Agenda item

This agenda item will consider an update on  the Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board annual report for 2023-2024.

The 2023-2024 Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board Annual Report summarises the work of the Board and its subgroups to enhance the profile of safeguarding.

The report includes contributions from all strategic partners, highlights positive partnership working and provides a range of customer stories that evidence good safeguarding practice.

The agenda item provided an update on the Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board Annual Report for 2023/2024.

The Chair welcomed to the meeting, Moira Wilson, the Independent Chair for the Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board, Andrew Wells, Head of Service for Safeguarding and Mental Health and Gemma Cross, Safeguarding Lead at The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust.

The Chair invited the Independent Chair of the Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board to give the presentation, during which the following was noted:

·       The Report covered the period of April 2023 to March 2024.

Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board Priorities-

·       Back to Basics-

The Board would continue to work with partners to embed the six principles of safeguarding in practice. Making safeguarding personal was integral to everything the Board did. This was an important priority post-pandemic.

·       Systems, Processes and Performance-

The Board aimed to ensure that all services had appropriate systems and processes in place to support and safeguard adults effectively.

·       Strengthen Partnership-

The Board would collaboratively work with partners, organisations and communities, to work together to prevent abuse from happening, as safeguarding effectively was about working together, rather than as one sole organisation. Appendix One within the report highlighted the contributions that all partners made to the board throughout 2023/2024.

2023/2024 Actions-

·       In July 2023, the Board hosted a Peer Review by the Local Government Association. This entailed the service preparing a self-assessment to showcase the work of the Board.

·       The Board received the completed report, and as a result a partnership development day was held, to develop the recommendations from the report into an achievable action plan with three key themes. The three key themes identified were as follows:

o   Theme 1- Strengthening the user voice.

o   Theme 2- Governance and strengthening Board arrangements.

o   Theme 3- Making the best use of data and information.

·       The outcomes of the Peer Review were presented to the Heath Select Commission in early 2024.

·       The Board had a statutory responsibility to undertake Safeguarding Adults Review’s (SAR). SARs were completed in situations where somebody had died or was seriously harmed as a result of abuse or neglect and if the Board felt that lessons could be learned by the different agencies involved, then a SAR would be actioned.

·       There was a SAR completed in 2023/2024, known as the SAR Noelle and George. The review was signed off at the Board in March 2024 and work was on-going to ensure the development of the learning and recommendations from the SAR Noelle and George.

·       Safeguarding Awareness Week took place in November 2023, during which Rotherham hosted the Regional Launch for South Yorkshire. This was attended by 60 safeguarding professionals and leaders who came together to celebrate the start of a week of training and awareness sessions that related to safeguarding.

·       There had been a number of SARs in 2022/2023 which were as a result of self-neglect and several key themes were identified as a result of the SARs, self-neglect was an area that was increasing nationally. Therefore, in 2023/2024, there had been a whole partnership Thematic Review completed which focused on self-neglect and what the partnership could do to support this area. As a result, a pocket-sized guide was created that included a cluster scale to aid reporting.

·       There had been 3,963 safeguarding concerns received by the Board in 2023/2024. 588 of those concerns progressed on to a safeguarding enquiry. This was on trend with the previous years and was not an increase. In situations where concerns did not lead to an enquiry, it was often due to the Board finding alternative ways to meet the individual’s needs.

·       Neglect, physical and psychological abuse continued to be the top three categories of abuse during 2023/2024. Self-neglect continued to be a focus for safeguarding awareness raising.

·       The Board delivered a variety of safeguarding awareness sessions and supporting information. The Board had seen an increase in safeguarding contacts, especially during the last quarter of 2023/2024.

Future Aims of the Board-

·       The Board would complete all recommendations that had been made by the Peer Review.

·       The Board had completed a joint safeguarding self-assessment with Children’s and Young People’s Services in September 2024, this provided assurance that statutory partners were in a strong position and were safeguarding the citizens of Rotherham.

·       The Board would embed learning across the partnership from Safeguarding Adult Reviews, by holding learning events and completing audits.

·       The Board would work with Children’s and Young People’s Services and the Safer Rotherham Partnership, to deliver Safeguarding Awareness Week between the 18 and 22 November 2024.

·       Plans were in place to host a Rotherham Safeguarding Adults Board Development Day in January 2025; this would enable preparation of the new strategic plan for 2025/2028.

The Chair thanked the relevant officer for the presentation and invited questions, this led to the following points being raised during discussions:

·       The Board acknowledged that strengthening the user voice was an area which required further development. Often individuals who had gone through the safeguarding process were reluctant to talk about their experience. The Board collected the user voice via case studies and people’s stories.

·       When undertaking a safeguarding enquiry, the local authority captured the individual’s views and wishes at the start of the process, at the end of the process the individual would beprovidedwith an exit questionnaire which would capture their voice. The local authority had recently developed a user group which focused on capturing the user voice, the four board sub-groups already in place, also had a focus on capturing the user voice.

·       At the Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust there was an Expert By Experience Group for patients with learning disabilities and autism, the group was often asked questions on their experience of the safeguarding process. There were also Safeguarding Committee Meetings held by the Board which were attended by all partner agencies, each partner agency would take a story of a safeguarding journey to those meetings to discuss the user voice. The Board was starting to build the user voice across the partnership and remained keen to complete further work on this.

·       The Board was in discussions with Healthwatch Rotherham, to arrange joint working to raise the profile of the user voice. During the development day in January, the Board would consider whether an individual with experience should attend future Board meetings.

·       In relation to the figure of neglect and acts of omission detailed in the report (page 72), it was advised this was an area which had seen an increase nationally. The Board completed work with partners and the voluntary sector to increase the identification of neglect. A Vulnerable Adults Pathway had been developed and would be launched soon; the Neglect Pathway was included within the Vulnerable Adults Pathway. There were Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conferences (MARACs) held on a regular basis, MARACs focused on implementing the learning identified from SAR’s.

·       The Performance and Quality Subgroup had a focus on ensuring that the right data and outcomes were captured by the Board. The group had a joint Chair from South Yorkshire Police. All statutory partners were members of the subgroup. The group had a forward plan and focused on thematic reviews.

·       The Safeguarding Adult Review Subgroup met each month, and meetings included all statutory partners. The subgroup developed a time-out session to focus on lessons to be learned and to ensure that the action plans in place would be progressed and completed.

·       There was a Policy and Practise Subgroup and a Workforce Subgroup. One individual from each partner organisation sat on every sub-group to ensure they were cross-cutting. All subgroups fed back into the Board on a quarterly basis. Attendance at subgroups was good and had significantly improved over recent years.

·       In South Yorkshire, the police used a vulnerability scoring system which issued vulnerable adult alerts, any individual who had two or more referrals in a three-month period would be referred into Community MARAC, to identify any lessons learned. There were occasions where repeat referrals were due to organisational abuse, as a result the Board developed their case management system and the information available to support organisational abuse, a new pathway was also developed for practitioners. The Head of Safeguarding reviewed repeat cases monthly for the local authority and on a quarterly basis for the Board.

Resolved:- That the Improving Lives Select Commission:

1)    Consider the report.

2)    Request that further information on the activities planned for Safeguarding Awareness Week 2024, including the information on the launch of the Neglect Strategy, be shared with members of the Commission.