Issue - meetings

Report of the Director of Social Care and Health

Further to Minute No. 5 of 21 June 2017, the Committee considered the report of the Director of Social Care and Health providing a summary of the progress in relation to the Children’s Social Care Improvement Plan 2017 /18, to be considered alongside the performance scorecard data.

The Plan identified three key objectives, namely:-

1.            Ensure frontline practice is consistently good, effective and focussed on timely, measurable outcomes for children.

2.            To improve management oversight at all levels to ensure effective services for children and young people receive good quality supervision

3.            Ensure that frontline services are sufficiently resourced and the workforce appropriately skilled to enable high quality work to be undertaken with children and young people.

The following appendices were attached to the report:-

·         Children’s Social Care Annual Report

·         Annual performance score card

Members of the Committee asked questions/raised matters on the following issues:-

• What sort of accommodation was available for care leavers?

An increasing number of care leavers were continuing to live with carers. A range of accommodation was available and close work took place with Housing associations to identify types of supported living schemes. Care leavers were not placed in Bed and Breakfast type accommodation.

·         Reference was made to front-line services being sufficiently resourced and the workforce being appropriately skilled. When would this support be “bedded-in”?

Although the re-structure had gone smoothly, some issues had arisen since and it was considered that support was required for newly qualified social workers. The Local Government Association (LGA) had undertaken a peer review and a new improvement plan would be developed to ensure that improvement continued.

·         Could information on Serious Case Reviews be reported to this Committee for information?

Serious Case Reviews were reported to the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board (LSCB) and could also be reported to the Committee.

·         Timeliness of reports to Child Protection conferences was a concern as only 28.5% of reports were available 3 days prior to conference. What could be done to support this process?

This action was monitored via monthly monitoring reports and it was anticipated that performance would improve.

·         Were newly qualified social workers being retained by the Council?

The Council was generally good at retention and not over-dependent on agency workers, although this area was always a challenge. National research indicated that social workers tended to stay for around three years in a front-line role.

·         When would the next update to the Committee be reported?

The refreshed Improvement Plan, together with the outcome of the peer review was likely to be submitted to the Committee in September 2018.

RESOLVED: That

(1)       the Committee continues to receive bi-annual reports and updated performance scorecards;

(2)       the Committee receives the reviewed and refreshed version of the Children’s Social Care Improvement Plan at the September meeting; and

(3)       the receipt of information on Serious Case Reviews be added to the Committee’s Work Programme for 2018/19 and the Head of Children’s Social Care be requested to submit information to the Committee as and when cases arise.