Agenda and minutes

County Councillor Prynn

To note who is attending and any apologies for absence.

All were welcomed to the meeting and apologies were received and noted from County Councillor (CC) Lord, CC Snape, Jane Simpson, Lynsey Evans, Mark Twiname, Nicola Bamford, Diane Booth, Amanda Mansfield and Angela Epps.

County Councillor Beavers attended the meeting from 6.50pm.

One of the young people, had taken part in a sponsored head shave for the Teenage Cancer Trust and members were asked if they would like to sponsor him.

County Councillor Prynn

To agree for accuracy the notes of the meeting and receive any matters arising.

The notes of the previous meeting were agreed as an accurate record.

Audrey Swann

To receive an update on CLA attainment and what is being done to improve it.

Audrey Swann spoke to the presentation as attached.

A study has been done recently on the Educational Progress of Looked After Children in England: Linking Care and Educational Data.  Audrey presented a summary of the key messages from the report attached.  A full report can also be found here.

Catherine asked that with the changes in SATs this year, how confident was the Authority that the improvements would be maintained.  Audrey indicated that they would expect to see a drop in attainment, just like last year when the GCSE's changed, however, there were other measures carried out to ensure the changes were not significant.  Audrey reiterated that it was important to measure progress of children looked after (CLA) and ensure that the pupil premium was being used effectively.

CC Prynn noted that the research that had been carried out was very important since it highlighted educational attainment differentials between Children in Need (CIN) and Children in Care, illustrating how attainment increased for the latter group.  This was a positive message demonstrating how taking a Child In Need into care can improve their educational outcomes.

County Councillor Prynn and other Elected Members

To note feedback from work undertaken by the Chair of the Board and our Elected Members as part of their role on the CPB, including Member visits carried out since the last meeting.

CC Prynn

CC Prynn reported that she had been carrying out work on policies for CLA especially around care leavers.  Currently there is no policy on what the Authority offers care leavers and what they are guaranteed to receive when they leave care, therefore this is resulting in inconsistencies across this area.  CC Prynn is looking to set up a Task and Finish Group to devise a policy which will set out information on what is offered.  Guidance on the Leaving Care Grant needs to be included in the policy, so that young people in secure settings, have access to the grant when they leave that setting.  CC Prynn invited Elected Members of the Board to be on the Task and Finish Group.

Action:  Elected Members to email CC Prynn if they wish to be on the Task and Finish Group.

At Full Council on 25 February 2016, CC Prynn submitted a notice of motion for this Council to call on the Government to amend the Children and Families Act 2014 to enable all children in residential care to stay under the care of the Local Authority until 21 years of age.  It was agreed that, as this Motion had received unanimous, cross-party support, the letter to be sent by the Chief Executive to the Secretary of State would be signed by each of the political group leaders.  A letter has now been sent to Edward Timpson, Minister of State for Children and Families at Department for Education.

A complaint had been received from a young person at Bowerham Road

Residential Unit.  The associated complaint investigation report is still outstanding however actions have been undertaken and the young person concerned appears to be happy with the outcome when asked about this at a recent event.  As a result of such actions, CC Prynn has requested information from officers on relevant legislation and government guidance to clarify the position of 16/17 year olds who are placed in supported accommodation from residential homes by staff.

CC Prynn attended a Safeguarding Conference in Manchester and discussed with a lead member of the LGA opportunities for aiding the work of the CPB through possible workshops and consultancy.

Thanks were also expressed to all involved with the PROUD awards including the young people and the success it was on the evening.

CC Brindle

CC Brindle attended the PROUD awards which were held on 4 March 2016 as Chairman of the County Council.  She reported on what a fantastic evening it had been and the achievements of the young people who won awards were phenomenal.  CC Brindle thanked all the young people who had attended the awards.

It was also noted that CC Brindle had attended a number of events organised by the sea and army cadets and encouraged the young people to look at joining these groups.

CC Gibson

CC Gibson is Lead Member for Community Safety, and they are currently looking at the Hate Crime Strategy.  Lancashire Police are taking this forward and working  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

Young People and Barnardos

To receive feedback on the work our young people have been doing including:

Performance Report

Young Inspectors

Care Leavers Strategy

Ofsted

What LINX Have Been Doing

LINX took the Board through everything they had been doing since the last meeting.  Please see powerpoint attached.

