Agenda item

Steve Eccleston, the independent Chairman of the Worcestershire Safeguarding Children Partnership introduced the Annual Report and gave a brief overview of the background and structure of the partnership and also the challenges and areas for development.

He explained that the safeguarding partnership replaced the Board in 2019 following a change to the legislation. The three member Partners, Worcestershire Children First, West Mercia Police and Health had equal responsibility for safeguarding. The Executive Group was made up of a representative from each of the Partners and the Chair of each of the four subgroups

The four subgroups were:

1.     Get Safe Partnership Group

2.     Quality Assurance Practice and Procedures Group (QAPP)

3.     Child safeguarding Practice Review Group, and

4.     Head Teachers Education Safeguarding Steering Group

During the discussion the following points were discussed:

·       There were various projects being undertaken by Partners such as Climb, Operation Encompass and Drive, and it was queried whether there were any gaps in the Partnership. The response was that there were no obvious gaps but it was an on-going challenge to ensure that the correct service was supplied at the correct time. A National Review Panel around Children harmed in domestic abuse settings was expected and that would be considered to see if there were any gaps in Worcestershire processes.

·       With regard to whether families had sufficient support available to them, it was quoted that the Josh MacAlister report believed that £2 billion was needed for early intervention and that Worcestershire was mindful of an increase in mental health needs, post COVID. Services needed to be used effectively and agencies needed to be aware of what support was available so they could sign-post effectively. Programmes such as Drive and Climb existed but there was a query whether everyone knew they existed and could signpost effectively.

·       Cllr Kent explained that the Get SAFE programme was doing an important job but felt that the challenges it was trying to address were growing in number and complexity, and wondered if the GET SAFE programme and the Partnership would be able to cope in future.  It was clarified that the Get Safe programme was now a broader response than the sexual exploitation and gangs response it started as. A large part of exploitation now took place online and it was estimated that as many as two out of every five incidents were not reported. There would be a future focus on online risks and providing support to professionals. The Partnership was also looking at supporting families at risk and looking to prevention before exploitation occurred and support from GET SAFE became necessary.

·       When asked about the media report of a Worcestershire Child being placed in at a campsite 100 miles away, it was explained that was the responsibility of Children’s Social Care, however in general, the Josh McAllister report suggested that Early Help could mean there would be around a 30,000 reduction in the number of children who were looked after and a reduction in demand would mean that more appropriate placements would be available.

·       Cllr Steve Mackay, Chairman of the Children and Families Overview and Scrutiny Panel explained that the Local Authority and Councillors had been promoting foster care as that gave better life chances to children than residential care.

·       In response to a query about whether the concerns that COVID could have resulted in an escalation of safeguarding issues were justified, it was stated that there had been no significant change in the child protection data and overall quality assurance of practice and procedures was generally in line or better than the national average. There was also continual professional curiosity and consideration of national reviews. As a way of considering the quality of the child protection process, 10 cases classed as a ‘red’ risk of exploitation were examined to see that the child protection system was being used correctly and the children were properly on a plan. Generally, the quality was found to be good although there was some learning.

For the future and following the reports into the deaths of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes and Star Hobson issues which were being considered were:

·       Whether there were sufficient resources for child protection, and audits were finding that the answer was yes; and also the quality of information sharing.

·       A recommendation was that there should be a Partnership sub-group looking at the quality of day-to-day child protection work, but Worcestershire already had that.

·       It was being discussed nationally whether education should be a fourth safeguarding partner. It was felt that, in practice, Worcestershire already had strong engagement from education through the Head Teachers Education Safeguarding Steering Group.

·       A standard Leadership Development package for Safeguarding was also being considered.

·       Once the findings from the Domestic Abuse Thematic Review had been released Worcestershire’s practice would be assessed against them.

·       The Joint Targeted Area Inspection in Solihull would be considered and what it means for the Partnership.

·       It was noted that although it was important to manage and minimise risk, it was not possible to prevent it entirely. It was necessary to give professionals the skills and confidence to manage the risk. Although the Star and Arthur report talked about the necessity of having the correct processes in place, it was important to have the right people in place, with the correct recruitment, training and retention policies

·       It was agreed that generally children had better outcomes with foster carers than in care homes. There was a national need for more foster carers, with a figure of around 3,000 suggested. The Government response to this need was awaited.

·       With the major changes to Health and the creation of the Integrated Care System it was suggested that the system should engage more with children, rather than mainly concentrating on older people. From a safeguarding perspective, Cabinet was reassured that the experienced safeguarding leads working in Health were still working within the new system.

Steve Eccleston was thanked for the report and the work he carried out, along with all partners and individual officers who managed risk on a daily basis. The Children and Families Scrutiny Panel Chairman stated that at their last meeting Steve Eccleston had been asked if he was assured that everything was being done to keep children safe in Worcestershire; his response being that everything was being done which could be done, to keep children safe.

RESOLVED that Cabinet:

(a)    received the Worcestershire Safeguarding Children Partnership Annual Report 2020/21; and

(b)     noted the progress of the work of the Worcestershire Safeguarding Children Partnership.