Agenda item

The Independent Chair of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership, Jenny Myers attended the meeting to present the first Annual Report of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership (RSCP).

The Independent Chair was accompanied by the District Commander for Rotherham, Chief Superintendent Steve Chapman and Sue Cassin, Chief Nurse at NHS Rotherham CCG. The Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Children's Services and Neighbourhood Working, the Strategic Director for Children and Young People’s Services, the Assistant Director, Children’s Social Care and the Business Manager, Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership were also in attendance.

The report stated that it was a statutory requirement under the Children Act 2004 for an annual report to be produced that detailed the activities that had been carried out by local safeguarding partners in the previous twelve months that also detailed the effectiveness of the activities in the safeguarding and the promotion of welfare of children in the local area. It was noted that as part of the governance arrangements of the RSCP that it was a requirement that the RSCP Annual Report was presented through Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council’s own scrutiny arrangements as well as the other safeguarding partners own governance arrangements.

The Independent Chair advised that the RSCP Annual Report detailed the activities that had been undertaken in relation to its core business and priorities for the year 2019/2020 and considered how well it had worked towards the achievement of the priorities and objectives as detailed in its Strategic Business Plan 2019-2020 that were: 

·       Safe at Home

·       Safe in the Community

·       Safe Safeguarding Systems

The Annual Report detailed the key areas of progress that had been achieved against each of the objectives and areas of priority.  The Independent Chair noted how well the different members of the partnership had worked together and advised that the frequent meetings that had been held between partners had enabled effective oversight to be carried out and actions to be taken to deliver on the key priorities of the partnership.

In addition to detailing what had gone well the Annual Report set out that the areas of activity that could be done differently or better and detailed the challenges faced in achieving the priorities over the year. The areas identified for development that were highlighted in the report included:

·       Budgeting pressures.

·       Ensuring that babies and very young children were kept safe.

·       Further scrutiny of Early Help Strategy and Front Door activity.

·       New developments, including contextual safeguarding in the identification, assessment and response to criminal exploitation and adolescent neglect.

·       Review of the Multi-agency Safeguarding Arrangements and safeguarding plan.

·       Ensuring that the voices and lived experiences of children and young people, families and workforce were represented across the activities undertaken by the RSCP.

The Independent Chair detailed the objectives for the partnership for the coming year and advised that a key area of focus would be ensuring that the voices of children were heard clearly by increased engagement activities so as to ensure that the partnership could meet their needs as effectively as possible. The Independent Chair thanked the members of the partnership for there work in keeping children and young people in Rotherham safe in what had been a very challenging year.

The District Commander for Rotherham, Chief Superintendent Steve Chapman highlighted the activity that had been carried out by South Yorkshire Police and the rest of the partnership regarding child sexual and criminal exploitation, including the activity to raise awareness widely on what the warning signs of such activity looked like.

The Chief Nurse at NHS Rotherham CCG, Sue Cassin summarised the activity that had taken place with regards to the role of health care provision in delivering the objectives of the partnership over the previous year.

The Strategic Director for Children and Young People’s Services noted that new approach to managing safeguarding strategically in Rotherham via the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership would provide a framework for managing safeguarding in an effective manner that also enable innovative approaches to safeguarding activity to be delivered across the Borough. The Strategic Director noted that while the number of Looked After the Children in the Borough was of concern, advised that as highlighted in the recent Ofsted inspection of Children’s Services, that there were no children currently in care that did not need to be the care of the authority.

The full Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership was attached as an appendix to the officer’s report.

The Chair thanked he Independent Chair of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership, the District Commander for Rotherham and the Chief Nurse at NHS Rotherham CCG for attending the meeting to present the first annual report from the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership.

The Chair noted the comprehensiveness and wide-ranging scope of the report and welcomed the information on how the partnership had successfully responded to the challenges created by the pandemic. The Chair noted that the format of the report had not presented the information in way that was as accessible and easy to understand as it could have been and recommended that the format of the next annual report be reviewed in order to make the content clearer and more accessible for a wider audience.

