Agenda item

[Alison Hinds, Deputy Director of Children’s Social Care, to present report]

The Chair invited Alison Hinds, Deputy Director of Children’s Social Care, to present the report.

The Deputy Director outlined the action plan and proposed process for monitoring progress following the Ofsted inspection of the City of Wolverhampton Local Authority Children’s Service.

The Deputy Director advised the panel that Ofsted undertook a short inspection of Children’s Services between 21 March 2022 and 1 April 2022. The inspection covered the following areas - services for children and families needing help and protection and children and young people in care and care leavers.

The Deputy Director commented that since the last inspection by Ofsted the rating of the service for children and families needing help has been assessed as ‘good’, previously it was rated as ‘requires improvement’. The service has maintained an Oftsed rating of ‘good’ for service for children and young people in care and care leavers.

There is a Government consultation about making changes to the inspection criteria which would put the grading for care leavers services into a separate category in future Oftsed inspections. The Deputy Director commented that this proposal would be welcomed by the Council in the response to the consultation.

The Deputy Director commented that the assessment for the impact of leaders on social work practice with children and families was rated as ‘outstanding’ by the inspectors; it was previously rated as ‘good’. The Deputy Director welcomed the recommendations from Ofsted and highlighted the reference to areas for improvement, for example, the arrangements for the tracking and monitoring children who are missing from education.

The Deputy Director advised the panel that an action plan had been produced which will be sent to Oftsed in August 2022.

The panel were invited to comment on the report and the action plan.

The panel welcomed the positive report and congratulated the service on its performance.

The panel queried if the availability of housing near a parent’s preferred school was an issue in the numbers of children and young people missing from education who were allocated a school further away. The panel also commented on the issue of children needing to take several buses to get to school because of the high demand for local places and queried the advice given to parents to engage them in discussion about their school preferences.

The Deputy Director advised the panel that in the example given this would probably relate to a situation where a family has moved because of an emergency.

The Deputy Director reassured the panel that the service works with colleagues in housing to enable children to attend the nearest local school where possible. The Deputy Director commented on the change role of the Virtual School Head to include families who may have been contacted by a social worker in the past to offer them advice support and advice in this situation.

The panel highlighted the issue of families with children with no recourse to public funds after being granted permission to stay being asked to move home at short notice to a location some distance from a school. The panel queried if children in this situation would be included in the data about children missing from school and if families in this situation are monitored by the service.

The Deputy Director reassured the panel that the service works closely to support families who have no recourse to public funds to help them to settle into their new home and school. The Deputy Director accepted that the situation is not ideal as families may be living in a hotel in another local authority area and not always be known to the service.

The Deputy Director offered to meet with outside of the meeting if panel members had cases involving families with no recourse to public funds.

The panel queried the support in situations where children are being presented as homeless and the advice given about their rights in this situation. The Deputy Director advised the panel that where a young person aged 16 or 17 is at risk of homelessness then the service would work with colleagues in housing to do an assessment. The Deputy Director commented that the issue of the support for homeless young people had been identified previously and outlined a range of actions, for example, providing information in different formats about the support on offer.

The panel discussed the difficulties facing schools wanting to expand capacity and reduction in national funding for building maintenance as factors in reference to the previous point about parents not being able to get their preferred choice of school.

The panel thanked the Deputy Director for the report.

The panel queried the meaning of the colour code RAG rating in the action plan. The Deputy Director advised the panel that the service uses blue to show the action as being completed, green is on track and red or amber when there are concerns that progress for the action may not be on track.

Resolved:

1.    The panel welcomed the report and congratulated the service on the progress made.

2.    The panel comments to be noted.

3.    The Deputy Director of Children’s Social Care to send a final draft of the action plan to the panel after it has been shared with Ofsted in August 2022.