Agenda and minutes

County Councillor Brown

To note who is attending and any apologies for absence.

All were welcomed to the meeting and apologies were received from Dr Nicola Bamford, Stephen Young, Sharon Hubber, Tracy Smith, Kirsty Clarke and Audrey Swann.

Nighat Parveen, Senior Manager Central, South and North, Children, Family and Wellbeing Service, Lancashire County Council had replaced Judith Gault on the Board and was welcomed to her first meeting.

County Councillor Brown

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

Resolved:  That the minutes were agreed as an accurate record.

Item 3 – Care Leavers Housing Report

The Chair reported that a meeting to be held with District Housing representatives in the New Year was ongoing.  The Board also noted that the Chair, Sharon Hubber, Brendan Lee and Sam Gorton had all met to discuss the future of the Corporate Parenting Board and will be discussed later in this meeting.

Item 4 – LINX

Nighat Parveen reported back following the action from the meeting held on 24 November 2020 where Judith Gault was going to feedback to Kathy Ashworth, Project Lead Manager, Child and Family Wellbeing Service on the suggestion of delivering life skills courses in Youth Zones following a request from the young people.  The Board were informed that this had been reported back to the Senior Management Team and following discussions, Nighat informed the Board that this was difficult at this moment in time, especially during the pandemic, however there are some programmes available virtually to all children, young people and their families.  The Service's suggestion back to the Board, is that if anybody would like to lead on life skills courses from the Board, the buildings are available through Facilities Management to book and deliver the courses.  The Child and Family Wellbeing Service however does offer a good range of programmes that young people can take part it, and, be referred if further support is required, through a Request for Support pathway from the Child and Family Wellbeing Service, via the following link:  https://www.lancashire.gov.uk/practitioners/supporting-children-and-families/children-and-family-wellbeing-service/

A link to the What's On guide was provided and circulated to the Board: https://fisonline.lancashire.gov.uk/SynergyWeb/Enquiries/Search.aspx?searchID=231 and further information can be found by searching on the relevant district.

Jane Hylton, Development Team Manager, Looked After Children and Leaving Care, Lancashire County Council agreed to speak with Nighat outside of this meeting with regards to buildings that have access to kitchens, which may be useful in delivering some specific care leaver life skills courses in the future.

Umer Khonat, Practice Improvement Officer, Business Intelligence, LCC

To receive the Performance Report.

Umer Khonat, Business Intelligence Analyst, Business Intelligence Team, Lancashire County Council provided an overview of performance information for December 2020 that is produced in relation to Children's Social Care and more specifically Children in Care and Care Leavers that the Board received with the agenda papers.

The Board received the headline indicators which are a subset of the main indicator set, which gives further breakdown data.

A few highlights from the data was:

·  In October the number of Children Looked After was 2130 (84.8%) and in December 2020 there had been a decrease to 2106 (83.9%) a reduction of 10 in Lancaster and 26 in Burnley.  There have been some increases in other districts, however they were offset by the decreases.  Rates did peak in July 2020 during the pandemic and the trajectory is now showing signs of decline.

·  There has been a reduction from 94% (October) to 91% (December) in the percentage of children looked after with an up to date statutory visit and it is expected that this will increase again in the new year.

·  99.5% of reviews were carried out during the previous 12 months in time and this figure had been seen since April 2020.

·  The percentage of children looked after registered during the previous 12 months, who also had a previous period in care had increased from 8.6% (October) to 9.8% in December.

·  In terms of placement stability, there has been a small improvement in children looked after during the previous 12 months who had three or more placements.

·  Children looked after who have had the same placement for at least two years had fallen slightly from October (70.8%) to 70.0% in December and there is scope for improvement on this.

·  Up to date health assessments was the highest in December for over two years and a lot of work has been undertaken with Health partners to improve the outcomes for children looked after in Lancashire, with 78.3% in December 2019 to 91.9% in December 2020.