The Chair asked for further information on the work that was being carried out to raise awareness of CSE and CCE. The District Commander provided further information on the video that had been created for hoteliers to help them identify potential warning signs of CSE. The District Commander advised the video had been created in a way that enabled it to be broken down into separate sections that could then be used more widely to raise awareness of the warning signs of CSE. The District Commander also advised awareness raising activities had taken place during National Children’s Safeguarding week and were also planned for the National CSE Awareness Week in January 2021. The Chair asked that members be involved with future awareness raising activities where possible.

Members asked for further information on the budgetary pressures that the partnership was facing and how these would impact on the work of the partnership. The Independent Chair noted that the reduction in the contribution to the partnership from the Police and Crime Commissioner was an issue that was facing safeguarding partnerships nationwide and that as a consequence some innovative activities would have to be scaled back. The Independent Chair assured members that the reduction in the partnerships budget would not negatively impact its ability to ensure the safety and wellbeing of children and young people in Rotherham.

The Assistant Director, Children’s Social Care and the Chief Nurse noted that while reductions in the budget did create challenges, the wealth of experience and knowledge across the partnership would be ensure that resources were used strategically across the partnership in order to deliver the best possible outcomes. The Business Manager, Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership assured members that resources would be concentrated on core activities that provided the positive outcomes for children and young people and that any impacts of reduced funding would be on back office support functions and not on the delivery of front line services.

The Chair asked for further information on the concerns that had been detailed in the report surrounding the increase of incidents of injury to babies of less than one year old and enquired whether activity in this area would be impacted by the reductions in the partnership’s budget.

The District Commander advised that an upcoming audit of cases would highlight key actions that needed to be taken in response to this concern. The District Commander assured the Chair that as this was an area of key concern for the partnership that related activity would not be negatively impacted by budget pressures. The Assistant Director advised that targeted social care visits with new parents would enable concerns surrounding risk in this area to be picked up and acted on. The Assistant Director noted that the partnership provided a framework for joined up multi-agency working in order to positively deal with concerns and enable appropriate and effective safeguarding activity to take place. The Chief Nurse noted that initiatives provided through maternity care had helped to address potential risks around injuries to babies and advised that learning from past cases would be used to develop future actions right across the partnership.

The Chair welcomed how this area of concern clearly showed how multiagency and cross partnership working was being enabled and maximised by the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership.

Members asked for further information on what action was being taken regarding the concerns that had been detailed in the report regarding the increased number of children in receipt of Elective Home Education (EHE). The Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Children's Services and Neighbourhood Working advised that the increase of the number of children in receipt of EHE was a concern nationally but advised that there had been some success in Rotherham in reducing these numbers and in parents being dissuaded from EHE and as a consequence keeping their children in school. The Assistant Director, Education who was in attendance at the meeting provided further information on the activities that were being taken around EHE.

The Chair asked whether the number of children in EHE was of concern for the police due to the potential risk that EHE provided for increased opportunities for the radicalisation of children and young people. The District Commander noted that children and young people not being in school could create a heightened risk of radicalisation but advised that as any activity was taking place in the home that it was very hard to take specific action on. The District Commander assured the Chair that despite the challenges this was a key area of activity and that work in this area was also supported by the work of the Safer Rotherham Partnership.

The Chair thanked the Independent Chair of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership, Jenny Myers, the District Commander for Rotherham, Chief Superintendent Steve Chapman and Sue Cassin, Chief Nurse at NHS Rotherham CCG for attending the meeting to present the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership Annual Report and for answering member’s questions.

Resolved: -

1.    That the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership - Annual Report 2019-20 be received and noted.

2.    That the format of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership - Annual Report 2020-21 be reviewed in order to make the content clearer and more accessible for a wider audience.

3.    That the submission of the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership - Annual Report 2020-21 to the Improving Lives Select Commission in December 2021 be supplemented with a presentation.

4.    That the refreshed Neglect Strategy be circulated to members of the Improving Lives Select Commission when it is completed.

5.    That the Rotherham Safeguarding Children Partnership’s response to the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel national thematic review into non-accidental injury into children aged under one be circulated to members of the Improving Lives Select Commission once completed.