Agendas, Meetings and Minutes - Agenda and minutes

Agenda and minutes

Venue: County Hall, Worcester

Contact: Alyson Grice/Alison Spall  Overview & Scrutiny Officers

Items
No. Item

513.

Apologies and Welcome

Minutes:

There were no apologies for absence received.

514.

Declaration of Interest and of any Party Whip

Minutes:

None.

515.

Public Participation

Members of the public wishing to take part should notify the Assistant Director for Legal and Governance in writing or by e-mail indicating both the nature and content of their proposed participation no later than 9.00am on the working day before the meeting (in this case 22 February 2022).  Further details are available on the Council's website.  Enquiries can also be made through the telephone number/e-mail address listed in this agenda and on the website.

Minutes:

A summary of the key points made by the public participants at the meeting were as follows:

 

Debra Lamont

 

  • Ms Lamont advised that she had a 14-year-old child with additional needs and outlined the long struggle to get an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP) in place, including the lack of support and guidance received during the process. There was frustration that emails were not responded to and that her child did not have a named caseworker, a situation which was suggested to be common amongst other families.
  • There was poor staff retention in the Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities (SEND) Team, which had such an adverse impact on parents and carers. Ms Lamont questioned what action was being taken to ensure that staff retention was substantially increased, indicating that she had thought this was an integral part of the Action Plan in place.

 

Dr Karen Nokes

 

·         Dr Nokes asked whether in light of the findings by Ofsted in their recent inspection report, an independent body would be appointed to assist Worcestershire County Council (the Council) and Worcestershire Children First (WCF) to ensure that they acted lawfully as public bodies and workedconstructively with parents in so doing.

·         She outlined her experiences over the last 4 years in which she had been forced to go to mediation twice to secure an EHCP for her son. When the named school couldn’t meet her son’s needs (which the school had advised) further legal action had been instigated. Dr Nokes believed that WCF had misled her family, their lawyer and the tribunal over a period of many weeks. Ultimately WCF had conceded that the allocated school could not meet their son’s needs. This long process had resulted in their son missing out on 6 months of schooling, which she felt was shameful.

 

Asher MacKenzie-Wilson 

 

  • Asher (aged 13) told the Panel about the trauma she had experienced at primary school because of the lack of teachers’ understanding of autism andsuggested that some teachers hadn’t been kind to her or sensible.
  • Asher highlighted that she hadn’t been in school since last July because of anxietyand questioned how long was it acceptable for children to wait?

 

Rowan Winchester

 

  • Rowan (aged 10) informed the Panel that his difficulties had started at nursery school and continued in the first few years of mainstream school. In Year 1, after a short while, he found that he couldn’t cope and as a result ended up spending 19 months out of school. He then attended a new school but had found it difficult to trust and learn again. During his first term, there were a lot of changes within the school, and he ended up leaving and being out of school for a further year. He was then placed in Sunfield School, where he currently attends and which he likes. He was currently also getting help from the NHS Trauma Team.
  • Rowan said that he had been through so much and what had happened to him was still happening  ...  view the full minutes text for item 515.

516.

Confirmation of the Minutes of the Previous Meeting

(previously circulated)

 

Minutes:

The Minutes of the Meeting held on 11 January 2022 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

 

517.

Ofsted and Care Quality Commission (CQC) Joint Area Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities Revisit in Worcestershire pdf icon PDF 306 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

In attendance for this item were:

 

·         Marcus Hart, Cabinet Member with Responsibility (CMR) for Education

  • Tina Russell, Chief Executive, Worcestershire Children First (WCF) and Director of Children’s Services
  • Sarah Wilkins, Director for Education, Early Years and Children with Disabilities, WCF
  • Mari Gay, NHS Herefordshire and Worcestershire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG)
  • Phil Rook, Director of Resources, WCF

 

The Panel was asked to consider an update on the outcome of the Ofsted and Care Quality Commission (CQC) Special Education Needs revisit in Worcestershire which took place between 1 and 3 November 2021. The visit took place to decide whether sufficient progress had been made in addressing each of the twelve areas of significant weakness detailed in the inspection report letter published on 16 May 2018.

 

Sufficient progress had been made in addressing eight of the significant weaknesses identified at the initial inspection and four significant weaknesses remained. As an outcome of the revisit inspection, the DfE (Department for Education) and NHSE (NHS England) required an Accelerated Progress Plan (APP) to demonstrate how remaining areas of weaknesses would be addressed.