·  With regards to up to date dental assessments, this has shown a decrease from December 2019 at 69.5% to December 2020 at 51.0%, however, this is mainly due to the lockdowns experienced during the pandemic with access to dentists being limited, however 51% is not an acceptable level and further work is required to improve this rate.

·  In terms of the three care leaver indicators, they are as follows:

Ø  Percentage of care leavers in suitable accommodation had seen a reduction of 9 care leavers in suitable accommodation since October 2020 93.0% to 92% in December 2020) and this is not acceptable and further work will be carried out in terms of improving this figure.

Ø  Care Leavers in Education, Employment and Training (18-20 years) has increased by 6% since April (48.0% in December 2020, an increase of137 care leavers) and is the highest it has been for around 18 months.  There is a lot of work being doing in this area.

Ø  With regards to care leavers with  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

Roxanne McAllister, Team Manager, Looked After Children and Leaving Care, LCC

To receive an update on progress of the action plan since the last Board meeting.

Roxanne McAllister, Senior Manager, Children in Care and Care Leavers Services, Lancashire County Council provided the Board with an update on the Education, Employment and Training Strategy Action Plan since it was last presented to the Board at its' meeting in November 2020.  The data has gone from 53.6% of young people Not in Employment, Education or Training to 51%, and given the current situation, the 2% decrease is quite significant, and work is ongoing to keep those young people engaged.

The Virtual School have a big focus on children look after ensuring that those who are in care are accessing their education place, and if they cannot go into school, ensure they have the correct equipment to enable them to do online learning.  Information is being tracked as to who is accessing education during the current climate and any discrepancies are being followed up.

The restructure of the Children Looked After and Care Leavers Service has also progressed with a recruitment process in place as well and ensuring staff are in the right areas and this has delayed the roll out of action plan.  There will be a lot of development work being undertaken with the new workers on strategic pieces of work which will include the action plan and how it is moved forward and progressed.

It was agreed that going forward the data reported (Item 3) would reflect the work that is being undertaken in the action plan.

Resolved:  i)  That the Board noted the update on the Education, Employment and Training Strategy Action Plan.

ii)  That the data received at Item 3 is aligned to the priorities in the Action Plan and shared with the Board at subsequent meetings.

Brendan Lee, Head of Service, Looked After Children and Care Leavers, LCC

To discuss ways of further developing the Board.

Brendan Lee, Head of Children in Care and Care Leavers Service, Lancashire County Council informed the Board that the Chair, Sharon Hubber, Director of Children's Services and Sam Gorton, Clerk to the Corporate Parenting Board had met recently to discuss the future of the Board and how to take this forward.

Following discussion, the Board agreed that there would be two/three development sessions to discuss:

·  Priorities

·  Membership of the Board

·  Terms of Reference

·  Cycle of meetings

·  How other Corporate Parenting Boards work across the Country

·  Alternative approaches to meetings

·  Develop a forward plan for two/three years to ensure that a significant difference is being made to the children and young people of Lancashire

·  Link-in with other wider strategic partnerships across the Council and other Stakeholders

·  Involve other County Councillors not on the Board and ensure they know about the work and what corporate parenting is all about

·  Look at having a budget for the Board

·  Reports presented in a young person friendly way

Young people shared their thoughts about the future of the Corporate Parenting Board as follows:

·  How will they be involved in the Board going forward with participation back in-house from 1 April 2021?

·  How will their voice be heard?

·  Who will invite them to the Board?

·  How can they be independent if in-house?

·  Use the What's Changed poster so they can see at a glance what has changed since the last meeting

·  More activities from the young people, especially younger members

·  Have the option at future meetings of some people on Zoom as well as some around the table

·  Future agenda item of What does support look and feel like for younger people?

Resolved:  That Development Sessions be arranged, and details be circulated to the Board.

County Councillor Brown

To receive any other business.

There was no other business received.

County Councillor Brown

Tuesday, 16 March 2021 at 6pm via Zoom.