The Assistant Director Safeguarding and Review, Commissioning and Provider Services will provide feedback on the two- day formal visit by the National Implementation Adviser for Care Leavers which took place on 8 and 9 September 2022.
(Amandip Johal – 01274 431620)
Minutes:
The Assistant Director Safeguarding and Review, Commissioning and Provider Services provided feedback on the two- day formal visit by the National Implementation Adviser for Care Leavers which took place on 8 and 9 September 2022.
The Chair said that Cllrs Thirkill and Dunbar had attended a session with the National Implementation Adviser for Care Leavers, who had offered to visit Bradford to review its provision and make recommendations. That visit had taken place on 08 and 09 September 2022 and the Adviser had made recommendation about the governance of corporate parenting, including the deployment of Link Councillors to progress specific areas of work.
The Chair invited iAD/SRCP to give an overview of the recommendations.
iAD/SRCP said that the Adviser had met Councillors and officers. He had spoken of strengthening the membership of the Panel. He had acknowledged that Bradford was on a continuing journey of improvement and that the Panel itself was undergoing change, including the adoption of a Link Councillor/Champion approach. He had recommended that the Panel:
· confirm the themes on which it needed to focus to improve the Council’s effectiveness as corporate parent;
· consider how to ensure that Council portfolio-holders for the areas covered by those themes establish sub-groups comprising the agencies and decision-makers for those strands of work – this would help to embed the Champion model; and
· review its membership and consider the membership of the theme sub-groups with a view to strengthening relationships with key partners such as the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
The Adviser had considered that, together, these recommendations would bring about the necessary whole-Council approach to its role as corporate parent.
The Chair had reviewed the responsibilities of Council portfolio holders and how they impacted on the Council’s role as corporate parenting. She had trawled Good and Outstanding LAs to learn how they organised the governance of corporate parenting. The outcome had been a list of corporate parenting responsibilities within each portfolio. The Panel needed to identify the themes from among these responsibilities. She asked members to consider the themes that would be required and which of them they would each prefer to lead, reporting back to each meeting of the Panel. The following themes and Panel Leads were agreed and would be adapted or refined as necessary in light of experience:
|
Theme |
Panel lead |
Initial thoughts |
|
Further Education and skills |
Cllr Alipoor |
Linking with Cllr I Khan on Skills House. Identification of work opportunities for young people with the Council, helping them to adjust to working structures. Support to obtain apprenticeship positions. |
|
Education (schools) |
Cllr Pollard - Chair of Virtual School Governing Body |
|
|
Health |
Ali Jan Haider - Bradford District & Craven Integrated Heath & Care Partnership
|
In this very broad theme it would be important to focus tightly on the areas that young people themselves considered of most immediate relevance to them. It might be necessary for the Panel Lead to bring in other people to work on different areas within the theme. |
|
Housing |
Cllr Thirkill |
Liaising with Louise Kay, LCS. |
|
Leisure |
Cllr Knox |
Including liaison with Head/Virtual School on potential scope to draw on Pupil Premium Plus funding for leisure purposes. |
|
Youth Justice |
Claire Smith – WY police
|
Including: avoiding the criminalisation of young people in care. |
|
Adults and businesses |
Cllr Duffy |
|
The Chair would:
· inform portfolio-holders of the names of the lead Panel Members who would contact them to progress this work; and
· with iAD/SRCP, identify the major issues expected to arise within each theme and advise Lead Panel members accordingly.
Action: Chair
Resolved –
(1) That the Panel noted the importance of acting in liaison with the appropriate portfolio-holders to ensure that they recognised the importance of resourcing these areas of work. The role of Councillors and officers as corporate parent was a collective one and was apolitical: Panel members needed to emphasise in their work with portfolio-holders and other Council members their cross-party responsibility for going beyond the statutory minimum requirement to provide the best for Bradford’s young people. As a political leadership team, the Panel needed to ensure that tangible action was taken in each of the themes.
(2) That as work progressed on each theme, the Panel would consider how best to inform young people of the actions that had been taken and the outcomes, and to gain their feedback on the impact.
(3) That the Panel considered that the representation of partners through its co-opted members should be expanded to include:
Housing
Department of Work and Pensions
Youth Justice
(4) That the Governance Officer advise on procedure for the appointment of additional Co-opted Panel members.
Acton: All, Governance Officer (4)
