‘Children not getting care they deserve in the Grimsby area’
OFFICIAL DELIVERS FRANK ASSESSMENT OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES
VULNERABLE children are not necessarily getting the care they deserve, a council official has said.
Janice Spencer, the director of children’s services at North East Lincolnshire Council, delivered a frank assessment of children’s services in front of councillors yesterday.
Ms Spencer, who took up her post earlier this autumn, said some children who were in care did not need to be. This was partly due to the churn of social workers in the past year.
Children’s services were rated “inadequate” by Ofsted in October 2021. In the summer, Peter Dwyer, commissioner for children’s services in the local authority, told the council to partner with a neighbouring local authority.
At the Children’s and Lifelong Learning Scrutiny Panel on Thursday, November 17, Ms Spencer admitted she could not currently guarantee all children in the services’ care needed to be. “I can’t sit here hand on heart and say that every child we’ve got in the system should be in the system,” she said. Turnover of social workers had partly complicated such matters with a new social worker potentially coming to a different conclusion on care needs than the previous.
The panel was given a report setting out the latest performance details for children’s services. “I am absolutely delighted we have got some metrics,” said Cllr Matthew Patrick, the Labour opposition leader.
But performance information showed there remained a long climb before the council’s children’s services improved across the board. Across 38 performance metrics split into three categories - demand management, effectiveness of service delivery and compliance, and feedback from children - the service was labelled red in nine, for being more than 20 per cent away from achieving targets.
This included having only 28 per cent of social workers with caseload on permanent hire by the council in September, as opposed to an aim of more than half. There were also 377 referrals in September, well above the target figure of 230, and the highest recorded this year.
Social worker average caseload also increased at the end of September, due to some agency staff leaving at short notice. However, based on recruitment in the UK and 33 social workers recruited from South Africa, the children’s service report predicted that by January 2023 the balance should change. It is expected there will be 69 per cent permanent social workers by then.
In half of the performance metrics, the council’s children’s services were rated amber, within 10 per cent of achieving its incremental target. In nine, they were rated green, for within two per cent of the incremental target, such as achieving not overburdensome average of caseloads, 16 in September and on November 2 down to 15, for social workers in their assessed and supported year in employment (AYSE).
The demand for children’s services is the primary factor behind the council’s forecast £7.9mn overall overspend. There seems little immediate prospect of this easing. There were 342 children subject to a child protection plan on November 3, a rise of 49 per cent from
six months earlier.
But children’s services open cases did fall slightly in October to 2,352. Ms Spencer said work was going in cohort phases to identify childrens whose cases could be safely closed. Those in provision not registered with Ofsted had been consequently reduced from 12 to nine. A second cohort of 27 children with kinship carers, where a child is looked after by close friends or extended relatives, was being reviewed for cases which could be closed.
She said the next cohort to then be reviewed will be looked after children, those in the care of the local authority itself for more than 24 hours. “There are particular cohorts that we need to target first in order to demonstrate that we are making improvements.”
Ms Spencer said there were more children who could be supported in their homes than there currently. But the support and systems were not yet in place “to help them thrive and flourish”.
She answered in conclusion to the final question from panel members on the state of the council’s children’s services: “The children of North East Lincolnshire are not receiving the service they deserve, and that’s hard for me to say.” The panel thanked her for sharing her insight in response to questions, and future working groups on issues such as permanent worker numbers were welcomed by councillors.