Agenda and minutes

Children, Families, Lifelong Learning and Culture Select Committee - Thursday, 12 September 2024 10.00 am

Venue: Woodhatch Place, 11 Cockshot Hill, Reigate, RH2 8EF

Contact: Julie Armstrong, Scrutiny Officer 

Media

Items
No. Item

32/

APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE AND SUBSTITUTIONS

    To note any apologies for absence.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Chris Townsend and Mark Sugdon, and Mr Alex Tear.

33/

MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS MEETINGS: 30 JULY 2024 pdf icon PDF 158 KB

    To agree the minutes of the previous meeting of the Children, Families, Lifelong Learning and Culture as a true and accurate record of proceedings.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    The Committee AGREED the minutes from the previous meeting were a true and accurate record of the meeting.

34/

DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

    All Members present are required to declare, at this point in the meeting or as soon as possible thereafter:

           I.       Any disclosable pecuniary interests; or

     

          II.       Other interests arising under the Code of Conduct in respect of any item(s) of business being considered at this meeting.

     

    NOTES:

    ·         Members are reminded that they must not participate in any item where they have a disclosable pecuniary interest

    ·         As well as an interest of the Member, this includes any interest, of which the Member is aware, that relates to the Member’s spouse or civil partner (or any person with whom the Member is living as a spouse or civil partner)

    ·         Members with a significant personal interest may participate in the discussion and vote on that matter unless that interest could be reasonably regarded as prejudicial.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    None received.

35/

QUESTIONS AND PETITIONS pdf icon PDF 155 KB

    To receive any questions or petitions.

    Notes:

    1.    The deadline for Member’s questions is 12.00pm four working days before the meeting (6 September 2024).

     

    2.    The deadline for public questions is seven days before the meeting (5 September 2024).

     

    3.    The deadline for petitions was 14 days before the meeting, and no petitions have been received.

     

    The public retain their right to submit questions for written response, with such answers recorded in the minutes of the meeting; questioners may participate in meetings to ask a supplementary question. Petitioners may address the Committee on their petition for up to three minutes. Guidance will be made available to any member of the public wishing to speak at a meeting.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    There was one Member question received from Cllr Davidson about the budget for SEND play provision. The question and answer were published as a supplementary agenda.

     

36/

ACTIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS TRACKER AND FORWARD WORK PLAN pdf icon PDF 230 KB

37/

REPORT OF THE ADDITIONAL NEEDS & DISABILITIES: PARENT AND CARER EXPERIENCE TASK GROUP pdf icon PDF 428 KB

    • Share this item

    To receive the findings and recommendations of the Additional Needs and Disabilities: Parent/Carer Experience Task Group, tasked with considering what changes could improve the Council’s support of parents and carers of Children and Young People with Additional Needs and Disabilities.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    Witnesses:

     

    • Councillor Jeremy Webster, Chairman of Task Group
    • Councillor Jonathan Essex, Task Group Member
    • Clare Curran, Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Lifelong
      ?Learning
    • Rachael Wardell, Executive Director for Children, Families and
      ?Lifelong Learning
    • Julia Katherine, Director for Education and Lifelong Learning
    • Liz Bone, SEND County Service Planning & Performance Leader

     

    Key points made in the discussion:

     

    1. The Chair thanked the Task Group for an insightful and sobering report. While recognising that Education Health and Care Plans (EHCP) were an issue nationally, she said the Task Group’s recommendations addressed long-standing local issues that were within the Council’s control.

     

    1. The Task Group Chairman said they had been moved by meeting parents, carers and staff, but despite this they had kept the report proportionate. He stressed the need for better support and tools for frontline staff to improve customer engagement and expressed frustration with slow progress in improving staff career paths. He praised good practice observed at the Learners’ Single Point of Access (L-SPA) and was very hopeful about the Partnerships for Inclusion of Neurodiversity in Schools (PINS) programme.

     

    1. The Scrutiny Officer thanked the parents and carers who took part, having to relive difficult experiences. She also gave thanks to the case officers who contributed.

