The Deputy Director of Children’s Services will submit Document “A” which reports on the outcome of the Ofsted’s Inspection of Children’s Social Care Services from the 17 to 28 September 2018 and the fifth of a series of Monitoring Visits which took place on the 28 to 29 April 2021.  

The findings were published by Ofsted on the 4 June 2021.

Recommended -

            That the contents of the letter from Ofsted (Document “A”) be noted.

                                                                        (Miniza Hussain – 01274 432904)

The purpose of the report was to inform Children’s Services Overview & Scrutiny Committee members with an outcome following the Ofsted Assurance Visit, which took place from 28 to 29 April 2021.  This was the fifth monitoring visit since Bradford Council Children’s Services was judged inadequate in October 2018.

Children’s Services Officers informed Councillors that the focus of the visit was on children in need and children who are subject to a child protection plan.  A copy of the Ofsted Assurance Visit letter, was also appended for members.

Members learned that the Ofsted letter had recognised a number of improvements relating to:

§  Since 2018, a new permanent senior leadership team had been put in place and was driving improvement;

§  An improved front door service and revamped training programme;

§  Improvements in quality assurance and performance management;

§  Significant investment to increase social work and managerial capacity;

§  The newly commissioned agency social work teams have been incrementally introduced and are beginning to have a positive impact on some children;

§  Quality assurance and management information have continued to improve in the last six months.

Children’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee members were encouraged at these improvements, however members were extremely concerned at the areas of weakness in achieving consistently good practice, as set out in the Ofsted Assurance Visit letter. Particularly those areas that relating to:

§  The pace of improvement being too slow for children and families, but OFSTED did recognise that this had been exacerbated by the breadth of the inadequacy and challenges associated with maintaining service delivery during the pandemic;

§  In particular, the progress on the quality of core social work practice has been too slow to show the impact for children and families and there have been four previous monitoring visits, which have all reported on the slow pace of change in improving the quality of core social work practice;

§  Although the service had been restructured and there has been significant investment in staffing and service improvement planning, due to the breadth and depth of the inadequacy identified in 2018, this had not led to sufficient positive change for some children;

§  Delays in the identification of risk, need and early intervention and where risks are identified, this does not always result in timely progression to an initial child protection conference and if needed, resultant multi-agency protection plan.

§  The recruitment of experienced social workers remaining a challenge;

§  Some children’s cases are not taken to conference quickly enough, meaning that there has been a delay in the needs of those children being considered and to having a mutli-agency plan in place to reduce the risk;

§  There is variability in how rigorously the social worker uses the child’s plan to check progress to avoid drift.

§  Inspectors felt that Initial Child Protection plans were too long and complex for parents to understand.

§  As well as this, Inspectors also identified that some Child Protection Plans were closed prematurely and resulted in needs remaining unmet for children.

Children’s Services Overview & Scrutiny Committee members indicated that OFSTED had consistently mentioned the slow pace of change in delivering improvements and that this Committee had also expressed its concern over the slow pace of change.  Therefore, members were keen to understand what plans were in place to ensure that real improvements are actually being made.

In response, officers from Bradford Councils Children’s Services stated that, the breadth and depth of the inadequacies was greater than they had imagined and that since the period between the failed inspection and the appointment of the Director for Children’s Services, had taken too long.  As well as this the COVID19 pandemic had also had an impact on the pace of improvement, particularly in the areas of training and practice standards.

Officers also highlighted that the recruitment of level 3 Social Care Workers was still the biggest challenge.

Members were keen to understand to what extent the key findings from the

Child Exploitation Thematic Review, had actually been covered in the Improvement Plan and that whether Children’s Services Officers were confident that they were doing everything they could do in this area.

Officers responded by stating that there had been investment in the Safeguarding Hub and that Children’s Services staff were now better trained, with better monitoring systems now also in place.  Moreover, Children’s Services officers assured members of the committee, that a significant amount of work had gone into this area.

Furthermore, members expressed their frustration at the level of social care practice not being at a good enough standard to be able to look after the children of the District.  As well as this, members felt that officers should be more proactive towards the recruitment of level 3 Children’s Social Care Workers and providing a better offer, in terms of training, salaries and advancement.  Members also indicated that officers should be undertaking benchmarking, to establish what other Councils, bit regionally and nationally are doing in terms of the recruitment of level 3 Children’s Social Care workers.

Bradford Councils Children’s Services officers did acknowledge that the improvements were taking a long time, but the leadership team was fully in place on March 2020; the Practice Standards had been agreed in September 2020.

Continuing on, members wanted to know what officers were doing in relation to reducing the 25% of agency staff currently working in Children’s Social Care.

In response to this, officers insisted that there are key areas that exist which attract Social Workers to Bradford and these are:

§  Salary;

§  Manageable Caseloads;

§  Good training;

§  Good supervision;

§  Stable Management.

Furthermore, in response to members questioning, a representative from the Childrens Services Improvement Board state stated that the key issues facing the service were that recruitment needed to be better and that there needs to be a reduction in the case loads of Children’s Social Care workers.

Resolved –

(1)  The Committee considered the OFSTED monitoring letter and requests that an update on progress be brought back to this Committee, together with an updated Vital Signs report at the meeting on Wednesday 22 September 2021; as it is clear that the pace of improvement is still unsatisfactory.

(2)  The Children’s Services Overview & Scrutiny Committee has examined this report in the context of serious shortcomings, both historic and relatively recent, as highlighted in the Child Sexual Exploitation Thematic Child Safeguarding Practice Review.  Therefore, the necessity for driving the pace of improvement as a matter of the highest corporate priority, is clear.

Action – Strategic Director, Children’s Services

                                                (Mark Douglas – 01274 431266)