Agenda item

The Board will consider a report giving key highlights from the latest Performance Monitoring data for the Children’s Service

Contacts:

Ophelia Rix, Head of Service for Children in Care, Care Leavers and Looked After Children

Louise Hallas, Virtual School Headteacher

Gill Addy, Designated Nurse for Looked After Children

Ian Mottershaw, Head of Service –Contextual Safeguarding and Y.E.S, Family Support and Child Protection

The Board considered the latest Children’s Performance Highlights Reportgiving key highlights on Performance Monitoring data for Children’s Services. Ophelia Rix, Head of Service for Children in Care, Care Leavers and Looked After Children presented the key highlights in relation to Children Looked After Reviews and Missing and it was highlighted that:

• There had been a slight decline in relation to the performance data for Visits, and the service, continued to maintain oversight of this.
• The decline was partly due to delays in the recording of information or declined visits where there were no safeguarding concerns.
• Declined visits were a result of some children living with connected carers, who wanted the Council to afford them normal family life.
• Where this was the case, the service ensured there was clear oversight and no safeguarding concerns.
•  The service also worked to ensure that children were safe through clear connections with the fostering service and schools.
• Some delayed visits were also planned, i.e.- where a social worker was off work the visit was delayed by a day, to allow a young persons regular social worker to visit and maintain consistency where it was safe to do so.

The Board noted the update and asked in respect of Children Looked After Reviews and Missing and in the discussion to follow asked a number of questions.

Responding to a question from the Board about the number of foster carers for out of area placements and whether the figure presented in the report (55) related to in house or IFA’s foster carers, Tom Brailsford, Service Director (Resources, Improvement and Partnerships) agreed that the data would be provided to the Board to follow.

Responding to points highlighted by the Ex-officio, including staffing challenges in social work and continuing to keep children safe whilst managing the additional pressure on staff, Ophelia Rix reassured the Board that social worker vacancies were being managed through recruiting other practitioners who could bring additional skills to provide a network of support to children and young people. This included Family Support Workers and Youth Engagement Officers who would work alongside social workers to ensure that children were visited, and that the service continued to build good quality relationships with young people. In relation to education, employment and training, work was undertaken to ensure that there was a network of practitioners not just within social work but within the wider Council who could continue to build those relationships and ensure children and young people were seen in a variety of settings, including the home, and schools.

Responding to a question from the Board about the number of foster carer vacancies, Tom Brailsford advised that this information was managed on a weekly basis through the new Dashboard and agreed that this information would be provided to the Board to follow. 

Ophelia Rix, presented the monitoring data in relation to Care Leavers and highlighted that:

• Areas of concern related to the timeliness and quality of pathway planning.
• Pathway Planning was about ensuring young people were able to access further education employment and training.
• Work was being undertaken to understand how we work across the council to develop different opportunities for young people including working with the virtual school and our post 16 provision.
• There was a clear plan in development, and a commitment from the Council to drive this piece of work forward. 
• The impact of these changes, would be presented to the Board to follow.

The Board agreed it was essential to individualise pathway plans and agreed to receive the data around impact of the work undertaken. The Board also asked if staff had dedicated time to complete admin work, and in response Ophelia Rix confirmed that all practitioners had protected dedicated time to record information on the system.

Louise Hallas, Virtual School Head Teacher presented the data in relation to Children Looked After Educational Outcomes, and it was highlighted that:

·         100% of PEPs had been completed within the Autumn Term with 100% initial PEPs completed withing 10 school days.

·         The Virtual School was currently leading on all PEPs which were virtually held meetings.

·         The Virtual School continued to work closely with social care to improve young people’s educational experiences.

·         73% of school moves since the start of the academic year were carefully planned across the service to ensure a smooth transition with no break in provision.

·         Attendance was key area of focus, which had reduced but there had been a lot of illness in the past month in addition to other reasons.

·         Reducing the number of unauthorised absences in both frequency and duration was also a key priority of the Virtual School.

·         There had been a reduction in the number of suspensions, and in the number of young people who are classed as PA (Persistent Absenteeism (90%).

·         Not in full time education was another key area which impacted on attendance.

·         School moves were very low in December but some of this was planned to ensure school moves were in line with the start of the new school term. 

Stewart Horn, Head of Childrens Integrated Commissioning presented the data in relation to Children Looked After Health and it was highlighted that:

• Workload for the Children Looked After Nursing Team continued to be high but there was an improving picture in due to a temporary increase in staffing.
• Initial health assessments (IHA):
  • LA rolling 12-month data shows that 76.8% were completed in the statutory timescale.
  • Locala monthly data for November showed that 28 IHA’s were completed + 3 for OLA, 100% in timescales.
  • The number of IHA’s had doubled from the previous month and sees the largest increase since 2017.
• Review Health Assessments (RHA):
  • Kirklees rolling 12-month data shows that 86.9% and 91% of the ‘Developmental’ assessments (under 5yrs old) and ‘Annual’ assessments (over 5 yrs. old) were completed in statutory timescales.
  • Locala monthly data showed that 54% of under 5-year-olds and 62% of over 5-year-olds RHA’s were completed in timescales.
  • This showed a continuing downward trend.
  • There were 19 inhouse breaches, with capacity and carer arrangements being the most common reasons.
  • A Business Case has been presented to the Commissioners to request additional nursing resources.
• Dental Checks (attended) within last 12 months:
  • Kirklees rolling 12-month data shows that 61.5% of children aged 1+, at the point of their RHA had attended the dentist.
  • 100% children over the age of 5 had registered with a dentist at the point of their last RHA.

In response to the Boards suggestion around increasing the accuracy of data in relation to dental checks through taking into account the information from foster carers (at 4-6 weekly visits from supervising social workers) Stewart Horn agreed to discuss this with Gill Addy, Designated Nurse.

The Board acknowledged that the team had been under pressure for a sustained period, and that a business case had been put forward to help resolve this. The Board further asked about the future of the flexible commissioning project highlighting its value and impact. The Board also requested to receive feedback from the Oral advisory group via the Designated Nurse. Stewart Horn agreed to bring information in response to the Boards comments to a future meeting of the Board.

RESOLVED: The Board noted the Children’s Performance Highlights Report, and it was agreed that:

1. The breakdown of IFA and in-house foster carers for out of area placements be provided to the Board.
2. Data in relation to the number of Foster carer vacancies be provided to the Board.
3. An update in relation to the impact of improvements made to the timeliness and quality of pathway planning be provided to the Board.
4. Information relating to the future of the Flexible Commissioning Project be provided to the Board by the Designated Nurse.
5. Feedback from the Oral Advisory Group in relation to supporting children in Kirklees be provided to the Board by the Designated Nurse.
6. The possibility of including data in relation to dental checks from foster carers when reported to their supervising social worker by included in the monitoring figures. To be discussed with the Designated Nurse.