Agenda item

The Chairman introduced the first draft of the framework of an Improvement Plan for Rotherham which must draw on the findings and recommendations of external reviews and inspections, including the Jay report, C.G.I, Ofsted and H.M.I.C., but must consolidate them into a single statement of the key challenges facing the Council.  The challenges must be fully considered and fully owned by the Council and should not be limited by the focus of external processes in setting out the challenges. 

 

The Improvement Plan could not be completed until the outstanding inspections, by OFSTED and Louise Casey, have been reported and the Council have been able to reflect on their findings and recommendations and for the interim Chief Executive to be able to make an assessment. 

 

In order for the Improvement Board to focus on immediate actions and discussion, provide challenge and support a draft list of eleven consolidated challenges were proposed:-

 

1.         Improvements across the partnership and those specifically within the Council for arrangements around Child Sexual Exploitation, ensuring that all fourteen local recommendations from the Jay report are quickly acted upon and improvements made.  Detailed progress monitoring arrangements currently sit with the Rotherham Safeguarding Children’s Board and its CSE Sub Group.

 

2.         Wider improvements in Children’s Safeguarding Services to ensure that all services for children in need of help and protection are robust and that children are quickly and adequately safeguarded and protected from harm.  OFSTED findings and the reports from Malcolm Newsam will form the basis for defining this area of challenge.

 

3.         Rotherham’s responses to these challenges will be made in the context of a period of further severe reductions in public spending both nationally and locally.  Managing Rotherham’s response to this financial context, and ensuring that the Council re-establishes a clear service offer to local residents, constitutes a third challenge

 

4.         Ensure that the Council has the programme management disciplines and culture that is required to deliver its organisational and service transformation programme.

 

5.         Ensuring that there are clear and appropriate mutual expectations of both the roles of Members and Officers in relation to strategic and operational accountability, challenge and governance.  Ensuring too that the culture and inter-personal relationships of the organisation are appropriate.

 

6.         Ensuring that Rotherham’s performance management arrangements are embedded at all levels of the authority and that adequate openness, challenge and robustness is evident in these arrangements.

 

7.         Ensuring the most appropriate and effective use of the Overview and Scrutiny functions is in place to secure robust challenge of council decisions and functions of the Council.

 

8.         Ensuring that a robust system for whistleblowing is in place, that there is a culture of welcoming challenge and responding well to it, and ensuring that staff feel comfortable to use the processes with confidence  that their voices will be heard and acted upon.

 

9.         Ensure that a comprehensive review of policies, practice and procedures is undertaken in relation to taxi licensing and that standards are enhanced were appropriate.

 

10.      The Council needs to continue to review clarify and build on its partnership working.

 

11.      The Council needs to share its learning from the improvement journey with other local authorities and partners.

 

In considering the eleven challenges it was suggested that Nos. 1 and 2 be joined together and feed into the bullet points for strands of action.   The two suggestions appeared to be intrinsically linked and could be comprehensively dealt with as one, whilst noting that certain areas would be developed at different paces.  It was also suggested that there be some consideration to the role of Adult Services in the support to victims and survivors.

 

In terms of No. 4 it was suggested that this was broadened out more to allow the Council to consider its vision and how it wished to operate in the future with a more open culture embedded.

 

The Board agreed in principle with all the challenges and suggested that they be simplified somewhat, to ensure the organisation could be fit for purpose.  The Improvement Plan needed to be clear and provide the reassurance that improvements were being made and that success was being achieved.  It also needed to make the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board stronger in its role for the Council and its partners.

 

Again for the purposes of Challenge No. 4 it was suggested that this area also include communication and workforce development looking at how staff and services could operate differently with further work to restore trust and rebuild confidence in the organisation.

 

Challenge No. 7 relating to overview and scrutiny needed to be done a little quicker in order for Members to understand their roles and to ensure that it was delivered more effectively.  There were various models of delivery for scrutiny and it should form part of wider review to help move forward the process and obtain political trust.

 

The support from the Local Government Association and the Children’s Commissioner in taking forward the improvements for Rotherham was acknowledged. 

