Transcript

and care leader of the committee. The first items of business are to appoint a chair and vice chair of the committee for the municipal year. It should be noted that the committee's terms of reference state that the chair should be the statutory lead member for children's services which is currently Councillor Carol Bullman. Please can I ask for that nomination for chair. Councillor Beaman. I vote for that nomination. I vote for Councillor Bullman, thank you. And is that seconded? Thank you, all in favour? Thank you, that's carried. And are there any nominations for vice chair? Councillor Beaman. I vote for Councillor Saunders. And is that seconded? All in favour? Thank you. In the absence of the chair I'll hand over to the vice chair for this meeting. Thanks very much everybody and welcome to the meeting. So going on to the agenda, any apologies for absence? Thank you, chair. We have apologies from Councillor Carol Bullman and Councillor Dawn Clark. Thank you very much. Any declarations of interest? Minutes of the previous meeting. Any comments in terms of accuracy? Can I state them when we're all in favour of approving them? Thank you. So on to the body of the report, the first item on the agenda is update from the Shadow Committee which is a verbal update. Thank you very much. Sorry you were just muting yourself at the time I spoke, just use the right. Yeah, sorry. I know you only have one. Thanks Sally, thank you. Hi my name is Annie Britain and I'm the participation community for Cheshire East. So I attend every committee on behalf of our care and care leaders to share an update of what their world is, their lived experiences and what life is like for them. Next slide please. So just as a bit of an overview, we do offer projects and smoke activities and activity dates for our care for our children and care leaders, but we do have a team to have projects called My Voice, both specific care experiences, which is where our care for our children can have their voices heard and be involved in wider participation projects, influence decisions that affect them. But also we throw a lot of life skills, preparation and travel according to the activities that we offer. So the Shadow Committee happened one week before every main committee happened, only in Kennedy Library, and spoke to our group about access to a wider provision outside of care for children's services. Young people spoke about their views about that and the reason that I'm here today is that we know that there are a lot more children and young people that we work with and receive services and supporting Cheshire East, so I will speak on behalf of them. Next slide please. So our recent activities, so I did prepare this presentation for the last committee, which was postponed, but I didn't want to miss out on the valuable information that we've gathered. Our team and our children and young people that have worked, they've actually had a really positive experience from speaking about their views to our spread of perspectives. So we supported young people to create written pieces, drawing, artworks, voice recordings and even more sharing with the inspectors that came to Cheshire East in February. And also we supported young people to prepare and to be part of a focus group to speak to inspectors as well. There were some really beautiful comments about relationships with social workers. One young person said 'I love my social worker', which was just amazing to hear. But also similarly, young people were able to talk about their experiences that could have been better as well. And as I talk a little bit about that further on, she also supported pure insight to offer a focus group of officers and doctors as well at their care leader cafe and group and fell in love with young people that were willing to speak to officers about their experiences too. Next slide please. So yeah, Morgan, our new apprentice, was also involved in speaking to inspectors and also shared his experiences in a both recorded interview. And I just wanted to share how amazing it's been to have a young person in my team that's expert by experience, but also is delivering our activities to loads of young people, curious about, wow, they support service offers, work experiences and partnerships. So yeah, really good opportunity. Next slide please. So we've had activity days for our care for children, focused on preparing for adulthood. And in February and Easter, we've also had a make-up day in one as well. And we have been looking at what could be included in a community care guide if that could be shaped and developed. Next slide please. And also planning for the Star Awards, we've just got annual celebration day. So we have been around for a while, but still calling it Star Awards, Star Celebration Day. So we've been looking at themes with young people and the potential activities that could be offered for anybody that wasn't at the annual Star Celebration Day last year at Macclesfield, town hall. It's amazing for adults to come together and quality of their time to celebrate the achievements of our care for children. This year's Star Celebration Day will be on Sunday, the 24th, and at Sandbatch Town Hall. So we're in the process of developing a communications plan around that. I hope I haven't said it too soon. But it is super exciting and Sandbatch have all been really supportive and taken their corporate plans into activity very seriously. So the community care guide, some of our young people, we've got some things that I'd like to share. Some good things is that the community care guides don't come in the midst of this, they've gone through all ages, it doesn't explain things. However, one person who has been involved in the project has said that they would probably like a little bit more explanation of what's happening when you go into care. So we've also came out with our young people. We have a little bit of a portfolio and selection of recommendations from our young people. We've got a long look at working with some of our managers across the Careful Services to shape the needs of coming into the care guide or developing a new one. So a beautiful project that I've been involved in over the last 12 months. So my team, the participation team, have worked closely with FormInsight and some care experience and people that access FormInsight, alongside my treasure without abuse, my CCUA and the domestic abuse service. So we have been developing as part of the domestic abuse strategy, a domestic violence strategy, developing a training resource aimed at equipping professionals who work with care for children and care experience young people with the right skills to support those facing domestic abuse. So our young people said rather than giving us more professionals in our lives, equip the ones that we already trust and work with, with the skills to support us. So yes, care experience young people have used other experiences and they've shared some really powerful messages that are going to be included in the training. So we're looking to deliver with young people the first pilot training session. So if you can go to the next slide, it can show some looking messages for young people. So these working groups with these young people have been probably one of my favourites over the last 12 months. Our young people are so brave, but also what's really different is that we've seen our journey over the last 12 months. So some of the young people accessing the particular projects and being a part of it have had children of their own in the last 12 months and it's been great to see their confidence growing through developing this training. So some of the young people have said hear me, see me, talk to me, domestic abuse isn't just about physical violence, make sure that our professionals are trauma informed, attachment training is through. So one question, can I access support anonymously so I can avoid the risk of having my children being taken away? See me as a person, take the time to get to know me, can't judge me, be patient, be kind. There's a lot of focus about a more judgemental approach to this training as well as the key messages. So we are looking to deliver that training hopefully during the summer or in September. So what we're trying to do is match it to some of the papers and then write them. So education, employment and training, I believe is on the agenda. So hopefully it's still very much included with today's theme. But young people have said it's good to have interventions if needed as I missed over school but I don't get into it now. So much positive feedback from the School of Education, Employment and Training from our Careful Children who really value the support of virtual school resources. Good actual provision sessions to get you ready for exams. There's been discussions about bullying, there's still a lot of people getting reports and that some of our uncareful children would like a little bit of extra support when being bullied and make others feel more confident when they are sharing their experiences with kids or speaking out. So yes, and related to education, employment and training, we've quickly got an apprentice in our team who will be leading our Careful Children in care with other folks. So it was really nice to hear some of our different people talk about foster carers recognising when things go well and also talking from the time as well as the siblings that they don't live with anymore in their current home. Next slide please. Our Careful Children said that they have good regular dentists and GP check-ups. One anonymous care leader said that they'd like to see male mental health groups as there aren't many. Mental health groups, the care leaders would be good and the mental and the pure insight to help with the jobs around the house and my wellbeing. That's everything. So since I created this I just wanted to add on some things that are upcoming which I'm quite excited about. I've been working with the Linda who leads on the fostery panel for Cheshire East and some parents being done with people who are basically involved in training and the development of the fostery panel in September. So the fostery panel can have all of an example of what other people would like from their foster carers and what parents want to care as they would like and also we are launching as part of the care leader form a monthly cooking and blood session for carers as well. Next slide please. Thank you very much Annie that was really useful and obviously it was a challenging time with Oxford etc as well which we're coming up to later. I've got one question before I hand it over to other members. One of the care leaders was talking about it'd be good to have a male mental health hub and I just wondered what do you know what the rationale was that was it because he felt embarrassed to speak about things that were emotional to him in front of young women and girls or I just wondered if we could explore what was going on there and is it something that you're taking on and exploring in the future to have that provision. Thank you. So that was that feedback that's given as part of the care leader survey so we are about to start developing and pulling together some focus groups of carer experiencing people so that we can look at the results of the care leader survey to form some recommendations and ideas that could go forward to our decision makers and perhaps community as well so that we haven't yet explored this it's from an anonymous input in the care leader survey but we will search in it and we explore mental health and wellbeing while care leaders join those focus groups so that we can ask some people what what they might um I suspect that um that that some of this might tie into the care of the whole process. Right thank you. Thank you. Yeah just just picking up on on council so on this comment there you're linking with other male mental health groups like MENTAL and this man called I don't know if they have a younger cohort but I know in Macclesfield have worked with both them groups quite closely and they're absolutely fantastic and the age range they get is you know sort of from 18 to 80 if you like but it might be where that could be a nice hive of MENTALS