No apologies had been received.

To confirm the record of the meetings and special meetings of the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee held on 26 September 2019, 7 November 2019 and the 29 January 2020 (previously circulated).

The record of the meetings and the special meetings of the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee held on 26 September 2019, 7 November 2019 and 29 January 2020 were confirmed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

In accordance with the Regulations, Members are invited to declare any personal or prejudicial interests they may have and the nature of those interests in respect of items on this Agenda and/or indicate if Section 106 of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 applies to them.

No declarations of interest were received.

To receive any petitions, deputations and questions received from Members of the Public in accordance with the provisions of Procedure Rule 216.

The total time allowed for this item shall be 30 minutes. Petitions, declarations and questions shall be dealt with in the order in which they are received.  Questions may also be submitted at short notice by giving a written copy to the Committee Administrator 15 minutes before the start of the meeting.

The total time allowed for questions at short notice is 15 minutes out of the total time of 30 minutes. Any petitions, deputations and questions that have been submitted with prior formal notice will take precedence over questions submitted at short notice. Any questions that are not considered within the time limit shall receive a written response after the meeting and be the subject of a report to the next meeting.

No petitions, deputations or questions had been received.

To consider any questions with notice from Members received in accordance with the provisions of Procedure Rules No. 218 and No. 218A.

No questions with notice had been received from Members.

To consider any Notices of Motion from Members submitted in accordance with the provisions of Procedure Rule No 219.

No notices of motion had been received from Members.

To consider any matter referred to the Committee for a decision in relation to call in of a decision in accordance with Procedure Rule 206.

No matter had been referred to the Committee for a decision in relation to a call in of a decision in accordance with Procedure Rule 206.

To receive a presentation from Janette Harrison, Designated Nurse, Children and Adult Safeguarding and Chris West, Director of Nursing and Quality, reviewing the issues raised in the Care Quality Commission (CQC) report; “Review of Health Services for Children Looked After and Safeguarding in Rutland.”

A copy of the CQC report is attached

A presentation reviewing the issues raised in the Care Quality Commission (CQC) report; “Review of Health Services for Children Looked After and Safeguarding in Rutland.” was received from Janette Harrison, Designated Nurse, Children and Adult Safeguarding and Chris West, Director of Nursing and Quality.

During discussion the following points were noted:

·         The CQC review took place in July 2019 and looked at the experiences of 50 children including 6 cases which were then further tracked right across the range of health practitioners and partner agencies.

·         Unlike OFSTED, the CQC did not provide a judgement grade but asked for action plans to be submitted. The action plans were collated from RCC and Public Health commissioned services such as drug and alcohol and sexual services, as well as from the CCG.

·         Any reports submitted to the CGG went first to the organisations’ safeguarding committees.

·         The review looked at four main areas; Early Help, Children In Need, Child Protection and Looked After Children (LAC), as well as the management and governance of these areas.

·         All children in care with mental health issues could be fast tracked to a specialist Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) team; the Young Persons’ Team. A recent audit had shown that there were no Rutland children in care who were currently on the CAMHS waiting list.

·         Every LAC had to have an independent health assessment (IHA) within 20 days.

·         Peterborough and Cambridgeshire hospitals had explained that they had not got the capacity to do any IHAs for LLR so a specialist nurse went out of area to perform them. 

·         The CQC had looked at the management and the leadership of the health services for Children Looked After and Safeguarding in Rutland and could see that the issues were already being worked on.

·         Councillor Begy asked whether the action plan and a further progress report could be given to ensure that the actions were being delivered and were on track.

·         The inspection that the CQC referred to in their report was an inspection in November 2018 but their report was just 6 months later in July 2019. 7/8 months was not a great deal of time to see results but the CQC appreciated that things were on the right trajectory.

·         Midwifery was currently being audited which would enable the CCG to see whether the pre-birth assessments, referred to in 2.6 of the report, were now robust.

·         Councillor Harvey voiced concern, and this was also highlighted in the CQC report at para 4.10, that although there was a fast track to CAMHS for assessment for Children Looked After, the waiting time for actual treatment was still too long.

·         The IHAs were sometimes undertaken by trainees but their work was overseen by the CCG’s designated doctor, Dr Lyn Snow, and were regularly quality checked.

·         Any 18 year olds or younger who presented themselves to the adult emergency department were now asked a set of questions to ensure that safeguarding was considered.

·         Level 3 training in safeguarding was being  ...  view the full minutes text for item 603.

To receive Report No.47/2020 from the Strategic Director for Resources.

Report No.47/2020 was received from the Strategic Director for People.

Bernadette Caffrey, Head of Service: Early Intervention, SEND and Inclusion introduced the report the purpose of which was to update the Committee on the Early Help offer for Rutland and to note the drivers which supported a whole system approach to early intervention and prevention.