 

Resolved:-  That the challenges contained in the Improvement Plan be revised to reflect the context of the discussion and presented back to the next meeting for further consideration. The Chairman introduced the first draft of the framework of an Improvement Plan for Rotherham which must draw on the findings and recommendations of external reviews and inspections, including the Jay report, C.G.I, Ofsted and H.M.I.C., but must consolidate them into a single statement of the key challenges facing the Council.  The challenges must be fully considered and fully owned by the Council and should not be limited by the focus of external processes in setting out the challenges. 

 

The Improvement Plan could not be completed until the outstanding inspections, by OFSTED and Louise Casey, have been reported and the Council have been able to reflect on their findings and recommendations and for the interim Chief Executive to be able to make an assessment. 

 

In order for the Improvement Board to focus on immediate actions and discussion, provide challenge and support a draft list of eleven consolidated challenges were proposed:-

 

1.         Improvements across the partnership and those specifically within the Council for arrangements around Child Sexual Exploitation, ensuring that all fourteen local recommendations from the Jay report are quickly acted upon and improvements made.  Detailed progress monitoring arrangements currently sit with the Rotherham Safeguarding Children’s Board and its CSE Sub Group.

 

2.         Wider improvements in Children’s Safeguarding Services to ensure that all services for children in need of help and protection are robust and that children are quickly and adequately safeguarded and protected from harm.  OFSTED findings and the reports from Malcolm Newsam will form the basis for defining this area of challenge.

 

3.         Rotherham’s responses to these challenges will be made in the context of a period of further severe reductions in public spending both nationally and locally.  Managing Rotherham’s response to this financial context, and ensuring that the Council re-establishes a clear service offer to local residents, constitutes a third challenge

 

4.         Ensure that the Council has the programme management disciplines and culture that is required to deliver its organisational and service transformation programme.

 

5.         Ensuring that there are clear and appropriate mutual expectations of both the roles of Members and Officers in relation to strategic and operational accountability, challenge and governance.  Ensuring too that the culture and inter-personal relationships of the organisation are appropriate.

 

6.         Ensuring that Rotherham’s performance management arrangements are embedded at all levels of the authority and that adequate openness, challenge and robustness is evident in these arrangements.

 

7.         Ensuring the most appropriate and effective use of the Overview and Scrutiny functions is in place to secure robust challenge of council decisions and functions of the Council.

 

8.         Ensuring that a robust system for whistleblowing is in place, that there is a culture of welcoming challenge and responding well to it, and ensuring that staff feel comfortable to use the processes with confidence  that their voices will be heard and acted upon.

 

9.         Ensure that a comprehensive review of policies, practice and procedures is undertaken in relation to taxi licensing and that standards are enhanced were appropriate.

 

10.      The Council needs to continue to review clarify and build on its partnership working.

 

11.      The Council needs to share its learning from the improvement journey with other local authorities and partners.

 

In considering the eleven challenges it was suggested that Nos. 1 and 2 be joined together and feed into the bullet points for strands of action.   The two suggestions appeared to be intrinsically linked and could be comprehensively dealt with as one, whilst noting that certain areas would be developed at different paces.  It was also suggested that there be some consideration to the role of Adult Services in the support to victims and survivors.

 

In terms of No. 4 it was suggested that this was broadened out more to allow the Council to consider its vision and how it wished to operate in the future with a more open culture embedded.

 

The Board agreed in principle with all the challenges and suggested that they be simplified somewhat, to ensure the organisation could be fit for purpose.  The Improvement Plan needed to be clear and provide the reassurance that improvements were being made and that success was being achieved.  It also needed to make the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board stronger in its role for the Council and its partners.

 

Again for the purposes of Challenge No. 4 it was suggested that this area also include communication and workforce development looking at how staff and services could operate differently with further work to restore trust and rebuild confidence in the organisation.

 

Challenge No. 7 relating to overview and scrutiny needed to be pursued early in order for Members to understand their roles and to ensure that it was delivered more effectively.  There were various models of delivery for scrutiny and it should form part of wider review to help move forward the process and obtain political trust.

 

The support from the Local Government Association and the Children’s Commissioner in taking forward the improvements for Rotherham was acknowledged. 

 

Resolved:-  That the challenges contained in the Improvement Plan be revised to reflect the context of the discussion and presented back to the next meeting for further consideration.