and the same with your CUCU facilities and you know your life skills is going into the community you know I can only speak from Macclesfield because that's where I live and I represent people in here so this is you know we've got a community cafe there's cray song and council platoons and broad there's lots of things that are already in place because we're talking about um not working in silos and see what else is there is is to spread our wings a little bit more and get people young people are leaving here to to get into their communities and and to integrate a little bit more and just to thank you for the repository because the other thing we're going to ask and well I've got the microphone is um is this it would be good if um I've done the trauma informed training and a little bit of attachment but it might be where some committee members doing that as well as the the people on the foster care because it does give you a real insight into the type of children like working on the reasons why they're so traumatized and how that affects their behaviors and I'm not going to speak for ages because it goes on right through the life and then why they end up in a bit of a mess as they get older and it gets in the brain and everything so but I think that would be really good training with options. Thank you. Before I hand over to Councillor Holland I would actually echo that because I think anything any training that we can have that better informs us in terms of what we can then contribute to you know the care for children service I think can only be good so I would absolutely endorse what you just said. Councillor Holland. Yes thank you chair I just wondered if we do ask if there's a gender specification that an individual would wish to speak to because we've assumed that this is a male wanting to speak to a male but it could be completely different and it might be due to a trust issue so I just wondered if we've given that opportunity to state and is it available? Because that feedback was given in an anonymous survey if I was to receive that feedback face to face from a child or a young person I would explore that with them and sign people into the appropriate service perhaps look at the level of the role as well or if I didn't know the answer I would speak to that and pick my child with or if she'd wake up. Yeah the reason I ask you because it could be quite easily a young lady who has been maybe bullied and might not trust another female you just don't know what the circumstances are so I think we just have to be open that's why I raised it. Thank you. Councillor Hayes. Thank you chair obviously since the time of the last committee meeting the highlights especially of course being published I'd just be grateful to understand if and how that's being shared directly with these young people and what things that's being gathered from because ultimately these are people most impacted by the alcohol manufacturing process and I'd be grateful to understand how that's been managed and particularly how it's been managed sensitively because lots of the report talks about circumstances that they may be able to reflect in their own lives and experiences. Would it be helpful if I assisted there Amy because it's a really good point Councillor Hayes thank you for making it and we were really thought I hope thoughtful about the fact that when this report was published it talked about some inadequacies and significant inadequacy in our offer to our care leaders and actually we needed to talk directly to them about about that and to be frank we needed to apologise and so we have put an open letter on the local offer and PA's have got access to that as well for those young people who aren't aren't accessing the local offer but that is the go-to place but we know that there's work for us to do around that but there is an open letter which is is clear that we recognise and hear that the shortcomings are not good enough and that we seek to improve those at pace and we apologise we apologise to those young people who have been affected by any of those shortcomings but there is much more for us to do now in terms of that ongoing participation understanding the voice of our young people some really powerful messages that Annie has been able to share through that survey and it's all well and good isn't it hearing the voice but it's a so what that matters so I think some of the activity that stems from the survey that Annie's described is really critical and the critical that you hear about hearing committee for your residents and our young people and in our role as corporate parents that we are seeking to listen but actually more importantly do something about it so in this report we'll look for that information to come through more regularly to to this committee council Perkin yeah I think it's coming relevant question thank you for the report and then I've got the 24th of November but I was going to raise the same point that Councillor Haynes raised it's clear that the report would undermine the confidence of the young people who are the recipients of of the service and we do need to talk to them about it and listen to their views obviously because you know they can tell us how they want to want to improve so I think it's it's not it should be used as opportunity to continue the communication so that you know there is understanding on both sides really but wealth being open about the inadequacies that are there absolutely it's a peer group meeting that obviously helped create links between the different attendees which are important and might help them quite establish their minds how many children according to the scorecard there's about 533 children in care how many children attend the star celebration events and is there any barriers to though their attendance that we can have with the transport cost so the um the star celebration event so over 100 children and young people attended last year every um casual child or young person was invited to the event um and that was electronically through their carers and but also we invited their their trusted adults social workers on service workers youth workers whoever else to also speak to them about it and get them excited for it and yeah get them there really and we try to move the venue each year for different areas of luxury so that it will accommodate um you know distance how old gets me then if that makes sense so um yes we're quite careful to make sure that it's inclusive as possible it doesn't it was a great day last year and also alongside that we um we invite um professionals and carers to also nominate and say what what's special about their children and young people um what they've achieved over the last 12 months as well and to make sure that every child and young person is given a bespoke certificate an award that for all they've achieved back here just trying to make sure they're hard to get ones are really picked up yes sorry really yes so we we we do our best to to recruit and offer that opportunity to children and young people some some will naturally choose to not attend but we still make sure that their achievements are recognized through getting a certificate to them even if they get no time through and they're social workers for an unlimited amount of their life okay thank you thank you very much if there's no other questions thank you very much on behalf of all of us for the report the report is just for noting today there's no decisions to be made on it so we'll move on to the next item on the agenda which is the obstet inspection findings i thought i'd just state at the beginning of this before we go on to questions in debate and after we've had the any presentation that for many of us we've actually already received and scrutinized this and the reason i'm saying it is for those members who weren't at the children and families committee please believe us that we did spend two hours debating and scrutinizing it so if we're not answering asking as many questions that's the reason why and i i just felt that you know we all really participated and i want you to feel sure that we gave it the scrutiny it deserves so would it be you deborah over to deborah thank you and thank you chair um and uh and thank you uh for the points in terms of previous presentation however whilst this did go to children families committee and given the shortcomings that were identified within this uh within this inspection with regards to those young people who sit under this committee it felt highly appropriate to uh to bring it to this committee too for consideration um i i don't intend to go through the report but i do want to just reiterate the point uh that i made uh in relation to my response to um to the previous question um around communication um we the inspection findings were extremely disappointing they're extremely disappointing for the service but most importantly extremely disappointing for the services that we provide to our children and in particular those young people who are defined as care leavers um our care should never end and it seems for some young people it was found our care was found to be wanting and we are both disappointed but more importantly extremely apologetic to those young people and we are determined to improve our services in such a way that our caregivers are and and all of our young people are are engaged in that improvement understand that we will we will improve and they actually experience an improvement so we are we are determined and we have a developing action plan members of the committee including members of this committee and the children's committee have been invited to a member workshop to look at our improvement plan to support us in the development and provide challenge to that to that plan to deliver those improvements at pace i am i think probably if that's okay chair um because it is a full report and obviously the the uh the report from offstead is available for everybody and i'll perhaps open up for questions thank you councilor hayes uh thank you chair i was i'm a member of the children family squinting i was unfortunately not able to be there so i asked my questions absolutely not having heard what may have gone before so if things happen coming elsewhere please do just read directly um i actually start with being grateful which sounds quite absurd given the topic we're talking about i do have a gratefulness for the way in which we apologize i respect that that's hard uh because nobody i don't believe has ever worked to or intended for this video but also the way in which we are approaching it with honesty about what needs to change and improvement forms and i think with those two key foundations that does give me a confidence about the journey that we have embarked on um i wonder it relates partially to to paragraph 18 of the records but it's a broader question really about how well the areas that this inspection has identified needed improvements were reflected within our own self-evaluation pre-inspection what did we know before paragraph 46 concerns me slightly it's a paragraph about finance and it talks about improvement journeys and a particular focus on car leaves and i'm under no illusion that that is the prime area of focus given the inadequate judgments but i think we need to be very conscious that the other areas of that inspection were not good and therefore i'm of the opinion that improvement journeys requires improvement to good will also have some capacity pressures um and needless to say in some ways but given the council's finances being so tight i do wonder whether the improvement plan that the director talks about will have costs associated and will start to provide a view towards corporate funds and strategies moving forward because that's going to be essential i think that's everything for now thank you chair and thank you councillor hayes and thank you for your comments um so what did we know beforehand and what did we tell the inspectors they would find you'll see a note a line in the report that i can't quote it but it refers to the fact that other than the care leavers we we understood ourselves better than we have done before something like that and apologies i'm not quoting it directly um and that