150^th Anniversary of Barnardos

A video was shown which included some members of LINX which is marking Barnardos 150^th anniversary and invited everybody to a Summer Fayre on 11 June 2016.  The invite is attached and the Board were asked to share this amongst colleagues.

CPB Performance Report

Next, LINX gave feedback on the Performance Report which is attached.  Questions that were raised on the powerpoint will be addressed when Diane Booth goes to visit LINX at their meeting. 

The fixed term exclusion target of 70, was felt by the young people an unacceptable target and wanted this lowering.

Action:  Tony Morrissey agreed to discuss this with Audrey Swann and endeavour to reduce to the target.

Catherine raised an issue around there currently being more perspective adopters than there were children.  Georgine Lee stated that there were a number of older children, sibling groups and children with disabilities awaiting adoption and there is work being carried out with the Government Adoption Vision to address this.  There are currently no Adoption Activity Days planned, however with the new Adoption Recruitment Strategy, the Adoption Service are looking at planning more Activity Days and also looking at Adopters Activity Days.  This will be a joined up approach with Blackburn with Darwen and Cumbria and will do further work around this together.  CC Prynn requested that Board be kept informed when these dates are planned.

Young Inspectors Report

The Board noted the Young Inspectors report as attached and feedback from these visits, especially the revisits were that young people at the establishments welcomed the Young Inspectors back and that they were following up the recommendations to ensure they had been fulfilled.  It was requested that for the next meeting a more detailed report be provided ie a case study. 

Action:  LINX agreed to bring a more detailed report to the next meeting.

Debbie Ross commented that she had attended a National Safeguarding Steering Group where examples of good practice were requested.  Debbie informed them of the Young Inspectors work and offered to share with them the LINX model.  Health colleagues have also appreciated the feedback received on health assessments.

Kirsty Clarke invited the Young Inspectors to inspect Lancashire's Children's Rights Society and Advocacy Service where Lancashire have children/young people placed.  The Young Inspectors welcomed this invite.

Activity

Two County Councillors became care leavers for this activity and put on blindfolds and were asked to make their way to the back of the room which was their road to finding supported accommodation.  The rest of the Board stood in their way holding up obstacles as they tried to reach their destination.  A sample of comments that care leavers had raised with regards getting supported accommodation were as follows:

·  Lonely

·  Isolated

·  No pathway plan

·  Not seeing social worker regularly enough

·  Feeling too young to live independently

·  Lack of information on college  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

Tony Morrissey/Linda Clegg

To discuss the following arising from the recent Ofsted Inspection including:

Recommendations – CPB Action Plan

Children's Services Remodelling

Update from Children's Service Improvement Board

Update from Children's Service Improvement Board

Linda Clegg gave an update from the Children's Service Improvement Board which was attached.

The Improvement Board had met monthly since January 2016 and had an independent Chair.  It was a multi-agency group which includes a Social Worker and young people and was responsible for providing support and challenge and overseeing progress.

There were two documents that the Improvement Board had adopted which were:

The Practitioner's Guide

Our Vision (as attached)

These documents were available to take away from this meeting.

Linda reported that from 9 May 2016 there would be specialist support given to Care Leavers and when this had been in place for a few months, would come back to this meeting to give an update on how it was going.  The specialist support would be a mixture of predominantly Personal Advisors and some Social Workers.

With regards the issues with LCS, and it providing real time data it was proving difficult to fix, however work continues on this but the Board were asked to note that it was not a quick fix.  They were currently looking at seven areas and once they had been solved, they would move on to other areas.

CC Prynn asked where the CPB fits in with the scrutiny of these services and how it can link in with Post Inspection Improvement Board.  Linda felt that the work the Board was undertaking around policies would be a useful piece of work to dovetail in.

Linda was thanked for her presentation.

Unfortunately, the presentation from Georgine Lee on Fostering and Adoption had to be deferred due to the meeting running over, and she agreed to come back to the next meeting to present her report.

The Action Plan was also not discussed.

County Councillor Prynn

To receive any other business.

There was no urgent business received.

County Councillor Prynn

Thursday, 16 June 2016 at 6.00pm in the Duke of Lancaster Room (formerly Cabinet Room 'C').

Thursday, 16 June 2016 at 6.00pm in the Duke of Lancaster Room (formerly Cabinet Room 'C').