Powys County Council Children's Services Improvement Plan

Powys County Council Children's Services Improvement Plan 2017-2020

This improvement plan was produced in response to Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales's (CSSIW) review of Powys County Council's Children's Services in July 2017. It sets out the immediate, medium and long term actions that will be undertaken by the Local Authority to address the recommendations made by CSSIW.

Powys County Councils Children’s Services - Update

Following the critical findings in the recent report by the Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales (CSSIW) about the provision of Children’s Services in Powys, Powys County Council has prepared its Improvement Plan to address the improvements required. You can view the current version of the plan at: http://www.pavo.org.uk/policy-and-partnerships/key-documents.html. You can also view the CSSIW report on Children’s Services at: cssiw.org.uk/our-reports/local-authority-report/2017/171017-childrens-services-powys/. 

Improvement Plan

The Improvement Plan is a working document and will evolve over the course of the coming year; its development and actions being informed by “feedback from staff, children and young people, parents and carers, external review, audit and challenge”.

The Plan focuses upon the four broad areas that were identified as requiring improvement in the CSSIW’s report:

·         Priority Improvement Area A – Leadership, Governance and Partnership

·         Priority Improvement Area B - Case Management /Strategy and Models of Care

·         Priority Improvement Area C – Workforce

·         Priority Improvement Area D – Practice and Quality Assurance

The Plan sets out a range of immediate, medium and long term actions to be taken against all four of these areas.

Importantly, the Plan also sets out four ‘key aims’ which set out the purposes and quality of services that the improvement process aims to achieve:

1.       To support families to stay together and reduce the need for children to be looked after, by focusing on services which provide timely help, build on a family’s strengths and prevent greater problems arising.

2.       To manage risk confidently and effectively when providing support to families where children and young people need to be safeguarded or they are judged to be on the ‘edge of care’ by making sure that their needs are accurately assessed and met effectively, with positive outcomes for them. This includes supporting families to avoid children becoming accommodated unnecessarily and by making private arrangements within their wider family networks so that children become looked after by the Council only where this is clearly in their best interests.

3.       To provide and commission a flexible and affordable mix of high quality placements for children who are looked after to meet the diverse range of their needs and circumstances.

4.       To give children and young people clearly planned journeys through care and into adulthood which remain focused on achieving care and support plans, prevent drift, enable them to be reunited with family and friends where possible, have stable placements and exit the care system with good prospects for improved life chances.

Improvement Board and Improvement Partnership

An Improvement Board has been established under the powers contained in the Social Services and Well-being Wales Act, to oversee and report upon the improvements required of Children’s Services. Its role is to hold the Council accountable for improvement and seeking to help deliver improvement in both Social Services and the Council as a whole. Its membership is independent of the Local Authority and the Minister for Social Services has determined that it shall be:

·         Jack Straw (former Local Authority Chief Executive) - Chair

·         Phil Hodgson (former Director of Social Services)

·         Geoff Burrows (former Portfolio Holder in another Local Authority)

·         A representative from the Children’s Commissioner

As previously reported, the Council has also established a multi-agency Improvement Partnership which will work closely with the Improvement Board. The role of the Improvement Partnership will be to take forward and oversee the actions contained in the Improvement Plan. Membership of the Improvement Partnership includes:

·         Cllr Rosemarie Harris (PCC Leader) – Chair

·         Carl Cooper (PAVO)

·         Chief Executive of PCC

·         Portfolio Holder Children’s Services, PCC

·         Portfolio Holder Education, PCC

·         Director of Social Services, PCC

·         Director of Education, PCC

·         Section 151 Officer, PCC

·         Head of Children’s Services, PCC

·         Director of Workforce & Organisation Development, PCC

·         Chief Executive of PAVO

·         PTHB

·         Police

·         Regional Safeguarding Chair

·         Improvement Programme Manager, PCC

·         Primary Head Representative

·         Secondary Head Representative

Others in Attendance:

·         Senior colleagues from Children’s Services, Education and partner organisations will attend and report into the Board as required.

·         PCC Scrutiny Chair to Observe.

The Sector’s Role

The establishment of the Improvement Partnership and PAVO’s membership of it offers a significant opportunity for voluntary organisations in Powys to help inform the actions to be taken to improve Children’s Services.

Although the activity of the Improvement Partnership is still in its early stages, PAVO believes the experiences and insights of voluntary organisations and community groups who work with Children's Services or support users of Children's Services are an essential element in helping the Improvement Partnership achieve its aims. We shall be looking to agree arrangements with the Improvement Partnership for how these can be best shared with it to support its work.

An initial meeting of interested voluntary organisations and PAVO earlier this month to consider the issues raised in CSSIW’s report identified a wide range of different experiences, evidence, ideas and potential opportunities. We are currently working up on these and are also setting up some easy ways for you to feed into to PAVO your organisation’s own comments and will be sharing further information with you shortly.

In the meantime, if you have any questions or comments upon this issue please contact either Lucy Taylor lucy.taylor@pavo.org.uk or Peter Lathbury peter.lathbury@pavo.org.uk or call PAVO on 01597 822191.