up until care leavers they were giving us a clear indication that we did understand ourselves particularly around consistency what we said is you'll find some really good practice and they found some really good practice but what they didn't find is that practice spread right across the system so there were pockets of excellence pockets of really good practice but not that wasn't sufficiently spread across the system so that issue around consistency was was understood and was described to the inspectors prior to their delving further into their inspection regime so but it's still not good enough that we know most of our service but not all of it and so we are working really hard to understand a how that was the case and b to ensure that doesn't happen again and will be part of our is part of our improvement plan going forward in terms of scrutiny we are also looking at how we can support all of the systems corporate parents to better to to to to have a role in that quality assurance activity and working with the lga to look at how they can support us to develop that corporate parenting as everybody's business obviously you understand that here in this committee but spreading that beyond beyond this committee then in terms of finance it's such an important point and we've been working at pace to look at how we can how we what the what the indicative costs would be to deliver on this improvement plan and we are working up a more costed version of the improvement plan which will be part of the plan that you will will get to see and scrutinize because whilst again we were pleased to note because it has been part of our improvement journey that the inspectors identified that capacity wasn't an issue within this inspection in fact they reflected the case those were felt to be manageable undoubtedly some of the improvement activity requires a really dedicated focus and we we want to enable our workforce to do that so there will likely there are already some i think i mentioned this committee in earlier on in the month are we in the same month yes same month that we had already put in some additional personal advisors into the care leaders team two additional at the moment because of the because of the work that we're doing around our 21 plus care leavers where that service was found to be more of an opt-in than an opt-out service we've had contact with the 209 young people who were in that cohort and i i think i'm going to i hope i don't quote this round but i think it's 187 said they want some form of a service so you can see that adds capacity requirements to our system so we are going through that at the moment and we'll hope to have a more clearer picture as we bring this matter through through the committee processes about finances did you have a follow-up question that's okay i think it could be paragraph 15 the inspection report the director referring to which reads the local authority's self-evaluation now recognizes most of the strengths and areas for improvements and whilst it's good to know yourself i suppose my feedback from a governance and corporate parenting perspective is i don't count myself in that sentence i didn't know whether it was inadequate requires improvement good or better and actually our scorecard gives us hard data and statistics which has started to demonstrate an improving picture and then the inspectors come in and very clearly turn that on its head slightly so my feedback constructively around moving forward is how we have an oversight of that self-evaluation so that there is that absolute shared organizational clarity not just in terms of numbers of children time limits of xyz but rather in terms of we now believe we are our data was demonstrating improvements you're absolutely correcting your analysis of that and in fact in terms of a suitable accommodation we are significantly reporting significantly better data than our statistical neighbors and the regional national averages and that gave us some some cause for optimism but it only tells a part of the story and it is it is the quality and what is happening for the five percent who aren't in receipt of suitable accommodation that needs to exercise our minds all of our minds both officers and members more more significantly to that end we are reviewing the frontline visits program it's still ongoing i know there's been some questions about that but we would like to bring to this and the children families committee a proposal to enhance and develop that to enable you to have a more of a a line of sight into quality of practice as opposed to data now accepting that's quite an onerous task and we need to work up a program that's both realistic doable but also that you've got all the the tools and the skills that you would need so we are working on that over the next couple of months to bring forward to committee because i think the very point you make that as a committee you weren't didn't have a line of sight into that to that area uh is really important um so yes we've picked that one up thanks councilor hayes councilor bennett way thank you i don't wish to repeat myself and we discussed that that that five percent that we're in unsuitable accommodation was was not good enough and i absolutely agree with that but locally i know there's quite a few councils around the table that the peaks and plains um meet in a area this year and even peaks and plains have got a waiting list of um 12,237 um each each house has bit by 184 bits on it which is up from last year again i get lots of case work about people being um given new fault addictions and that's really hard we have to recognize that i know it's really important that officers scrutinize but we also need to look at at the bigger picture of the housing crisis i think it's really important that again as counselors we do have that overview about what's going on it's not just statistics on a page it's it's young people who've gone through the care system and i know that this nationally there's about a third of people at home have come through the care system in one way or another and that's the bigger picture it's like why i i could tell you a story about why that happens i could write a book on it i'm not going to waste your time doing that now but i think looking at the bigger picture of what needs to change is is more than we can do in this committee it needs collaborative work and say for example i didn't just navigate my computer i'm not my notebook which is is it's i'm trying and that there'll there'll be lots of other people involved in a communication plan i think on point 39 on page 50 well that includes social housing providers job centers um that give support for care leaders you know we can we can move this into like meets and so on it's it's kind of a realm of situation that i just think we need to look at the bigger picture not work in silos and and work with other providers and help one another thank you do you want to answer the question thank you um thank you in relation to housing is really important when we're thinking about our young people who are 18 plus how do you know where do they live ideally they live with their their foster care who's been looking after them for a period of time and they stay put with that foster care that's the ideal for our young people but for some young people they leave home at 18 go off to university and again what what's our offer for them how can we make sure that they've got somewhere to come back to that's suitable that is is nurturing and is supporting them in their time away from university but we also have a cohort of young people who are ready for independence want to live independently want to try out living independently but we all know that from from children and young people who we know in our own families and in our own lives sometimes of trying out doesn't work so well and you need to come back and try again and that happens for our young people in particular especially where they've experienced loss and rejection experienced some of the adverse childhood experiences that you've described and who who haven't haven't had all the opportunities that many young people do so finding the right accommodation that allows that understands that that enables them to make mistakes but come back and be welcomed again that they can that we can resolve and restore harm when harm's done and and move on to accommodation is difficult in particular we've got scarcity of accommodation we are i'm looking at the report and trying to find the the mention of it we are stepping up a corporate parenting working group that will be multi-agency and and partners and providers will be part of that what's their corporate working group to enable us to have because partners don't sit around this table here do they but that will be the table where they will sit around and be both supported to deliver to understand what we need but also challenged when that's not available but that's going to be really critical to our development of this program is that corporate parenting working group and i know that the effects constituted of a number of members of this and the children's committee along with the partners and other officers i think just to add to deborah's point there and picking up in some of the about the consultation and communication and that corporate parenting working group will have representatives from from our young people so our experts by experience essentially who will be able to and when we when we're looking at recruitment and i think your point about not just a select few it's how we gather the views and represent those across the board really so you know a young person who who has experienced homeless it's really important that they have the opportunity of sort of sharing their views to to that corporate parenting and working group so when we when we do go out for recruitment they are going to be page roles and one of the sort of criteria that we will look for is is that your person's ability to communicate with a range of people including those who've perhaps not been as fortunate as themselves to be able to represent their views at that working group thanks very much i think um all of us realize that this report was very very disappointing um my colleague councillor hayes has alluded to the fact that all areas needed improvement however i mean i i think the corporate parenting working group is a really good idea a really good step forward it is cross-party and it is going to have all the stakeholders around that table so that's a really good thing the other positive thing that we've heard today is about the reviewing of the frontline visits and so we have more insights into practice as i've said on many an occasion the more training that we have the more informed we have the better job that we do um the only other thing that i would ask is we're all corporate parents on this council and i am not particularly confident that many of our colleagues who don't sit on these two committees have had any training whatsoever so i would really urge if we can get that out there because it's all of our business it's not just the people who are sat around this table um this report is just for noting because we did have a good go at it last time so i hope those who weren't there last time can accept that okay so if we move on to the next item on the agenda which is the children care annual report thank you very much yes i can hear you okay my name is rebecca jones i'm the deputy designated nurse and safeguarding children for children in care for cheshire and my role spans across both cheshire east and west i'm here today on behalf of nickel richley and to present the report and so this is the children in care and the report from 2022 through to 2023 and i've been advised just to give a brief overview of the report and to take some questions is that okay yes thank you very much okay um so i'm hoping that you've all had time to go through the report but i'll kind of very briefly touch on some of the key points as we go through and i do have evidence at age 36 of the documents that have been provided today is to kind of stress this is the first children in care annual report that was produced and created as the nhs pressure and versatile and icb