 

At the Chairman’s invitation, the CMR Education addressed the Panel and in doing so welcomed the public speakers who had spoken so passionately about their concerns regarding the Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities (SEND) Service. The CMR gave the assurance that he was listening and that there was a relentless drive to get things right.  He acknowledged that substantial progress had been made across eight of the areas of weakness following the last Ofsted/CQC visit.  However, he also acknowledged the importance of the considerable work still required across the other four key areas of significant weakness, where insufficient progress had been made. There was an acceptance that greater inclusion in mainstream schools was needed across the County; although some schools were demonstrating very good practice, others had work to do. In 2021, the CMR advised that nearly 100% of EHCP’s had been achieved within target, although they needed to be of sufficient and robust quality and the actions identified needed to be being carried out. The CMR was committed to ensuring that this took place.

 

The CMR provided reassurance that he was committed to ‘getting it right’ and undertook to ensure that cultural issues were addressed.  He believed that the number of cases going to tribunals should be the exception and acknowledged the fragile relationships with parents/carers and was in no doubt that there was much work to be done.

 

In terms of funding, the overall level of resources provided for SEND provision in next year’s budget had increased by £200k. Previously in 2019, an additional £600k had been allocated to SEND which had enabled an additional 17 posts to be created. The funding for those posts had been continued in the base budget since 2019. With regard to the staffing situation within the SEND Team, the CMR accepted that there had been some recent movement of staff, but he stressed that he had every confidence in the professionals who continued within the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 517.

518.

Worcestershire Children First Independent Fostering Service Ofsted Inspection pdf icon PDF 275 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

In attendance for this item were:

 

Andy Roberts, Cabinet Member with Responsibility (CMR) for Children and Families

Tina Russell, Chief Executive, Worcestershire Children First (WCF) and Director of Children’s Services

Maria White, Assistant Director Permanency, Care Proceedings, Fostering and Adoption, WCF

Sharon Hurley, Registered Manager – Interim, Worcestershire Children First Independent Fostering Agency (WCFF)

Susan Fletcher, Kinship Team Manager, WCFF

Carol Barker, Mainstream Team Manager, WCFF

Alison Williams, Recruitment and Retention Lead, WCFF

 

The Panel received a report on the WCF first independent Fostering Inspection Report, for the Inspection carried out in September 2021. The CMR reminded the Panel that Fostering Services were previously part of the Council, but when WCF was formed, the fostering services were required to form as an independent Fostering Agency, and therefore were subject to a separate Ofsted inspection.

 

The Assistant Director introduced the Team and provided background to the establishment of the WCF independent fostering agency (WCFF), registered on 1 October 2019. In December 2020, Ofsted had carried out an assurance visit and had found no serious or widespread concerns. Following this, in September 2021 a full inspection had taken place, and the outcome was an overall inspection judgement of ‘Requires improvement to be Good’. The inspection report had included 9 requirements and 4 recommendations that needed to be addressed for WCFF to improve.

 

The Assistant Director explained that a Fostering Service Improvement Plan had been developed to address the requirements and recommendations of the inspection report. The level 1 plan set out a ‘plan on a page’ and featured 7 different workstreams and included links to the relevant fostering regulations and national standards, whilst the level 2 plan included more detail and milestone activity and measures to be achieved in each area. Each of the workstreams would be progressed by a working group, led by a Fostering Team Manager, and the Panel was updated on the actions that had already been completed in the plan. The Panel was assured that those people directly involved in the fostering process such as children, young people, carers, and staff were included in the workstream activity.  

 

Members were then invited to ask questions and the following is a summary of the questions and responses provided:

 

·         In response to a Member query about how the situation had arisen that Managers were not ensuring that sufficient attention was given to the matching of children to foster carers, the Assistant Director advised that the matching process was being refreshed to ensure that both the specific needs of children and the evidence providing assurance that foster carers could meet their needs, were being carefully reviewed and recorded. Although, much of this work was already being done, a weakness had been identified in capturing and demonstrating this on the matching report. In response to a follow-up question, the Chief Executive highlighted the importance in regulated settings for evidence to be recorded. A system was being developed whereby social workers and other professionals could record activities without it being too burdensome.

·         A Member  ...  view the full minutes text for item 518.

519.

Work Programme pdf icon PDF 228 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The following additions to the work programme were agreed:

 

·         Regular progress updates on the SEND Accelerated progress plan (including RAG ratings)

·         An update on the WCFF Fostering service following the Ofsted re-inspection later this year.