Agenda and minutes

An apology was received from Councillor Davies.

The Chair will consider the admission of late items of urgent business. Late items will be considered under the agenda item they appear. New items will be dealt with at Item 7 below. New items of exempt business will be dealt with at item 10 below.

There were no items of urgent business.

A member with a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is being considered must disclose to that meeting the existence and nature of that interest at the commencement of the consideration, or when the interest becomes apparent.

A member with a personal interest in a matter also has a prejudicial interest in that matter if the interest is one which a member of the public with knowledge of the relevant facts would reasonably regard as so significant that it is likely to prejudice the member’ judgement of the public interest.

There were none.

To consider the minutes of the meeting held on 25 January 2010.

RESOLVED:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 25 January 2010 be agreed as an accurate record.

MATTERS ARISING -

Overview and Scrutiny Committee- Hilary Corrick reported that the Overview and Scrutiny Committee had received a report on the work of this Committee and on local health visiting services.  It was noted that officers from Great Ormond Street hospital and NHS Haringey were present at the meeting.

The Committee was pleased to note that, from April 2010 with the move to multi agency working there would always be at least one health visitor working for half a day every day located in the offices of the First Response team.

Resolved:

That an update report on the operation of these arrangements be presented to the Committee in Autumn 2010.

Child Protection Conference- The Committee was advised that a conference about child protection was being organised by the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board, to be held in September 2010.

Report to Council – Cllr Jones advised that she had presented a report to Council on the work of this Committee and its future.

Resolved:

1.             That, as information on the work of this body needed to be disseminated more widely, a report should be presented to Council twice yearly.

2.             That the Overview and Scrutiny Committee may wish to review    their Child Protection role and their relationship with this Committee.

3.               That the idea for the future, of a cross party informal information sharing body for children’s services be supported.

4.               That as part of the generic child protection training to be provided to all old and new Members Cllr Mallett should talk about the Committee including its history and main decisions made.

5.               That the new Members of this Committee will need extensive additional and ongoing training to ensure they have the knowledge and skills necessary to continue the Committee’s work effectively.

To provide information on the process and operation of the new audit framework which has been developed and in operation since October 2009.

In  order to ensure that improvements in the quality of social work practice continued a new comprehensive quality audit had been implemented. The first set of audits focusing on quality of practice were completed in October 2009 and had been carried out monthly thereafter. A random sample of cases had been selected across 10 sections of Children and families. More specific themed audits would also be carried out periodically where a need had been identified. Heads of Service were responsible for follow up actions on any audits that were rated as inadequate and a sample of these were re-audited on a quarterly basis and notified to the Assistant and Deputy Directors.

A summary of the number of cases audited, overall ratings and section ratings was noted. Members also noted the results from a themed audit undertaken in January 2010 based on the standard quality of practice audit tool, which examined how the new format of child protection core assessment was working.

Some concern was expressed over the drop in the number of cases perceived as good in February 2010. It was noted that this could be due to the fact that these audits had been carried out by independent review auditors who had been out of the operational area for some time. Also it was noted that officers considered some of the evaluations to be harsh.

The Committee welcomed the fact that a considerable amount of effort had gone into improving risk assessment.

There was a need to get the balance right between managing and monitoring cases and getting the work done. Consequently in the future the number of cases audited might reduce or alternatively audits might be carried out every other month.

Members noted that OFSTED welcomed the audit tool and that it was now being used by the health service and shortly would be used by the police. This would greatly assist with multi agency working. It was felt that Adult services would also be able to adopt it as a model to use.

Resolved:

1.        That a further report be presented to the next meeting in respect of the January themed audit on child protection.

2.        That the audit tool be passed to Adult Services for their use.

3.        That a further report be presented in six months time on progress and on cases followed by this Committee.

4.        That the Independent Social Worker analysis some of the cases deemed to be inadequate.

To provide the Committee with a summary of the number of children under five years of age who came to the notice of the First Response Service during January 2010.

members received details of the number of children aged between 0 – 5 years who had come to the notice of the Children and Young People’s Service during January 2010.

In total there had been 226 contacts relating to 120 children aged 0-2 and 106 children aged 2 – 5, the total number of children was 189. 32 cases were audited in February and again in March. The Committee was pleased to note that there had been a marked improvement from the audit carried out in July 2009, and senior officers had found evidence of families being correctly signposted and evidence of throughput to other Authorities and of multi agency working.

The sources for referral of cases was noted which included the police, emergency duty service and midwives. With regard to outcomes the Committee noted that 63 of the children were already known to the service and further information had been provided, 40 cases had resulted in advice and information being given, but only 3 cases had progressed to an assessment under the Common Assessment Framework. It was considered that more work needed to be done in this area.  All of 59 cases which had progressed to the referral stage had been allocated within timescales. The audits on these cases had shown timely and appropriate work.

It was pleasing to note that the follow up audit in March 2010 had demonstrated that some cases had either been closed or were now allocated within the safeguarding and Support service.

However the Committee was concerned to note the number of cases that involved domestic violence and it was agreed that this was an area that should be examined further. Members noted that the LSCB Domestic Violence Sub – group were looking to produce a cross borough strategy on this issue.

RESOLVED:

That the Committee examine cases involving domestic violence in more detail.

To consider any items admitted under item 2 above.

None

That the press and public be excluded from the meeting for consideration of item 9 as it contains exempt information as defined in Section 100A of the Local Government Act 1972 (as amended by section 12A of the Local Government Act 1985) paras 1 & 2 namely information relating to any individual, and information likely to reveal the identity of an individual.

RESOLVED:

That as the following items contained exempt information (as defined in Section 100a of the Local Government 1972; namely information likely to reveal the identity of an individual, and information relating to any individual) members of the press and public should be excluded from the remainder of the meeting.

To receive details of a brief audit of cases.

in order to ensure some element of independence in the quality of cases referred into the First response team the Committee’s independent  social work consultant  provided details of a further brief audit of 12 random sample of cases which had been carried out.

All of the children that were audited were at a very vulnerable age and were all living in challenging circumstances. Whilst there was a lot of evidence of excellent pro-active work and good core assessment of a high standard there was some concern about failure to follow plans through and to complete work begun. This was an area where the service needed to investigate further.

The Deputy Director reported that regular meetings were now being held between children’s and adult services which was particularly

helpful as many families had adults with problems.

RESOLVED:

1. That staff in the First response team be thanked for the good      practice identified in the audit.

2.      That senior managers in Children and Families service review systems for ensuring that assessments are completed and signed off by Managers.

3.      That senior managers in Children and Families ensure that care plans for children in need are actively pursued and monitored.

4.      That managers ensure that regular supervision takes place and is recorded on casefiles.

5.      That the Committee receive a report on joint work with Adult Services.

6.      That the Independent Social Worker be thanked for the work she had carried out on behalf of the Committee during the last year.

To consider any items admitted at 2 above.

None.

Date of next meeting: 29 June 2010 (provisional)

date of next MEETING -  29 June 2010

Future workplan

Workplan for the next year to include:-

1.        Joint working with Adult Services, transition of young people to adult services and families with vulnerable adults.

2.        An examination of cases where domestic violence is involved.

3.        A themed U5’s quality of practice audit and the child protection themed audit carried out in January 2010.

4.        Further work on the child protection process and the quality of child protection plans and follow up Action plans.

5.        The first response service following the co-location of the health visitors into the team.

6.        Children referred for a Common Assessment Framework (CAF) and an analysis of cases that are presented to the CAF Panel.

7.        Recommendations made to Cabinet