was established on the first of july and 2022 and the purpose of the report was to ensure that the this collective all nine icb places which provide an overview of progress of the challenges in supporting and improving the health of our young people and children and within all of our nine areas for the purpose of today i will just stick to the areas that are and key to um treasuries and so as we go through there is a number of points in relation to ask to treat kind of responsibilities and also our kind of terminology and use of language throughout the report and what is key is that they the main focuses needs to help and care needs of iup people is a clear focus on access to services effective commissioning delivery through providers coordinated care approach partnership working with our colleagues and within social care and the local poverty and there is detail with regards to the icb scholarship in relation to initial and review health assessments and that goes into a lot of detail that is broken down into subset areas and it details the priorities for 2022 through to 2023 and that could be located on page 38 and as we go through and to the kind of end of the reporting details the icb system oversight process so this is a series of structure diagrams that we included as well as the accountability structure for the icb and that takes into consideration all of the nine places as we go further down onto page 41 there's a detail there in relation to both the national and the local profile of our children in care and so they'll be able to place comparatives as well as the detail for each of our icb close areas as you go into page 42 the details with regard to tressurries commissioning arrangements so that's in relation to our initial health assessments as well as our review health assessments and the associated health activity refers sorry apologies i'm just trying to keep up as we venture further onto the report this then gets split down to different subsets of the development areas across the icb place at the bottom of page 44 he details with regards to tressurries updates and about the screen lining of the iha process and to approve the timeliness of the return of completed reports as well as the promotion of the annual dental checks across in relation to the NHS England Dentistry scheme there's quite a lot of detail in relation to the other areas that are included within that it acknowledges the challenges that are faced both from a regional and national perspective and with a specific focus on sufficiency in placements increasing complexity of cases a lack of placements within the secure estate take for mental health services and specialists therapeutic provisions compliance with statutory time scales for initial health assessments and also the time of severe new health assessments which has been a challenge for children specifically placed out of our local authority areas and there's detail in relation to our local performance figures and these obviously go back through to the end of quarter three and quarter four within 2023 and as well as the details with the review health assessments as well there's some information on page 49 section number 10 with regards to the contribution of our designated doctors in care and how they contribute to the dysfunction of the health provision of our children and young people as well as their contribution towards our services and developments across our various specialities and the key areas of focus are detailed on page 50 but to look at the initial review health assessments to place focus on key performance indicators and to focus on the care leave convert standardized care leave that offer across the ICB and to look at the NHSE data collection and to support the dental pathway pilot program and to further consider standardization of terminology care for example the use of language such as care experience and so with regards to the conclusion and the summary it provides for in the progress of work with children and children in care and since the formation of the ICB this obviously is an ongoing piece of work which continues across all nine places and I think it's key to note that there has been the reformation of the children care networks across the nine places to bring the estimated professionals together to share learning as well as things that are working well and the information within the report demonstrates the ongoing continuing commissioning arrangements that are in place and to ensure that this work continues to work in our partners to ensure that the development services are in place and for our children in care and caregivers so that's the end of the report I'd like to take any questions. Councillor Hayes. Thank you chair you might have felt that I was light on questions to the opposite agenda but actually it ties back in at different points if that's okay with you. One of my long-standing frustrations is this report's nearly 12 months out of debt by the time it's been received today and realistically that's too late to have any kind of influence on an improvement journey. I'd raise the question about whether the ICB is committed to working at pace and hardship with this authority to secure the rapid improvements that have been identified because then moving on paragraph 22 of the inspection report references the challenges to initial and the review time scales and the emotional support waiting list and I'd be grateful to understand the ICB review on this and the broader inspection outcome but also because so much time has passed since this report was live section 7.4 b of the report from the ICB is actually in contrast to what we see on our scorecard today so you talk about dental checks being a potential area of success or to celebrate whereas completion of dental checks and stq's are actually an area of defined weakness within our scorecard and that's the point I'm trying to get to if we don't have the right information at the right time and we are relatively limited on what information we receive from ICB it's very difficult to try and do an improvement journey with one hand out behind your back thank you Jen thank you very much do you want to comment on that Rebecca yes no of course and thank you for your comments there Councillor Hayes and with regards to the delay of the report unfortunately I've been asked to come and do to leave today but I can definitely take that point back to Nicola which we need to ask for her to provide that and as an update to yourselves and with regards to the other ongoing work streams there is a current reports that are being under development that will be brought back to this room for to be presented and I think that we've done quite a lot of work in relation to IHAs and RHAs and I know that we are challenged due to a number of issues in relation to ensuring that our IHAs and RHAs are timely and we do struggle due to children either misappointment or placement moves or due to children being placed out of area those are our main areas where we meet a number of challenges and we're undertaking pieces of work collectively with all of our partners to look at our emotional health and well-being offer alongside our SDQ processes and we've got a number of groups going to be working together to try and pick that further and see how we can progress Councillor Hayes a follow-up thank you more more a comment I'm by no means letting this authority off the hook I think we've been very clear about the disappointment that we face but fundamentally the bar's got to raise across all such departments here to ensure that consistent and sustainable improvement and I wonder whether in going back to Nicola, Rebecca you could also discuss whether there could be more regular representation at these meetings because realistically if you weren't here today and I was talking about dental checks and SDQs and the downturn in performance that's not entirely somebody's responsibility it's therefore very difficult to hold those people to account and I think we've just got to be really conscious that there's no point Cheshire East Council potentially developing an action plan or an improvement plan which sets the pace which other partners can't keep with everybody's got to move at a similarly rapid pace here and I entirely respect the capacity challenges you talk about I'm sure we face them ourselves in a different way but nonetheless I think we're all on the same page that children require improved services and they're required those improved services rapidly. We've recently done a piece of work in relation to a data cleanse of the information that was received and the data the dentistry scheme and we know that there's been an increase from quarter three for 53% to quarter four to 72% but we do need to really understand and then secure a permanent solution to ensure this data is accurate and it can be produced readily and I think we've done a lot of work in relation to our local area and I suppose promoting the dental scheme as well as re-physics in a refreshing our partners with regards to kind of pathways etc and also ensuring that our carers have a look today guidance as well but I will absolutely take your points back and then we'll be back from there thank you. And Marie's going to comment. I was just going to come in with some updated figures but we've just heard those which hopefully will show that it's going in the right direction but there's still a lot of work to do. I also wanted to add that in terms of officers responsibility whilst obviously health sits with the ICB as corporate parents we have a responsibility to ensure that our children do access those services and I think one of the things that we've recently actioned is that they the dentist checks for example is part of our weekly performance scrutiny with the team so that we're making sure the information is up to date and recorded clearly that helps in two ways one hopefully it improves our data and shows a more accurate picture but two it also shows where there are areas of need and we can we can target support to those carers who are struggling to get their child a dentist etc. Councillor Hollings. Yes thank you chair and I think throughout ever since I've been on this committee the dentist well IHI dentistry as well has just been a thing that's run a theme throughout every single meeting and it is so important because my fear is that these children will be identified because of their dentistry you know their issues with their teeth as care coming from a careful background and that's totally not right. I know we understand nationally there's a problem with the NHS dentists throughout the country but I think we need to think outside the box here and see how we could do it differently do dentists can we employ a dentist in our own to go into the schools can we do something differently because the last thing is that they shouldn't be getting or shouldn't be not to be able to accessing the dentist for sure and so I don't know maybe we can think of doing it a bit differently or even going to dentists and saying can each week you designate a slot for care for children and we do it as a Cheshire East Council. That aside I've got some questions which just to understand it a little bit better so the graph on 48 I think it's page 47 sorry so I'm looking at Cheshire East CICOLAs in quarter three is 100% and Cheshire East is 20% so can somebody just explain that a little bit further because that's a massive disparity and so just so I understand it correctly then what we're looking at in that graph apologies if it's written somewhere and I've not. Rebecca if you could answer that one please. Yes apologies the sound quality is quite poor so I couldn't quite hear what Steve asked if you were referencing that. Page 47 because I'm sat closest to the speaker it was about initial health assessments and disparity given that CICOLAs in Cheshire West quarter three was 100% and then Cheshire East over 20% was a question about why was such a stark disparity. So when you look at the data in relation to our children placed in our area from outer area the numbers are extremely small and sometimes what we come across is that we have children and people that have multiple placement moves before they