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RESOLVED That the report be adopted and that the next steps and key elements of the action plan be presented to the Executive with an addition to the budget setting process to ensure projects were considered and continued and became core projects.
Moved by Councillor Huw Murphy; Seconded by Councillor Aaron Carey The vote, undertaken by way of a show of hands, was carried. RESOLVED That Councillor Nicola Gwynn be elected as Vice-Chair for the ensuing municipal year
There were no declarations of interest made.
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RESOLVED That the report be adopted and that the next steps and key elements of the action plan be presented to the Executive with an addition to the budget setting process to ensure projects were considered and continued and became core projects.
The Chair reminded Members of the role of the Social Care Overview and Scrutiny Committee as follows: · To review and scrutinise services relating to the care, support and well-being needs of children and adults. · To scrutinise the quality and performance of all Social Care related services delivered by the Council, through the development of a risk-based approach utilising relevant management information. · To support the raising of standards and outcomes in all social care related services. The Chair then explained that the meeting was arranged as a result of the Child Practice Review Report following the tragic death of a young child in Pembrokeshire. He then welcomed the Cabinet Member for Social Care and Safeguarding to the meeting who introduced the report highlighting the improvement journey being undertaken within the Directorate. The Head of Children’s Services then presented the report to the Committee with the key points highlighted as follows: · Demand on the service had almost tripled over the last five years. · The numbers of Looked After Children (LAC) and the number of children on the Child Protection Register had also increased. · This increase was being experienced across Wales and United Kingdom. He highlighted the three key reasons that were affecting how the Authority needed to respond to demand. The Head of Children’s Services discussed the cost of living crisis, the Pandemic, the War in the Ukraine and Pembrokeshire’s historically high levels of child poverty in Wales. He advised that the National Transfer Scheme was a Government Mandated Scheme introduced approximately 2.5 years ago where every Authority in England and Wales were required to accept a number of unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children, predominantly from Kent Local Authority. The Local Authority are currently mandated to accept 23 children. He highlighted the high level of trauma experienced by these children and the level of expertise required by staff. The Head of Children’s Services then explained the uncertainty that the Eliminate Agenda had created in the market and for Local Authorities as the announcement was not accompanied by any great detail. Some providers had stopped providing the services in Wales and reduced the availability of placements. The expectation was that providers transitioned into a Not-For-Profit model; however, some had left the market entirely. Representations had been made to Welsh Government as whilst Heads of Children’s Sevices across Wales agree with the principle, current timescales and resources available are inadequate to manage the transition safely. The Service had a three-year strategy entitled ‘Keeping Families Together’ which included a number of projects as follows: · Preventing children becoming looked after · Effect the exit from care where possible This strategy had come to an end in March 2024 and the driving factors already highlighted had impeded on the success of the strategy, although without having implemented the strategy, numbers of young people looked after would likely have been even higher. The Development and Improvement Strategy activity that had and been introduced included: · The first registered Children’s Home in Pembrokeshire – West Lodge in St Ismaels enabling children to be able to stay closer to home - Options to consider further registered Children’s Homes were under consideration. · The introduction of a Children’s Commissioning Team – three members of Staff providing support in arranging Children’s placements and negotiating contracts and fees and monitoring the quality of placements and service provision. The Team’s value had already been proven, both in terms of achieving efficiences and in ensuring that children were receiving the quality and level of care and support that the Authority was paying for. · The ‘Step Up, Step Down’ project in the Fostering service which was formed of a small number of carers who provide respite care for parents and care givers. Pembrokeshire was the only Authority to undertake this Welsh Government funded pilot and early signs were very positive. · Special Guardianship Orders allowed children to be permanently cared for by members of the family or a connected person as an alternative to them being under the care of the Authority. · A Multi-Agency approach for referring was under review. A pilot had been taking place where referrals do not meet the safeguarding threshold but still require a level of intervention. · The launch of a Parent and Baby early intervention project developed to engage with expectant parents far earlier than had previously taken place. · The Childcare Assessment Team had received a significant injection of staffing resource following approval at Cabinet and 13 additional posts had been recruited under Operation Salus. · The Vanguard methodology, a systems thinking and interventionist approach, had been utilised ensuring the best use of resources available. · Referrals were now managed differently as a result of identifying a significant number of unnecessary referrals being received where no intervention was identified or required. The decision to no longer accept, process or record these