     

    1. A Member questioned why response times could not be monitored. The SEND County Service Planning & Performance Leader explained that currently there was no way of monitoring communications to and from the case officers’ individual email addresses and mobile phones. A new phone system using Microsoft Teams would enable monitoring, but the technology had to be set up first. To enable oversight of emails, they were looking at a group email option and, more long-term, building a parent portal. The Chair voiced her frustration that improving communication had not been made a higher priority.

     

    1. A Member commended a powerful report and asked if the team agreed with its substance. The Cabinet Member said she was concerned that there were many families across Surrey that were not getting the support and the service that their children need, and she apologised for that. She mentioned Surrey County Council had invested £15 million over three years to both address the backlog of overdue EHCPs and ensure children were getting some support in school while waiting. The Cabinet Member was glad the report acknowledged there were pockets of good practice but affirmed that there was more work to be urgently done.

     

    1. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Lifelong Learning said the report’s findings could be used to strengthen work already underway. The Service had made progress but, because demand continued to increase, proportionately, problems remained. She said the recommended increase in case officers had not been fully costed but would probably mean a £3.5 million pressure. They would take the suggestion seriously, but it would need to be balanced against other requirements in budget planning. The Chair commented that improvement to date was not of the scale necessary to meet need.

     

    1. A Task Group Member appealed to decision-makers to keep the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 37/

38/

EDUCATION, HEALTH AND CARE PLAN (EHCP) RECOVERY PLAN AND END-TO-END REVIEW OF EHCP PROCESS pdf icon PDF 1 MB

    To progress check if Recovery Plan is bringing timeliness in line with statutory obligations and understand lessons learned from a review of the EHCP statutory process.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    Witnesses:

     

    • Clare Curran, Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Lifelong
      ?Learning
    • Rachael Wardell, Executive Director for Children, Families and
      ?Lifelong Learning
    • Julia Katherine, Director for Education and Lifelong Learning
    • Liz Bone, SEND County Service Planning & Performance Leader
    • Kerry Oakley, Headteacher of Carrington School, Redhill

     

    Key points made in the discussion:

     

    1. The Chair said Surrey County Council was required to manage demand and review the Education, Health and Care processes as part of the Safety Valve Agreement with the Department for Education (DfE), which provided £100 million additional funding to offset the cumulative deficit on special educational needs. Part of the Recovery Plan aimed to help reduce the number of EHCP requests by strengthening Ordinarily Available Provision in schools. The End-to-End Review focused on improving the 20-week statutory process from the initial request to the issue of the EHCP, as well as annual reviews.

     

    1. The Chair said the review showed clear progress in completing more EHCPs on time, with rates improving from 9% in December 2022 to 71% in July 2023. The Cabinet Member said the level of timeliness achieved was commendable and ultimately the ambition was 100% wherever feasible. She noted the Council must report to the DfE three times a year on the Safety Valve Agreement.

     

    1. The headteacher, invited to report on progress observed in her school, described more EHCPs being completed and the increased stability and improved communication from having the same case officer for the last four months. The Specialist Teachers for Inclusive Practice (STIP) team had provided a good service with mental health support. She added that the challenge remained of the school not being able to refer to MindWorks. She also had concerns about the reduction in the number of specialist places planned, anticipating requests for EHCPs would continue to grow. Consultation with the Council was also problematic, with three pupils allocated to the school despite them stating at consultation that they could not meet their needs.

     

    1. The SEND County Service Planning & Performance Leader responded that schools had the opportunity to voice concerns about their ability to meet need. There should then be a conversation about what reasonable adjustments could be put in place, and she was sorry that had not happened in Carrington School’s experience. There were plans to streamline the consultation process.* The Chair said this highlighted the need for better communication with schools. The Executive Director for Children, Families and Lifelong Learning said the Service would follow up on the status of all cases where schools directed to take a student had expressed a view that they could not meet need .