arrive in our area and then they become settled so unfortunately it then will reach the 20-day timeline and for those assessments to be completed. We would have to pull the data to be able to clearly understand that but that goes for that specific cohort but with regards to my experience of working with the initial health assessment dashboard that is usually the area of concern that we come against. So does that answer your question sorry? Thank you Rebecca it sort of does but I still think that Cheshire West will have those same complications as we experience as well so it doesn't really explain it thoroughly really but thank you. Any other questions? I wondered if anyone could clarify how many NHS centres there are in Cheshire East and how long the waiting lists are and if children and careful children have to have a priority which can hold the basis. Rebecca can you are you able to take that one? Did you hear that? Yes so I heard that. So moving on to the number of dentists. So you'll be aware of the NHSE dental scheme that's been up and running for the last number of years. That is still running and we have a number of dentists that have been allocated. From our perspective of an ICB we would receive any escalations from the local authority or from the community provider health teams whereby there was concerns that a child or even person was unable to access dental care and within the time period and reports from Nicola directly is that there have been no escalations in relation to that. So I think we've got to be clear with the data in relation to is it access to a dentist or is that your person or willing to attend and we need to try and break both that information further. Yeah thank you. It didn't quite answer the question. I just know there's a national shortage of dentists and what you seem to be saying is the children just won't go to the dentist and I know how that feels. Sorry that wasn't my response it was with regards to there are dentists that are allocated as part of the NHSE scheme and there are spaces available. We've had no escalations or recent notice saying that we are struggling to ensure that our children will be accommodated. Okay thank you. Councillor Hayes. I think here in lies the problem I was trying to get to the no of at the beginning. The data is giving us a really clear picture that there are problems so regardless of whether the case has been escalated or not 53% in quarter three tells me the 47% we need to understand them it's not just one or two children here it's 47% of these children and I think this is where we possibly need to reframe our role as corporate parents more as parents. If I didn't want to go to the dentist would my mother force me to go to the dentist? Yes she would. Similarly if there wasn't an NHS dentist appointment available and she could afford to take me to an alternative would she? Yes I'm sure she'd try and it feels as if we're sat waving the white flag on these children and saying oh we're really sorry we can't or not yet or go again three weeks next Tuesday and actually I'm supposed to be here we're supposed to be here as any responsible parent and I believe any responsible parent will be back in the drum and getting those children appointments within a better time than us and I'm not sure that's entirely what I'm hearing at the moment. Rebecca is there anything else you need to add to that? No not at this point. Right okay members this is for noting but I think there's a number of things that have come up really. Those of us who've been on this committee for a number of years we know that this comes up all the time about dentistry. It's been, I don't want to use the term running sore, but it's been a cause for disappointment shall I say to all of us and the other area was also the health assessments which were also for many years quite slow on the uptake. Now Councillor Holland, Councillor Bennett-Wake have kind of alluded to can we start thinking outside the box? Is there another way of doing it? I know that there's work streams being set up in light of the Oxford report. Is this something that one of those work streams could explore? Because I think that would then come back and hopefully we could make progress because with respect Rebecca we have discussed this a few times before as you well know, but thank you very much for your contribution. I don't think there's anything else we need to add. Thank you and as I say this is just for noting so we've noted and scrutinized it. Thank you. Thank you very much. And the next item on the agenda is the Fostering Service Annual Report and that is Shamina Sadiq from Teams. Thank you. Thank you Shamina. Thank you Chair. I'm Shamina Sadiq. I'm the Fostering Service Manager and I have oversight of the Support and Supervision Team Recruitment Assessment and the Friends and Family Connected Service. I presume everybody's had an opportunity to read the report so I'll just share some highlights if that's okay. That's perfectly fine. Thank you very much. Okay so in the financial year 2022-2023 we had 237 initial inquiries and that led to 44 initial visits which converted. I have to apologize, there is an error on that report. It says three approvals which it should be five approvals. So that was the conversion rate of five percent. If you compare the data for the previous two years that is significantly low but there was contributing factors in terms of changes in leadership. There was the crisis of Ukraine so we lost a lot of potential fostering households who became Ukraine hosts for families and during that financial year we didn't have a marketing officer. So just wanted to give you sort of that rationale of contributing factors why it was low and nationally if you compare to other local authorities and there was also a reduction in fine to the group foster carers and I think that coming out of Covid made a significant contribution towards that as well and so it we had a total of 286 foster carers registered with Cheshire East. 162 of those were mainstream foster carers and 124 were friends and family carers and in that year we did have a total of 44 resignations and 14 of those were mainstream foster carers which resulted in a loss of 19 placements and 30 of those were connected carers. Just in terms of our connected friends and family service there has been a strong reliance in using families to place our children and that really reflects the shortage of foster carers that we have. So in that particular year we had 139 referrals which out of those 139 referrals we completed 216 by abilities and temporary regulation 24 assessments and that resulted in 46 approvals. Yeah they're the highlights of the report. Thank you very much I'll open it to questions. Councillor Hayes. Thank you chair without wishing to sound like we're open record receiving a report to March 23 isn't necessarily conducive to this committee not just being able to provide support challenge and accountability but also in terms of being able to influence change we're now and we're two months into a current budget year if this report was outlining significant areas of potential future expenditure we're then stuck for another 10 months but I appreciate that's not the fault of you but I do think it's something which needs that consideration. I wonder whether we prioritise enquiries in that we seem to benefit from quite a significant number of enquiries through events which I actually think is really positive those people are potentially turning up specifically with the purpose of enquiring about that rather than maybe passively seeing something on Facebook and sending a message or whatever that might be and whether we prioritise because the conversion rate appears very low. Tied into the questions I raised earlier with the director about as a former prime minister put it statistics and lies I find it really useful to have some comparison within this report so that we can see the Cheshire East position but we can also see our statistical labour and national average position because otherwise I'm sticking my finger in the wind I'm not sure that it's good bad or indifferent and actually as a part of an arbiter of quality for this provision that weakens my ability to be able to provide that constructive challenge and accountability. It was concerning to read that there were challenges in obtaining care for children's social workers at annual reviews and I'm fearful of how that must also reflect upon those children a bit like a mum or a dad not turning up at parents even in an org write similar but actually probably with higher stakes at play and then there's talk about introducing or the benefits of introducing a third mockingbird scheme to the benefit of the north of the borough. I just wondered whether any progress has been made since this time whether that features any corporate budget plans to be able to expedite given the success it appears to have yielded elsewhere thank you Jeff. Thank you very much Shemina are you able to take on those questions please? Yes so in regards to the Mockingbird third cancellation we have secured DfE funding and we have successfully interviewed a third pub carer and we're hoping that third constellation is up and running by beginning of September 2024. Thanks thanks very much I'd like to allude to what Councillor Hayes just said about not having the data from our statistical neighbours in terms of the foster carers because like in many areas the shortage of foster carers has been something that we've discussed a lot on this committee do we know I know you've expressed the fact that nationally there are challenges but is there any local authority which if you like is bucking the trend that we could learn from in terms of bringing you know their experiences their expertise here at all? Oh Andrea did you want to come in? Yes yes so I think um so it's my third week in Ketchly for being with me um but I think in relationship to fostering of course it is a national challenge in terms of recruitment of foster carers um but there are local authorities where for example my previous authority and it will require us to really look at the offer that we have for foster carers and whether we think we've got it about like it is a very competitive market um and whether we think about it about like in terms of how we recruit and retain so I'm not sure in terms of what we're doing at the moment in terms of the details and how we retain the ones that we've got whether the ones that left us that we would have rather had pecked and whether we need to do some more work with them so I'm not saying we're not doing anything I'm saying that I would want to be reviewing that um with the head of service over fostering um and with the support of Douglas just make sure we've got it about like in terms of how we might recruit because the right things you can do is challenging but the right things you can do to make it more attractive and just picking up on a point earlier around family carers so whilst we want to recruit more foster carers where it is appropriate for children to retain family and collective carers that is quite often better for them so I think what's happening in Chester East at the moment is lots of work around um special partnership orders and kinship assessments which you shouldn't have a very good extended family that's better so the balance getting a fund to work between supporting families to look after their own children but having a good range of foster carers to support children that some of those are more complex children that can otherwise be residential care stepping them out of residential into foster care that can manage that need something that we can start to consider moving forward I hope that's helpful thank you very much um Councillor Bennet wait yeah I'm just looking at the um the graph on page 63 looking at the age range of our foster care seems to replicate our our aging population in Chester East majority of our um foster carers seem to be over 50 and then it's it's a woman in her 50s and that's as far as we're gonna go it's it's tiring looking after children um you know and I've also I've got residents who are retired from Austria in the 70s so you go on and do a grand job for many years is that