referrals due to data protection and resources required had been made. · The expertise would now be moved to the front line with Social Work qualified staff as the first point of contact and all professionals were advised to make telephone contact in the first instance prior to unnecessary form-filling. The Chair thanked the Head of Children’s Services for the comprehensive report and invited questions in relation to the action plan from the Committee, with the key points highlighted as follows: In response to a concern raised by Councillor Mike James regarding the financial effect on the Education budget, the Head of Children’s Services assured Members that he did not anticipate the looked after children costing more in education. He further explained that the initial support and classroom support remained and did not affect the education budget. Councillor James further highlighted the cost involved in Out of County Care and the Head of Children’s Services confirmed that there was a great financial burden to placing children out of the County; however, this was reviewed on a case by case basis to ensure the level of expertise and on occasion, this could not be provided in the Authority or in Wales. An example of this would be where a secure placement was necessary as there was only one unit in Wales and therefore they may need to be placed outside of the Country. Councillor James commented on Jigso which was located on the Pembrokeshire/Ceredigion border and well utilised in North Pembrokeshire. The Head of Children’s Services advised that Jigso was an umbrella organisation dependent on where they were located and were location and need dependent. In response to a question from Councillor Sam Skyrme-Blackhall regarding the level of foster care, carers and respite across the Authority, the Head of Children’s Services explained that there was not enough respite care. There was a small number of carers who do offer respite care; however, they often have other conflicting responsibilities. The Authority was faced with extreme difficulties in recruiting foster carers and noted that, along with the other 21 authorities, they were part of an umbrella group called Foster Wales who were actively seeking to attract additional foster carers on a consistent rate. He noted that this would cost approximately £25M for Welsh Government to provide an acceptable level of remuneration for foster carers across all 22 Authorities. He also noted that Local Authorities were in competition with the private sector. In response to a concern raised by Councillor Maureen Bowen regarding the service demand data and the number of referrals being received. The Head of Children’s Services explained that 2535 referrals were received which resulted in 116 being placed on the child protection register and 266 classed as Looked After Children. He advised that very few of the referrals received require further intervention as some related to children already involved in the service and many will be investigated and not require further intervention or, following assessment will not reach the threshold for investigation. In response to a further comment from Councillor Bowen regarding the size of the difference and the change in the criteria of referrals, the Head of Children’s Services explained that following application of the Vanguard methodology which had involved sitting with a case officer from the start to finish of the journey, he identified that many referrals received via a Multi-Agency Referral Form (MARF) were not appropriate for referral. This was identified as an unnecessary element of the process and innapropriate MARF referrals received would be returned and not processed through the system. He highlighted that this change in practice would also reduce the workload to the agencies as they will no longer be completing and submitting forms unnecessarily. In response to a comment from Councillor Alec Cormack regarding the action plan and the long-time scale of events to date, the Head of Children’s Services explained the actions that had commenced prior to the publication of the CPR. He highlighted that the review was commissioned by the Safeguarding Board and not the Authority and that the tragedy had taken place during the Pandemic Lockdown which had resulted in initial delays to progressing the work of the Child Practice Review Panel. Additionally, there was time between the arrest and the charging of the offender which had prevented some elements of the investigation process commencing due to no multi-agency discussions with the family taking place to ensure the case was not prejudiced (at the request of the Crown Prosecution Service). He emphasised that this process had taken four years; however, it would ordinarily take, on average, three years for a review to be published. The actions of the Authority immediately following the tragedy included all records pertaining to the child being locked down, access to records being strictly limited, and a swift review undertaken to review the interaction that the Authority had with the family. It had been identified that there was not a formal process in place for this to be undertaken. Following this, a comprehensive template and process flow has now been developed so that within 72 hours of any incident, Senior Management would start the process to ensure immediate action was taken where required. This formal process will be adopted as standard practice across West Wales. Additionally, a rolling programme of process review and professional curiosity will take place ensuring appropriate levels of curiosity surrounding activities within the home and the support network that was available. This would ensure answers were not just accepted but were respectfully interrogated. The Chair then invited questions on the improvement activity, as set out in the report and in response to a question from Councillor Cormack regarding West Lodge Residential Home, the Head of Children’s Services explained that staffing had been completed with one child to reside from the