Agenda item

The Performance report for December 2023 is attached.

The Corporate Parenting Panel received the Performance report for the January data. The Interim Head in Service Children in Care and Care Experienced Young People, Carolyn Jones, spoke to the item:

The overview of the report in regard to the pathway plans for care experienced young people had shown that since September 2023 there has been discussions for how this would be addressed. The service looked at how we embed practice. Social workers and personal advisors were responsible for meeting with young people in a good way and in good time. 

The data relating had shown a steady improvement over recent months, during the Christmas period there was a decline in performance in looked after children care plans and care experienced adults.

The unfolding story was that there was an issue with planning from Christmas, however the Panel were assured that children were being seen. The Panel heard that care plans did not take priority over seeing young people.

The Panel also learned that Children Looked After team had suffered with resources as staff had been off with sickness, therefore the practice was not embedded.

The Panel asked questions in relation to the up-to-date care plans which were shown on the performance report as 91% in October, but had now dropped to 77%, and asked whether this was due to the period that had covered sick leave. Officers confirmed that the figures in the report today related to the December data and the drop in percentage was due to sick leave and holiday period. The Panel heard that the next set of figures should have an improving picture.

The Panel discussed that each care and pathway plans were a legal document, and it was very important that the service ensured all the plans were up-to-date in case of any legal challenge. However, it was stated that there were too many plans out-of-date, and the Panel enquired on what the consequences were and what were the service plans when the holiday period came into force. Officers responded that, at the service’s practice and performance meetings, there were monthly discussions with senior management in ensuring better practice to maintain a better performance in data for care and pathway plans. The leadership team had clear direction and expectation for young people. Difficult conversations had been held for clarity in expectations, and the level of scrutiny was different now to what it had been in the past. There were pockets where practice was not at the service’s expectations and thus change would need to be embedded within the service, which was ongoing, though the service was currently in a good place. 

ACTION – For the Panel to have an update on the care and pathway plans at the next meeting.

The Panel had comments in relation to annual leave in the workplace, highlighting that annual leave should be compensated in the way it was organised, as foster carers and foster children and care experienced young adults, the holiday period were seen as the busiest time and services need to ensure staff were available for everyone’s needs to be met. Addressing that the numbers were low every year, the Chair requested a plan to be put in place for improvement and further challenged what it meant when plans were not written up and how it affected young people. Officers stated that when a care plan was not written up the actions within the plan were not completed, though the actions pulled together the work on the record had not been completed but the work had been done. Further, it was said that the work was for all young people as it was a child’s record of their life story, and the care and pathway plans was a review for their voices to be incorporated. The service would need to be better in practice in having a professional responsibility to address each young person’s plan with their young person before any staff annual leave was to be taken.

A discussion was led by the Co-Chair that more transparency was required for young people when their social worker was to go on annual leave and for each young person to know when their social worker was unavailable. Experience had appeared that social workers and personal advisors would have to return from their annual leave to address matter that was not urgent. Officers noted that in the absence of social workers or personal advisors there was a duty team available to address any query a young person may have, though this was not communicated. The Care Experienced Ambassador added that from previous experience communication in supporting a young person has been poor. This applied to contact from a duty team or an on-call duty team also. In the discussion on communication, officers addressed that there was an emergency duty team (EDT) for children social care team though this was separate to the duty teams for each service division team and ensure that these team were active was to be revisited to ensure all young persons had the correct contact details.

The Panel further challenged on whether contact was made to young people when their social worker or personal advisor was off on long-term sickness, and heard that the service had updated the way they worked where, should a social worker or personal advisor be off sick for a long period of time, the young person would be allocated another social worker for continuity and contact numbers for emergencies were also available in various teams for young people to have. This had been improved within the last twelve months.

ACTION – An update on communication (what, when and how) with young people to be provided at the next meetings.

The Panel reviewed the performance report in more detail and had asked questions in regard to:

-        CLA7 (Rate of adolescents entering care per 10,000 (13–17-year-olds) population excl. UASC) and CLA8 (Rate of adolescents leaving care per 10,000 (13-17 year olds) population excl. UASC), where in April 2023 it had shown a big difference in that month for young people entering and leaving care. Officers did not have the explanation available and agreed to provide a narrative at a future meeting.

ACTION: For more information to be shared in relation to CLA7 and CLA8 in April 2023.

-        AD7 [Average time between a child entering care and moving in with the adoptive family, for children who have been adopted (days) (12 Months rolling average)] where it was noticed that the figure in the report was the highest number of days over the last twelve months. Officers confirmed that the figure addressed a very small number of children. The days for adoption would take longer when children had complex needs.

-        F4 (Percentage of Foster Carers' most recent announced visit within timescales (6 weekly), the Panel heard that the red indicator was in relation to the time of year and sickness.

-        Health assessments completed within 20 days after a child became looked after had fallen to 25%. Officers stated that October was a good month with a performance of 73%. This was different to social care performance numbers which were recorded at 11 of 15 children that became looked after. In November, the health team saw 23 children. Work represented in the performance report did not reflect their work with children placed in Croydon by other boroughs. Health services also prioritised Croydon children before other young people from outside boroughs.

-        CLA12 – this performance score was at 98% which was thought to be very good.