recruiting younger people what are the incentives for doing that really so I just wanted to add in terms of um the comparative data that you're talking about so we we've gone into um foster for collaboration with seven other local authorities and we have the official launch um in May this year um and and obviously we there's eight local authorities and we are collecting monthly data to compare in terms of the number of inquiries that are coming to each local authority and what the conversion rates are but in addition to that I think I can for the next report includes the data from the northwest local authorities and if that would be beneficial to that would be thank you very much thank you I've got I've got one question and it's about the targeted recruitment to find homes for young people who are in residential settings who want to live in the family and to find homes for young people who may otherwise go into a residential setting and it's got here um not achieved and this action will be pulled forward to 23 24 and then underneath the draft policy has been completed but this needs to be costed alongside an analysis of the demand for this service um I wondered if you could expand on that because um being um someone who is not professional in this area I'd have thought most people would want to live in a family setting rather than a residential setting I think I think there's a place for each um so every child has obviously got their own needs um and fostering families is not always um the right place for a child and based on their needs and not every child does want to live in a fostering household and sometimes there needs to be additional therapeutic input before they can do with the with the fostering family so and that's one of the targeted recruitment we are looking to recruit salaried foster carers which is one of our targets to um recruit five salaried foster carers who can take children who are currently in residential placement so it's stepped down from residential to a fostering placement with that support that they would need so they could live in a fostering family Deborah I think you want to come in then uh thank you uh chair and thank you Shemina um and it's really uh important that this committee understands that for um every child has a care plan and the care plan needs to determine what that plan for the child is for their permanence where they need to live whilst they're in our care and that plan needs to determine that permanence plan at four months for most children living in a family setting is the desired outcome for most children but as Shemina said there are a small number for whom residential settings group living or even individual living in a group setting environment is the safest and the and the best care plan for a period of time but it's highly unlikely that we we wish that we will have many children with a care plan for permanence in a residential setting so that exiting out of residential at stepping down as Shemina described is really important that we um explore further um we we've got a target for five salaried carers actually I think we may wish to be more ambitious than that and we do intend to bring a paper to committee to describe in detail both the costs and benefits because these it will be an investor save option um so we will be we will be bringing a fuller paper um as it is uh chaired by myself and the interim director have been in this discussion only this week I keep saying this week and it is only Tuesday a lot has happened um I think it was only yesterday um so so uh I'm I'm pleased that you've raised that it is an ambition for us to go deeper and further and at pace because what you're seeing is not pace and I I own that I hear that and and that's the uh a really critical area for us we will um hopefully um I can't remember when the next of these committees is I don't think it'd be the next one but it will be the one after that bring a paper for your consideration thanks very much for that Councillor Hayes uh sorry I missed one out it's only a very short question though the report talks about the panel being assisted by the interim panel advisor Richard Watts uh could somebody confirm whether we now have a substantive proposal for panel advisor please do you mean that you want to take that one yes yes so we've got a permanent panel advisor in post who came into post and September 2023 thank you well thanks very much Shemina for that and for your contribution uh members this is for noting only so no decision making to be made on this so if we go on to the next item on the agenda is the virtual school headteacher annual report so hand over to you Laura thank you very much thank you chair um so I'm here to present the virtual school headteacher report which details progress uh throughout academic year 2023 um I hope you will have an opportunity to read through I know it's quite a lengthy report uh with it covering that the whole of the academic year um the request for today is permitted to note and the annual report during 22 23 virtual school continued to support all cardboard children and high levers of the agency filling our duty to promote the education of children I picked out a couple of key highlighting points there is an overarching um acquired at the front of the headteacher's report which talks about some of those um yeah the kids the apologist um it talks through some of the highlighted points um around our data assessment and information for our children so attendance continues to be static at around 92 percent between 92 and 94 which although is positive we recognize that we need to ensure that we're supported to improve attendance for all children and there's still a number of children with attendance that is not good enough and that we need to ensure that we are removing any barriers and understanding what they are to improve the attendance for our children um we've developed a new internal meeting um each fortnight which myself and Annemarie support as part of that alongside both teams and that is purely around attendance so that we can track children so we are tracking attendance daily and receiving daily attendance from all of our schools and settings so that we can actually really start to support the and so what part of that not just collecting the data but how can we sort support to actually ensure that we're improving and supporting where we can we have not had any permanent exclusions for a number of years across our cardboard children which is again a real positive um our number of fixed term exclusions in primary again has continued to decrease but our number of fixed term exclusions within secondary continues to be a challenge which is no different nationally but again we recognize that we need to do more around that and we are working with our um our colleagues and partners our alternative provisions within the local area to make sure that we've got the right early intervention and support in place um i've included data highlights from last summer from formal exams within the report again although lots of our children achieve well we recognize that there is still a gap in comparison to their peers and all of the children i there is a lot of data and information in comparison to cared for children across the northwest and nationally and but we recognize that there's still a gap but against all children this is going to be a key focus for us as part of our improvement plan uh working um working with our school and working with our school improvement team on some of those key areas over the next 12 months this is aligning with our disadvantaged focus um area across the local authority we've been working across the partnership to develop our improvement plan for them in our study inspection and have developed key focus areas around education to ensure we are further strengthening our support to close the gap to be in line with peers and all of the children ensuring that we're working across the partnership to better prepare our children for adult hard and independence i'm happy to take um any questions out and hopefully i've picked up enough highlight points thank you chancellor hayes thank you um this is one such example where i can't quite correlate what this report says versus what officers are telling me so this report appears to suggest that children's outcomes whilst lower than national averages for the average child are either in line or above national offset paragraph 24 says outcomes children and care alone i can't correspond to the two there if i can just go forward a little bit it talks particularly about the challenge of transition between primary and secondary and the impact upon attendance and i'd be really grateful given that breaches two of our head teacher partnerships so it's somewhere between ecap and geesh how we're working particularly on that work stream because that's really significant and one's lost very difficult to to redress and then my other question stroke idea is whether the virtual school has a governing body i know lots of other authorities have introduced a governing body for virtual schools which means separate to this committee but to provide that much more dedicated focus upon the educational outcomes and attainment of these children which is another layer of insight and possibly a better forum for me to ask some of the questions sorry apologies members we're vying for the opportunity to come in on those questions so i'm going to let my virtual school head to come in and then i may make some additional comments thank you thank you um so yes in regard to like a couple of those uh key areas yes we do have a governing board and we do have um members as part of that governing board so we do be in line and exactly the same as a school governing board would we have a clerk for our governors we cover the same we have authentication so we've been established probably for about 18 months um around that and we've got across the partnership um we have um we have members on that so yes we do um again we take we took that away from some of those uh good good uh practice that we're working across the north west of the groups educational outcomes um as part of that comment um from inspection to our report it is around that we are we are above in regards of cared for children so when we do our comparison data to cared for children we are either in line or just above in all of those areas what the what the reference to is is compared to all of the children so our outcomes are not as good as all of the children in Cheshire East and that is where it's maybe referenced around that is that we need to make sure that we are clearly um creating that data dashboard and information about the comparison of our cared for children to all of the children within the local authority that's where um the synergy is because you said exactly as i would have said but actually i think i think you make the point uh really well Councillor Hayes and it has been made earlier we should i think it in from Councillor Holland in terms of ambitious being ambitious for our children in terms of their dental treatment and we should be comparing ourselves with all other children not cared for population and obviously really urged us to be more ambitious for our children and and we took that as a very very helpful challenge and our um locating our data analysis much more now i think hopefully going forward you'll see more of that um that doesn't we've got to be ambitious for our young people and we've got to have high expectations for them so that we can support as we would our own children um obviously we've also got to be mindful of their particular and specific needs um and recognize some of the challenges that they have to overcome but our job is to support them to overcome those challenges to access the education they need to have good long-term outcomes so we've taken that challenge seriously and i'm grateful for committee's attention to that point it is about how we can be as ambitious possible for our cared for young people Councillor Gilman am i reading this correctly that of three children that were at university so i think we need to be really careful that whilst we are very ambitious for all of our children that we don't miss the fact