeguarding Adults Board (SAB) to publish an annual report as soon as is feasible after the end of each financial year. The report focusses on:

-         What the SAB has done during that year to achieve its objective;

-         What the SAB has done during that year to implement its strategy;

-         What each member has done during that year to implement the strategy;

-         The findings of the reviews arranged by it under section 44 (safeguarding adults reviews) which have concluded in that year (whether or not they began in that year).

The report introduced both the achievements of Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board (RSAB) for 2016/17 and comments on some of the key points of inter-agency working arrangements and positive partnership.

Key priorities for 2017-18 include:

-          All organisations and the wider community work together to prevent abuse, exploitation or neglect wherever possible.

-          Where abuse does occur we will safeguard the rights of people, support the individual and reduce the risk of further abuse to them or to other vulnerable adults.

-          Where abuse does occur, enable access to appropriate services and have increased access to justice, while focussing on outcomes of people.

-          Staff in organisations across the partnership have the knowledge, skills and resources to raise standards to enable them to prevent abuse or to respond to it quickly and appropriately.

-          The whole community understands that abuse is not acceptable and that it is ‘Everybody’s business’.

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

Is there confidence that the RSAB is holding partner agencies to account? The peer review and audit processes had provided an opportunity to highlight good practice but also identify areas for improvement across different partner agencies. Further examples were asked about how this could be evidenced; the Safeguarding Adults Board Manager gave details of working with the police about referral processes to make ‘safeguarding personal’.

Clarification was sought to establish how the customer voice is captured? There have been two Safeguarding Adults Review (SAR) and both are completed and available on the RSAB’s website. There have been regional safeguarding events which have focused on learning. The RSAB is working with Healthwatch to support customers to attend the Board should there be issues they wish to raise. The Independent Chair and Safeguarding Adults Board Manager were also willing to attend groups to discuss safeguarding as appropriate. Further work has been undertaken to develop a performance ‘dashboard’. The service had also chosen a number of cases at random which had been considered by the RSAB, and had spoken to the customer or families about the processes. It was clear that further improvements should be made to communications to raise awareness of reporting routes.

A further explanation of the term ‘zero tolerance’ was requested and how this was applied to safeguarding issues. The term is commonly  ...  view the full minutes text for item 96.

The Chair welcomed Christine Cassell, the Independent Chair of Rotherham Local Safeguarding Children Board, to present the Board’s annual report for the year 2016-17.

The context for this report is one of increasing demand for family support and child protection services both locally and nationally whilst all public sector budgets are reducing.  The role of local safeguarding children boards in this context is particularly important in requiring assurance that local services are appropriately targeted and resourced to ensure that children are protected. 

The Independent Chair outlined that drawing on single and multi-agency audits and reviews and from inspection monitoring, that the safeguarding system in Rotherham, with the local authority as the lead agency, is becoming more compliant with statutory requirements and is beginning to improve in the quality of the assessment, decision making and planning for children at risk.  Rotherham Safeguarding Children Board will continue to monitor the improvements in the quality of safeguarding practice and will focus in particular on the quality and compliance of multi-agency meetings which are held when a child is considered to be at risk of harm. 

During the course of the year the Children and Social Work Act gained Royal Assent which has considerable implications for the role of the Board. The Act abolishes the requirement for a Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) but does not abolish the requirement for partners to work together. Responsibility for co-ordinating safeguarding activity is now jointly shared between the local authority, the Chief Police Officer and the local Clinical Commissioning Group.

The report detailed the Board’s activity in relation to the priority areas outlining areas of improvement and concern. This activity focussed on monitoring and improving responses to child sexual exploitation, neglect, early help and the safeguarding of children who are looked after by the local authority. The LSCB has sought evidence that agencies are individually and collectively listening to children and young people and taking account of their views both in plans for individual children and in wider strategic planning of services.

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

Clarification was sought on a series of issues raised in the 2016-17 Voice of the Child Lifestyle Survey in relation to bullying, alcohol use and sexual activity. The Independent Chair had met with the Youth Cabinet who had identified that bullying remained a concern The expectation was that schools would take the lead in this work. There were ongoing discussions with the Youth Cabinet to ensure that the work of the Board reflected the voice of young people. Alcohol use had not been identified as a priority issue by the LSCB but the Deputy Strategic Director gave assurance about action taken by school nurses and Public Health to raise awareness. It was outlined that the survey was self-reported, therefore services were triangulating evidence from case-files and partners (e.g. referrals to Accident and Emergency Departments or reports of anti-social behaviour relating to alcohol misuse) to establish if this required further action. Similarly, in respect of  ...  view the full minutes text for item 97.

Resolved:-

That a further meeting be held on 12^th December, 2017 at 2.00 p.m.