     

    1. The Chair asked what was being done to support disappointed parents after only 16% of a sample of recovery plan EHCPs in July 2024 were rated good or outstanding, down from 22% in May 2024. She had been notified by parents of wrong or missing information and not being able to reach their case officers. The SEND County Service Planning & Performance Leader said the review has identified issues  ...  view the full minutes text for item 38/

39/

CHILDREN NOT IN SCHOOL pdf icon PDF 891 KB

    • Share this item

    To explore how many children of statutory school age are not registered at school or suitably electively home educated, the range of reasons and the impact.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    Witnesses:

     

    • Clare Curran, Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Lifelong
      ?Learning
    • Rachael Wardell, Executive Director for Children, Families and
      ?Learning
    • Julia Katherine, Director for Education and Lifelong Learning
    • Sandra Morrison, Assistant Director for Inclusion and Additional
      ?Needs
      SE
    • Kelly Lancashire, Education & Inclusion Service Manager – SE

     

    Key points made in the discussion:

     

    1. A Member asked how Surrey compares with others in this area. The Assistant Director said Surrey had a lower than national number of children missing education, of severely absent children and of permanent exclusions, although the latter was rising nationwide. The number of children accessing Alternative Provision commissioned by the Council (0.18%) was slightly higher than the national average (0.12%). The Assistant Director said they would request comparative data from neighbouring regions in the Southeast regional group.

     

    1. A Member questioned how many of the 2,783 Surrey students who were severely absent (i.e. missing 50% or more of school time) had additional needs, and how many were on the waiting list for MindWorks. 723 had an EHCP (26%) and 429 had SEN support (15%). The Service Manager recognised these children were more vulnerable to exploitation and said they were closely monitored. Persistent absence comes under the category of neglect and would trigger an assessment and potential referrals. Being at school is seen as a protective factor and there may be safeguarding concerns when a child is not in school. Attendance is considered a multi-agency responsibility and education meet with police, health and social care every halfterm.

     

    1. The Assistant Director said that more parents had chosen to educate at home since the pandemic. Asked about reasons for this trend, the Committee heard this was primarily due to dissatisfaction with the school or not getting the family’s preferred placement. Of the 2,185 Surrey young people who were electively home educated, 146 had an EHCP (7%) and 602 had SEN support (28%).

     

    1. A Member asked for reasons for the 87 children missing education in Surrey, the primary reasons given were that elective home education had been deemed unsuitable; or children with an EHCP had moved into the county and a suitable place not found, with AP yet to be put in place. There was one instance of a child waiting over 500 days for a school place, though the average wait time was about six weeks. Pupils moving into the county were tracked to ensure they register for school within 28 days; if not, the Inclusion Service would intervene.

     

    1. A Member said they were concerned about children receiving too few hours of education and asked that a future report on Alternative Provision (AP) detailed how many young people were receiving less than the 15-hour minimum a week set by the Department for Education, currently 173 in Surrey. Some children were seriously medically unwell, and some were too anxious to spend more than an hour at school each day. Increased student anxiety since Covid had led schools to offer flexible teaching approaches. Case workers were actively working to build their  ...  view the full minutes text for item 39/

40/

CHILDREN'S HOMES - OFSTED REPORTS PUBLISHED SINCE THE LAST MEETING OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE pdf icon PDF 124 KB

    • Share this item

    To receive Ofsted reports on Surrey County Council-run Children’s Homes.

     

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    Witnesses:

     

    • Clare Curran, Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Lifelong
      ?Learning
    • Rachael Wardell, Executive Director for Children, Families and
      ?Learning
    • Tina Benjamin, Director for Corporate Parenting

     

    Key points made in the discussion:

     

    1.    The Chair thanked the staff of a children’s home for their efforts in retaining its ‘Good’ status and praised their dedication, stressing the importance of maintaining these high standards.

41/

PERFORMANCE OVERVIEW pdf icon PDF 115 KB

42/

DATE OF THE NEXT MEETING

    The next public meeting of the Committee will be held on Thursday, 14 November 2024.

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    The date of the next meeting is 14 November 2024.