that some of these children are performing amazingly you know together first is a huge achievement for anybody at least of all a child that is cared for and i think we do need to be really careful that we don't miss that and that we acknowledge that and i will have knowledge on what we as a council to enable that child to do that i think that's really important yeah i think quite rightly that needs celebrating yeah yeah laura do you want to come in yes thank you i think it's absolutely crucial that we do recognize the achievements of our young people um across the board um we do recognize as part of that we do link through to that annual celebration event um also as part of that we have we do have our increasing numbers of our young people going on to university we're linking through with providers such as higher horizons to do some work on our aspirations and supporting our children to actually go visit universities um across the board we've been doing that for about 12 months and we've also had some of our care leavers um who have now finished university or within that they've actually come and presented in front of our schools and settings so rather than me doing that in our last couple events that they had they've actually presented about how it's felt what supported them what did they need to really help shape but shape that with our schools and settings alongside us rather than me presenting which i think has been really powerful um to have them come and do that with us yeah and i think that's all brilliant but we mustn't allow um the oster reports to detract from that person's personal achievement it's massive i agree chancellor bennett wake i'm just going to echo what uh chancellor gilden just said is that for children who have gone through the care system for whatever reason that is a massive achievement and i don't think we need to be well i i personally don't think we should be looking at the distance traveled these children make because it's absolutely massive when you work with children um who have not had the best start in life just coming into school just taking the hood off is enough but to actually get a face that is absolutely phenomenal phenomenal i could never say that word you know but it's it's we i don't know sometimes i feel like we get drawn into comparing you know apples with pears or whatever the analogy is that we do need to be ambitious but we can't compare someone who's come from a secure background there's everything that they need the love the care the finance if necessary the place to live to a child who has had to be taken away from their their parents and looked after by a council or somebody else another family member or whatever to the impact that has on them which is why quite rightly say that training is so important to understand that distance travel is is enormous and we mustn't be excited about i'm quite agree with you and then chancellor hayes yeah i absolutely take on board what you're saying and agree i think it's about how we as the family celebrate those in the most time in appropriate ways because whilst the star celebration is one such occasion if i graduate in may or june it's probably a little bit lost by the time i'm potentially my first job in november and that's not to say that it shouldn't happen but i think we've got to look at this more through the lens of their peers you know if their non-care experienced peers are going to have a dinner with somebody because they've got that degree or they are i don't know what it is i didn't go to university i've never experienced that myself the point is it's about timely response and also being mindful that it could be the completion of an apprenticeship or indeed getting an apprenticeship it could be a whole range of things but i my personal view is the best way to try and look at it is through the lens of those young people because one of the things i'm always conscious of as well is not doing to you know we might say oh come for drinks on the lawn at Tatton with the chief executive and then i think no thanks how boring with no disrespect to the chief executive but the point being i think that's maybe a missing piece of the jigsaw when it comes to participation we're not necessarily understanding in very honest terms this is what i want you know there was a time a long time ago where i was the lead member of children's services and i wanted to send a birthday card to each of our children in the care system at the time and there was lots of debate around the benefits and disbenefits of that and it came down to me saying okay go and ask this group of young people and as it happened they said it's not something we're really interested in so don't bother save my handwriting but the point is what don't they get the opportunity to say actually i'd really like it if and it can't be the council's organized form you know t and snacks with the mayor t and snacks with whoever it needs to be on their terms and i think it's on that basis we should be proceeding around that element specifically thank you councilor hayes and i think these are absolutely splendid suggestions if if i may can we take away this um some of these ideas of course lots of these young people will have celebrations even with their birth families with their foster families and with those who've loved and cared for them in the way that we would with our own children but there is a point there about how do we celebrate the successes as well as focus on the areas for improvement i guess if i'm completely honest i have asked my service to really focus on the areas we need to uh to improve not to disregard where we're making successes but i want to flip the coin because for too long we're focused on where we've done well and actually that hasn't served us well and so i i am the imperative for us is to improve for all of our kids and young people and that is the challenge i've posed to to the wider service but i really like your ideas um and we'll take away and come back with some some ideas uh to the next in our next report if that's okay i don't necessarily feel the need to see no i just think it's useful sometimes to challenge the status quo and thanks very much those comments Deborah i think yeah i think they're very well said um Councilor Hollands uh yes thank you Jack i echo everything that everybody's said before me and in particular what Councilor Hayes was saying and i currently have two children at university and trust me i know what they ask for and i think we should be thinking again outside the box you know concert tickets you know a meal with family it's great but but what about those sort of i'm not quite sure if they've been completely in our care in these circumstances with the university degrees of the two and then the first but if they were you know even more so so let's reward you know if we're acting as corporate parents as we would our own children we would be you know we would be we would be being asked but i want to go to taylor swift and tomorrow night that's what we've got to do we've got to ask them what is it you would uh expect and they might be a bit beyond the realms of uh our um however it is something that we've got to think about because we should be treating them the same we might not be able to offer that we should be treating them saying and as you say um as jill has mentioned a two one and the first is magnificent it really is trust me my daughter got a two on the effort to get to that is unbelievable constantly on the phone constantly and you know reassurance it's it's unbelievable so um and i think we should reward it and we should congratulate it at every opportunity well thank you very much members and also thank you very much laura i think all of us would agree that was a really interesting report sorry can i just range just go back onto points very quickly i'm just conscious of how to answer things so uh councilor hayes raised around attendance i just wanted to confirm i do attend uh keisha kneecap alongside colleagues so sally ashworth um our head of service around attendance where we we are really um i suppose as part of that so that whole we are linked in and joined working alongside each other and our attendance those spaces so just wanted to confirm um that part and also wanted to offer as part of that that i can support about the attachment and form training um across if needed we do do that with our schools and settings virtual school we do provide um as part of that working with our ep and other colleagues so i'm happy to take that outside of here for an action if that would be helpful i think i think all of us would thank you for that thank you very much thank you this report's for noting so if we move on to the um next item on the agenda which is review of the terms of reference is that for you i think it's i think it's a paper sorry i uh chancellor hayes sorry i don't think it's changed significantly my question was going to be about whether there needed to be some element of the governance framework around some of the additional working parties groups etc that we talked about earlier on in this meeting just to ensure there is that reciprocal because whilst i entirely respect that there's a need for those working parties to be a fast-driving vehicle for changing progress the penstone sits with this committee and with elected members corporately and thus i didn't know whether terms of reference need to reflect that in a different way but that was my contribution thank you uh counselor hayes and uh i um if i may uh chair i would suggest uh unless there's a constitutional reason for us needing to do um make final agreement today i think there is some more work to be done uh to ensure that there is the alignment synergy but absolutely clarity around the um uh sovereignty if you like of this board committee so what would you do is come back with it once it's been refreshed because obviously we've got the working group there's work streams etc okay sorry can i just start with something can i can i suggest something you know like when you were saying about the concepts and something like that is what your people do enjoy going to we don't necessarily have to pay for it we can actually go to these venues and these providers and say look we've got this it would be a great story as well and to say that you know they have their corporate responsibility would you dedicate so many tickets per year especially to your children so we just need to think differently about it of course if the public see that we've spent 400 quid on a ticket for one but i mean let's face it how many have we got three huh it's nothing great but i think we need to look at it from a different perspective okay sorry it just sort of came into mind i think it's i think it's a really good point and i think it's something we will take away uh and look at how we can get sponsorship for some uh some elements we are already doing that in terms of our celebration event we're looking at how we can out we can cover that in a more of a more effective efficient way but still have a fabulous event um but also i think we need to be recognizing that for some young people who simply attend school when they didn't attend school that means celebrating too and so it's just the small steps and the big steps and not sort of um privileging one over the other but recognizing celebrations and um achievements should be should be marked but the impact of that on other children when they see that one of their peers has gone to whatever they've been at council or something and that they would like to go to that would have such a massive impact on the aspirations of those children very quick point really quickly i know when i lived in Nainsley the eastern and my daughter was doing a GCSEs used to have um the council had a world pro just and it was to get one grade higher and the easterly ward that it was with not taylor swift concerts but smaller concerts smaller rewards and that that worked really well it wasn't that expensive and a lot of local theaters and groups got involved if you don't ask you don't get them without it okay so moving on we've got the final item on the agenda which is the care for children and care leave the school card sorry Anne-Marie over to