During discussion the following points were noted:

·         The key messages for the Early Help offer were about responding early, working well with partner organisations and being able to respond in a way which worked best for families.

·         Councillor Ainsley welcomed all initiatives that looked for early intervention but had concerns that while all the individual elements of this approach were laudable they overlapped two scrutiny committees; adults and health, and children and young people,  and therefore it was difficult to effectively scrutinise the whole family approach.

·         Mark Andrews, Strategic Director for People would welcome a discussion on a more People Directorate orientated scrutiny that looked at the issues concerning adults, children, and health, all together.

·         The Council worked with Home-Start and had volunteers in place working with troubled families and acting as mentors. 

·         Members questioned whether the Council maximised the breadth of capacity in the community in terms of volunteering. Officers felt that Rutland could have a stronger volunteering community but the Council needed to look at how to enable and co-ordinate the community, not just in terms of finance, but in shaping and driving forward a completely different approach.

·         There had been a large increase in referrals but this was, in part, down to a change to the way referrals were reported. Now referrals were being accurately recorded through the front door so officers were very clear of the demand on the services.

RESOLVED:

The Committee discussed the drivers which support a whole system approach to early intervention and prevention and ENDORSED the direction of early help in Rutland outlined in the report.

To receive Report No.46/2020 from the Strategic Director for People.

Report No.46/2020 was received from the Strategic Director for People.

Dawn Godfrey, Deputy Director for Children’s Services introduced the report the purpose of which was to report on the progress made by children’s services since the Ofsted judgement inspection in 2016 and focused visit to children’s service in March 2019.

During discussion the following points were noted:

·         Ms Godfrey, the Deputy Director for Children’s Services confirmed that Ofsted were arriving the following week to inspect the service and to follow up on their visit in March 2019.

·         The report clearly showed the areas of progress that have been made since the last inspection and that the recommendations made had been addressed. 

·         There were still areas where improvement had not been as swift as hoped but because of the capacity of the service some changes had to be made incrementally to make sure that they were embedded.

·         Although the original inspection had taken place in 2016, much of the remedial activity had not taken place until 2019 because there had been a lack of focus. Staff in key posts had been newly recruited and were now able to deliver the quality expected.

·         Ofsted would be able to see the pace of change and the clarity of what was expected. Initial discussions had indicated that they were comfortable with the progress made.

·         Councillor Harvey attended Corporate Parenting board meetings and had been reassured by the progress being made and felt that it was a very positive factor that that staff were knowledgeable about each individual’s story and background.

·         Councillor Wilby, Portfolio Holder for Children’s Services and Education also endorsed the direction of travel the service was adopting and commended staff for the work that they did in an often highly pressurised environment.

·         The implementation of new measures had been helped by the Liquid Logic system.

·         The service had worked really hard on getting assessments done in a timelier manner. In Rutland all assessments were now completed within the national target of 45 days and many non-complex assessments were done much earlier. 2 years ago RCC was not meeting this target and nationally, many children were still waiting in excess of 45 days.

·         Ms Godfrey had inherited a team with a number of first line managers who had had too much delegated down to them. These additional responsibilities had now been stripped back to allow them to concentrate on their core tasks and take accountability and responsibility for them.

·         Councillor Begy felt that it would be useful to have previous years’ data alongside the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in order to give a comparison and indicate a direction of travel.

·         Attaining a 100% of target in a performance area was not because the target was not stretching enough but indicated that the service had reached compliance levels and so could now build on that quality.

·         Life Story work was about capturing what had happened in a child’s life to bring them into the Council’s care, and was used to help children understand who  ...  view the full minutes text for item 605.

To receive an overview of elements of the Corporate Plan that pertain to the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee and to identify any areas for future scrutiny input. A copy of the Corporate Plan is attached.

Mark Andrews, Strategic Director for People and Dawn Godfrey, Deputy Director for People identified areas of the Corporate Plan for future input by the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee.

The following items were discussed:

·         A report on the new participation strategy which could be ready for the April scrutiny meeting

·         An update on the CQC report and its recommendations, also addressing sexual health.

·         A possible joint meeting with adults and health scrutiny committee, inviting the Director of Public Health.

·         School admissions planning.

To consider the current Forward Plan and identify any relevant items for inclusion in the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee Annual Work Plan, or to request further information.

The Forward Plan is available on the website at:

https://rutlandcounty.moderngov.co.uk/mgListPlanItems.aspx?PlanId=254&RP=133

Items for the work plan had been discussed under the Corporate Plan agenda item and therefore no further discussion was had.

To receive any other items of urgent business which have been previously notified to the person presiding.

No items of urgent business had been previously notified to the Chairman.

Thursday, 23 April 2020 at 7pm.

The next meeting of the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee would be held on Thursday 23 April 2020 at 7pm.