The Director of Legal and Governance will report the names of alternate Members who are attending the meeting in place of appointed Members. 

Apologies were received on behalf of Councillors Berry, Sajawal and Shafiq.

Apologies were also received on behalf of Shifa Simab (Parent Governor Representative) and Dr Samina Karim (Children’s Social Care).

(Members Code of Conduct – Part 4A of the Constitution)

To receive disclosures of interests from members and co-opted members on matters to be considered at the meeting. The disclosure must include the nature of the interest.

An interest must also be disclosed in the meeting when it becomes apparent to the member during the meeting.

Notes:

(1)       Members must consider their interests, and act according to the following:

(2)       Disclosable pecuniary interests relate to the Member concerned or their spouse/partner.

(3)       Members in arrears of Council Tax by more than two months must not vote in decisions on, or which might affect, budget calculations, and must disclose at the meeting that this restriction applies to them.  A failure to comply with these requirements is a criminal offence under section 106 of the Local Government Finance Act 1992. 

(4)       Officers must disclose interests in accordance with Council Standing Order 44.

In the interest of transparency, Councillor Elahi declared a non-disclosable interest, in that his daughter worked for Children and Families Front Door.

In the interest of transparency, Councillor Winnard declared an interest in Minutes no. 41 – SEND Services, in that he was the Chair of Aware Charity.

(Access to Information Procedure Rules – Part 3B of the Constitution)

Reports and background papers for agenda items may be inspected by contacting the person shown after each agenda item.  Certain reports and background papers may be restricted. 

Any request to remove the restriction on a report or background paper should be made to the relevant Strategic Director or Assistant Director whose name is shown on the front page of the report. 

If that request is refused, there is a right of appeal to this meeting. 

Please contact the officer shown below in advance of the meeting if you wish to appeal. 

(Jill Bell/Kanwal Amrez – 07970 413716/07929 070228)

There were no appeals submitted by the public to review decisions to restrict documents.

There were no referrals made to the committee.

The Director of Children’s Services submit a report (Document “N”) which provides an update regarding the quality assurance and audit process in Children’s Services.

Recommended –

That next steps are endorsed to continue to support practice improvement.

(Amandip Johal - 07773 248040)

The Director of Children’s Services submitted a report (Document “N”) which provided an update regarding the quality assurance and audit process in Children’s Services.

In introducing the report, the Assistant Director of Safeguarding and Reviewing outlined the audit findings of the quality of social work practice and the actions undertaken to address practice that was required improvement or inadequate.

It was reported that early in the year, a decision was taken to step down team managers and practice supervisors from completing this monthly audits due to staffing challenges and capacity. It was agreed that the team manager and practice supervisors needed to focus on ensuring that service delivery was prioritised. This had limited the number of audits completed on a monthly basis. Auditing arrangements resumed with all managers and practice supervisors being part of the monthly programme from September 2022.

The focus of the work involved six areas of improvement work as outlined below:

• Practice Regarding Child in Need (CiN) and Child Protection (CP) Planning in the Keighley and Shipley Locality.
• A Review of 15 Case Closures/Step-downs in the Child and Family Teams in the Keighley and Shipley Locality.
• An Analysis of 25 Re-Referrals.
•  A Review of 10 Matters Involving Criminal Exploitation (CE).
• A review of the quality of current practice in Bradford’s Care Leavers service.
• Practice Evaluation and Management Development.

In the ensuing discussions, the following points were highlighted:

• The findings of the report outlined some good practice identified but was not consistent across the services. It was noted the challenges in recent years to bring more people into social care and equip social workers with the right knowledge and skills.
• The Director acknowledged the challenges around practice and management failings. Whilst the management had already started to make improvements in practice, including providing adequate training and recruiting more staff, it was recognised that more had to be done.
• Workforce showed signs of significant strain and there was more to do in recruiting, retaining and providing sufficient support.
•  Audit found that the dependence on agency staff was contributing to delays and leading to children experiencing many changes in social worker, adding that critical work were not always being completed.
• Members stressed the frequent turnover of social workers lead to children and parents frustrated with the delay and lack of support. It added the instability in the workforce and frequent change of social worker led to upset children and families at having to re-tell their stories and difficulties in forming a relationship of trust with their social workers and other professionals.
• In response to a query regarding what improvements had been made since the findings of the report, the Committee was advised that some improvements had been made and whilst there was a high level of agency staff and the reliance on agency staff was unsustainable, it recognised that there was still more to do to have stability in the workforce. The Interim Assistant Director of SEND & Inclusion advised the Committee that it looked to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 40.

The Director of Children’s Services presents a report (Document “O”) which provides an update on the progress towards the WSOA that followed the March 2002 SEND Area Inspection.

Recommended -

That the report be noted.

(Niall Devlin - (01274) 431356)

The Director of Children’s Services presented a report (Document “O”) which provided an update on the progress towards the Written Statement Of Action (WSOA) that followed the March 2002, SEND Area Inspection.

Bradford Council was required to deliver a number of actions to transform special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) services across the local area. On the 21^st October 2022, Ofsted agreed that the proposed Written Statement of Action was sufficient.

Following Local Area SEND Inspection, the report provided a high-level overview of progress within each of the five areas for improvement as follows:

• Poor communication between stakeholders across education, health and care.
• The variable quality of EHC plans, including plans which did not fully describe the provision that children and young people with SEND need.

·       The inconsistent delivery of the 0 to 19 health visiting, school nursing and specialist nursing service.

·       Children and young people waited too long for assessments, treatment and diagnosis. There was insufficient support for children and young people with SEND who were waiting for provision, services, diagnosis or equipment.

·       Education, Health and Care Services did not work together well. The arrangements for joint commissioning were underdeveloped.

In the ensuing discussions, the following points were highlighted:

• In response to a Member’s question, the Committee was informed that the improvements in the areas identified would all be actioned within 24 months.
• Collaboration between agencies had not worked well previously and required strengthening.  
• The Committee recognised the free services that SENDIASS provided was vital to support children and young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and families.
• Members expressed their frustration that children with SEN had been waiting an unacceptable amount of time for their EHC plans to be issued, with some families waiting for almost three years.  Officers explained how the applications received were prioritised. It was further acknowledged a high number of EHCP waiting to be issued and explained this was sometimes due to applications received that had not received any input from partner agencies.  This had been recognised and improvements were required to support parents and partners. 
• The criteria for orthoptic vision screening available for children was not clear and consistent approach was required around orthoptic vision screening for children.
• In response to the comments regarding the issues that not all children were being offered health checks at schools. The Committee was informed that all children (0-19) would be offered a health check. School nurses were well-equipped and ensured they had the right skills in managing the relationships between child, family and school setting. Furthermore, regular health and development reviews (health visitor checks) were offered for 0 to 2 years.

The Chair requested that the full Written Statement of Action be shared with the Committee.

Resolved –

That the Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny requests that a further progress report be presented in 12 months, which also includes the detailed Action Plan, RAG rating and the full Written Statement of Action.

ACTION: Strategic Director for Children’s Services

                                                                        (Niall Devlin – 01274 431356)  ...  view the full minutes text for item 41.