following week. He further explained that firm plans had now commenced on further provision and the Portfield Plan was for a three-bedroom bungalow to provide full-time care for children with disabilities in close proximity to other services. He noted however that this resource would not be completed until 2026 due to the school being built first. There were other locations under review by professionals to identify further opportunities for development of care homes. The lessons learnt from West Lodge Care Home were being utilised in future projects and funding was available from Welsh Government in this financial year and the future. He highlighted the remaining challenge which was that no revenue money followed the capital funding to develop the premises and highlighted the need for additional resources to staff the premises. Councillor Cormack highlighted the need for revenue particularly when increasing the cost for staffing West Lodge due to the recruitment bonus offered. The Head of Children’s Services noted that there was a case for the revenue budget to be forthcoming from Welsh Government. He highlighted a concern on the number of children that had had to be cared for in un-regulated accommodation (“OWRs”) due to the lack of availability of registered provision, and advised that if there was a further reduction in the pool of provision then the levels of reliance on OWRs could increase. It was noted that those children being supported in OWRs were often the most difficult to fi and so their ongoing safety relied on a large amount of support and commitment from staff. The Chair highlighted his recent visit to the facilities at West Lodge noting the excellent model that it provided moving forward. In response to a question from Councillor Nicola Gwynn regarding the financial efficiencies identified by the Children’s Commissioning Team, the Head of Children’s Services advised that the Team was invaluable and would like to see them continue. Councillor Cormack commended the million-pound savings identified by the Children’s Commissioning Team and asked if the level of improvement could be maintained and continued. The Head of Children’s Services advised that there were further reductions to be made, a number of children had additional support elements that were consistently reviewed. The Team had advised that they would return to examine the level of care and support required every three to four weeks to ensure a robust provision. He emphasised the changeability of support requirements and emphasised that the level of savings identified was unlikely to be at similar levels in future years. Engagement with local providers on developing provision was necessary but unachievable without the Commissioning Team support. Councillor Cormack sought clarity on the factor of five difference between the lowest and highest cost to children in residential placements. The Chair clarified that there would be a standing item on future agendas to scrutinise the budget and reassured Councillor Cormack that his concern would be considered further. The Chair emphasised the level of work being undertaken by the service and asked what assistance the Members and the Committee could provide to the Team. The Chief Executive provided observations that a Social Services Improvement Board which included the Chair and Cabinet Member was in place to oversee the complexities and challenges discussed today. He emphasised that this had not been solely as a result of the report but also the action plan from the Child Protection Review and any action relative to the Local Authority would be incorporated into the Board’s action plan. Initiatives were currently being undertaken by Adult Services and overseen by the Director of Social Care. This was not a decision-making board but was a corporate forum with an improvement agenda and would consider the case for additional measures including the requirement for additional registered children’s homes such as West Lodge. The Chief Executive advised that the Director was developing a letter to go from the Cabinet Member and/or the Leader inviting the new Minister for Social Care to visit the Authority and committed to keeping the Committee appraised. In reference to costings, it was requested that the Head of Service and practitioners be allowed to continue to make the decisions on individual cases being well aware of the differences in care that were required. He further clarified that the annual settlement anticipated in the 2025/26 financial year will provide a very challenging environment with the number of children and adults requiring support in both financial and human resource. At this juncture of the meeting, the Head of Children’s Services advised the Committee that he had received notification that the Care Inspectorate Wales had formally registered West Lodge so that they could accept residents. The Chair highlighted the future proofing of projects and introducing them into business as usual including Operation Salus, and the Cabinet Member reminded the Committee that the finances were the responsibility of all 60 Members of the Authority highlighting the difficult decisions that were pending. The Chair emphasised the need to identify the costs of statutory and non-statutory requirements. In response to a question from the Chair regarding Operation Salus, the Head of Children’s Services advised that there was a Salus Two paper, which had been presented to Cabinet. The detail required to identify necessary resource for Salus Phase 2 was a far more complex undertaking than Salus Phase 1 which had been around one team. Councillor Mike James then Moved the Recommendation; Seconded by Councillor Alec Cormack The vote, undertaken by way of a show of hands, was carried. RESOLVED That the report be adopted and that the next steps and key elements of the action plan be presented to the Executive with an addition to the budget setting process to ensure projects were considered and continued and became core projects.
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