Anne-Marie thank you um in line um with uh other sort of discussions today um the um members will note that the scorecard is significantly um out of date it relates to quarter three which is actually the period which ends at the end of december hence the uh accompanying report doesn't particularly focus on that because that data is now six months old and i i am i and um um andrea who's the new interim director felt that it was more um appropriate really to focus on our journey sort of post ofsted and so um the accompanying report which i hope everybody has read um sort of just discusses really um in brief um some um some of the work that's being undertaken and um or proposed work that's undertaken to address uh some of our improvement work really um i wanted to say that um one of my actions going forward from today will be to work with um the colleagues in business intelligence to make sure that the scorecard reports are more timely because i think i recognize the the importance really of members having the opportunity to sort of scrutinize that i also think that the um the work around uh frontline visits will supplement the information in terms of data because as we've talked about earlier in this committee the data was strong what we need to understand is is the quality of practice really and i think some of those frontline visits will enhance you as members to understand what the lived experiences of our children and young people and ultimately that's that's what this is this is about really um many of the areas that are covered in the accompanying report um have already been discussed within um other reports particularly the reports that deborah um has presented but i opened up for um for any questions really chancellor hayes not a question for saying i'm going to sound like a broken record if i've not already done so i find the principle of being accountable for something without the levers to influence or improve said thing quite difficult if i was a dentist i could say goodness 53 percent in time i tell you what send them to my surgery on friday and we'll make that 75 percent we as the authority are ultimately accountable as you talked about earlier on marie for the entirety of the scorecard but i find things like 4.2 and 4.3 quite difficult and i know rebecca's still there and i'm not expecting any further debate or discussion on it but i think there needs to be more regular opportunities for health partners to have their papers here and i don't wish to duplicate governance with what the icb sees but i think it's really important that we see it too because we're being held to account for this we are the corporate parents of these children and actually i've got very limited levers of influence or control over whether these children are or aren't getting stq's and dental checks within the right time or not and it ties back into as you've referenced amary the agility of the system having been on improvement journeys primarily in smaller organizations the improvement journey itself is often not the problem it's the governance arrangements keeping pace with the improvement journey to ensure the consistency and i'm really concerned as an overarching point today that we could work a great pace but if we don't keep that pace with it there'll be an uncertainty and a disparity as to whether that pace will be sustained whether those improvements can be recognized and i think i've not got the answer unfortunately but i think it needs a bit of a critical eye as we work on that improvement plan as to how we can move forward in the most timely manner i'm not asking for things a week after it's been published for example but 12 months after it's been published seems a long time but also without and it's a point i've raised that either these or children promised missus previously without it becoming either duplicated or overburdensome and taking officers away from that from my responsibility of actually delivering the improvement rather than talking about delivering the improvement did you want to come in hopefully to reassure you even whilst this committee has been sort of operational there's been some communication with colleagues within the icb to to talk about exactly this really so it's not just the icb it's also the fostering report it's making sure that across the board our reports are more timely and offer you as members the opportunity to scrutinize in the way that's most meaningful really data that's six months old isn't any use to anybody really it shows what we you know what you know the history essentially really so we that has been duly noted and i think we will at pace as deborah says take that forward and make some amendments in terms of how we look to present that that may be that we ask for regular attendance by you know colleagues from icb the fostering service so that we have a more regular update even if it's not the full report but there's something there for for members to be able to scrutinize council posner yeah i mentioned this in the children's families committee how confident are we that this scorecard actually reflects what we've all just been talking about all committee the voice of the children within the system also getting ourselves to that operating is any of this actually being well is it relevant is it getting us along the journey quicker or is it just because i don't know the answer to that and i don't know what will help us but it might be looking at it holistically and and finding out what will make us better what really matters here because some of the things on the area i look at and i'm not convinced that it will make a difference and we should be overly concerned to to be good on school but that's that in your capable hands i'm sure i i understand what you're saying um council president and uh for for background i guess the scorecard is made up of data that we are statutorily required to submit in returns to the government on a annual basis and the majority of our store scorecard is made up of that data we do we do add to it some localized data that we can find some benchmarking material to to assist but it is primarily the the statutory returns um but does data in itself make a difference but we know we know that our data in many areas is as good as good or outstanding local authorities so it's on its own it's not sufficient so it has to be that end diagram of data and quality evidence that may be auditing that may be spending time with the child that may be spending time looking and understanding the child's story in different ways that helps us understand whether this is good enough um so so yeah in on itself it's not good enough it's not it doesn't help you um what i think we can do more of is to develop the reporting on the back of the data to add um some of that quality information so i think that we don't tell you enough about quality assurance we don't tell you enough about auditing activity and you know for example i spent the afternoon with the care leaders team a couple of weeks ago i looked at the stories for two young people i heard about the input from the p the pa's a personal advisors i heard about a young person was invited you've heard some of you heard the story invited to christmas dinner with that pa um and there was something there that was about qualitative activity i didn't look at the the numbers but what i heard was about a relationship that was making a difference this is a young man who's in apprenticeship who at times struggled and firmed up the pa and said heck what am i going to do now and she was able to advise so so we do need to give you some of that qualitative information but that isn't just about telling you the good stuff because we can pick out some superb and that's those deep pockets of great practice that we've seen but those pockets need to spread and infect our system so we need to tell you about where it's not good enough and where those young people are sitting in accommodation that isn't meeting their needs so that you understand that in a richer and more transparent way and so i think that we will commit to make sure that our report that sits with the data because the data is important because we can really number crunch and and and uh look to make the uh those improvements and look at those margins and those percentages who aren't having their needs met more specifically and we can get into the child level data once we know what five percent those five who those five percent are um so i think that can be our commitment to you uh and and then what i i hear that the um that you're you support us developing the frontline visiting program and we'll be able to use that as well so it's about triangulating all the data sets that we've got to be richer and more transparent yeah that recently went on from my visit um with counselor bailey and that's why sometimes when i look at the facts and figures and actually talk to the people that are from wine and they don't correlate at all and but you know i'm preaching to the converter everybody appreciates that but you know percentage does not belie what goes on and hard work that's that's put in by the teams andrea i think you wanted to come in at one point ah okay thank you i don't want you to think i was ignoring you thank you councilman awake and yeah just to echo what deborah's just said i was just literally going to say you didn't just need a good one looks like in school you need to see what about what it looks like and also to say maybe we didn't do that quite right we made a mistake and that journey of how we approved it and i think that would really because i'm not a figures type of person tables type person i love those case stories stories in your report and that's what makes a really big difference to me even getting you know the young people or the pa's to come and tell us a story or video and make their own story is and i'm giving you more work to do but i think it just makes it more accessible and to understand the difficulties thank you chancellor hayes i think it's also about using us as elected members as the results yeah particularly through frontline visits so deborah whilst you might not have an afternoon every term to go and do what you just described around spending an afternoon hearing gig directly actually we could yeah um and it's an incredibly rich data source and similarly i appreciate i sit here and some people might say i can't hear it goes again i'd rather hear the question from me than from somebody outside that we shipped up by naturally it provides me with that reassurance that we do know what's going on here there is that clarity around where we're at but also where we need to be uh and i think it's just about i talked earlier about raising the bar across the whole system and that includes us elected members as well okay thank you thank you very much um that was for noting and providing scrutiny and i think again i think we've i think this off-stead report to be honest has focused our minds on not only the improvements that we need to make but also on us as members on what contribution we can make and i certainly think we've come up with some good ideas today um which hopefully we can then work on together and collaboratively okay thank you laura sorry chair i was just going to take this opportunity if possible um our care for and care leaders actually confident have got a event on thursday um they're raising money as part of sponsorship for the homeless they decided to do that as a community event it's our venture accountants program for us at the lifestyle center from insulate in grow um and any support i'm sure they would be um absolutely appreciative of that george that raises a really useful point actually so two administrations ago i used to sit on the fire authority and what the fire authority is incredibly good at is inviting you to everything with no great expectation that you'll always turn on but one of the most powerful things they used to advise us to was the princess just graduation programs and aligned to using members as resources those such things but not just exclusively those things the worst we can say is no okay thank you very much that draws the meeting to an end um thanks everybody for coming thank you very much thank you thank you