Agenda item

Purpose of the report: In line with the ambition of the councils Sufficiency Strategy for Looked After Children, Care Leavers and Children on the Edge of Care 2020-2025, to seek support from Children, Families, Lifelong Learning and Culture Select Committee for the proposed transformation of Surrey Children’s homes in order to strengthen the management capacity and current staffing structure and provide a workforce development framework. The transformation includes the development of additional provision of two places for children with autism experiencing crises. 

Witnesses:

Clare Curran, Cabinet Member for Children and Families

Tina Benjamin, Director – Corporate Parenting
Jo Rabbitte, Assistant Director – Children’s Resources

Key points raised during the discussion:

1.    The Chairman noted that the reports for Items 7 and 7a had been received late and published under a supplementary agenda as the detail of the proposed decision being scrutinising had not been finalised at the time the meeting’s agenda was published.

2.    The Assistant Director introduced the report, explaining that the council had reviewed its children’s residential homes and that the recommended changes were to develop its children’s homes’ management and workforce to enable the accommodation of the looked after children (‘LAC’) with the most complex needs within the council’s residential homes. Under the Sufficiency Strategy, the preferred placement for any LAC was within the community with their family or in foster care; however, there were a small number of children for whom residential care was necessary. The change to the model of practice would make residential care a specific intervention to address identified needs. The Assistant Director submitted that this would improve outcomes for children and young people and would be a more effective use of ‘scarce and valuable’ residential provision. It was hoped that the existing children’s homes would form the basis of an extension to residential provision under the existing capital development programme.

3.    A Vice-Chairman asked for the background to the recommended decision and what the key risks were in respect of the proposals. The Director explained that the improvement of residential provision was not initially prioritised as the council’s children’s homes were of a good standard, being mostly rated Good or Outstanding by Ofsted. As the Corporate Parenting Service (‘the Service’) had developed a better understanding of the LAC placed out of county and what it could ask of its staff, it had identified the need to develop its residential provision to make interventions more purposive and timelier. The proposed model would also support the No Wrong Door service.

4.    The alternatives considered were to continue with the existing model or place LAC in external residential provision, but this was undesirable as, when children were placed in the council’s homes, they were cared for by employees managed by Service, providing greater assurance of care quality. Part of the rationale for increasing the management capacity in residential homes was to provide management cover on weekends: due to the complexity of the needs of children in residential provision, behavioural issues often arose on weekends, straining the on-call system. The introduction of further assistant managers, considering significant regional workforce-development issues, would improve succession by enabling the Service to provide structured career pathways which would help attract and retain high-quality staff and develop registered managers locally.

5.    The key risks in not implementing the restructure were maintaining Good and Outstanding Ofsted ratings and not being able to support the children with the most complex needs in house and within the county.

6.    The key risks in implementing the restructure were the challenges of recruiting to the new staffing structure and co-locating children with complex behavioural needs, which could have led to homes’ capacity being underutilised.

7.    A Member asked why the Service was forecasting an increase of 169 looked after children in the next five years but not anticipating a consequential increase in children requiring residential placements. The Director explained that the Service aimed to increase the availability of foster provision, having implemented the Mockingbird scheme which promoted placement stability by supporting foster carers to manage the behaviours of the children in their care; the Service was aiming for a placement strategy which would not increase the number of children in residential care. The SEND Transformation Programme was also expected to increase the stability of foster care placements by providing children with more-appropriate educational placements.

8.    A Member asked what the short-term impact of the changes might be, highlighting a reduction in longer-term placement capacity with the introduction of No Wrong Door short-term placements, and sought assurance that the changes would not result in more children being placed out of county while the capital programme was being implemented. The Director responded that the proposed changes built upon the expertise of residential staff and reflected the needs of the LAC supported by the Service by providing residential placements for those who were most difficult to place within the county. It was important to maintain respite provision and develop short-term No Wrong Door provision to prevent children from entering care for longer periods.

9.    The Service had more children placed in private and third-sector provision than in the council’s. Some of those children could be accommodated by the council following the proposed transformation, and the Service would subsequently seek to reduce the total number of children in residential provision. The Director highlighted that there was a shortage of external provision in Surrey and, under the Sufficiency Strategy, the Service was to engage with external providers regarding them increasing their provision in Surrey, as the transformation would not meet the demand for residential placements entirely.

10.A Member asked how the need for two autism placements was identified and whether that was sufficient. With health colleagues, the Service had identified that there was a lack of provision for children in crisis detained under the Mental Health Act 1983; the proposals would provide crisis beds linked with the Children’s Crisis Intensive Support Service to accommodate children in crisis for up to a month before they returned home with a care package, preventing them being detained in hospital or placed out of county.

11.A Member asked what was being done to improve standards in homes requiring improvement. Each had an improvement plan in place and would be subject to Ofsted quality assurance visits as well as additional internal assurance and scrutiny.

Actions:

i.              Director – Corporate Parenting to provide the numbers of children placed in in-house and external residential provision. 

ii.            Director – Corporate Parenting to submit to the Committee the most recent report on children’s residential provision submitted to the Corporate Parenting Board.