The Children & Young People Overview and Scrutiny Committee met to discuss several key issues, including principles of effective scrutiny, special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) updates, performance reports, educational achievements, and customer feedback. The committee endorsed the Principles of Effective Overview and Scrutiny and noted the SEND update.

SEND Training and Awareness

Alyssa Novak, a public speaker, addressed the committee about the death of Owen Garnett, a young man with complex needs who died in 2023 due to a preventable choking incident at a special school in Warwickshire. She emphasised the need for councillors to attend co-produced SEND training and for the council to engage with families and embed their voices in decision-making.

Following this, the committee was informed that all elected members have been told to complete mandatory online training produced by the Council for Disabled Children. Training sessions co-produced with Warwick Parent Carer Voice and Impact have also been scheduled for September, and a SEND conference will take place that month.

Questions to Portfolio Holders

Councillor Judy Falp asked the portfolio holders to explain their passions and priorities for being on the committee.

Councillor Phelps said that education had changed his life, and enabled him to go to college and university, and set up his own business. He said he would take the role very seriously and would do anything to improve his knowledge to prevent a situation like Owen Garnett's happening again.

Councillor Norris said that he understood on a personal level about SEND, EHCPs, having a sister with a neurodiverse condition. He said that there was a SEND crisis, and that he didn't want to just do a sticking plaster policy, but to find out what's going on, and collaborate to find the best approach. He said that it's not about the councillors, it's about the children and families under their care.

Councillor Jennifer McAllister asked about the council policy for helping schools recruit quality headteachers, as 50% of the schools in her division don't have a headteacher.

It was explained that the council plays an active role in supporting schools to recruit, from succession planning to helping with the recruitment process itself. The governing body of the school is responsible and in control of that process, so the council does that in collaboration with them.

Corporate Parenting Panel Update

Councillor Norris reported on the Corporate Parenting Panel, highlighting two achievements: the establishment of a Warwickshire care experience football team, which won the National Care Leavers Championship Cup, and a fundraising effort for a Care Leavers Christmas Lunch, where officers and care leavers walked up Mount Snowdon. The team has raised £5,575 so far.

SEND Update

Sir Ross Caws, Head of SEND and Inclusion at the Council, provided an update on the council's response to two recent complaints reviewed by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO). The complaints focused on the annual review process for children with Education Health and Care (EHC) plans¹. The council was found at fault for not holding annual reviews within a year, delays in decision-making, and failing to issue amended EHC plans within 12 weeks.

Sir Ross Caws outlined four improvements being made: new training, revised paperwork, reminders to schools about due dates, and increased capacity within the SENDAR team² through additional funding. He suggested a fuller SENDAR review in September.

A committee member asked whether the school or the council was at fault for the reports not being done. Sir Ross Caws said that ultimately the local authority is responsible, but they delegate that responsibility to schools, and need to enforce that.

Year-End Integrated Performance Report 2024/25

Johnny Kyriacou, Director of Education, presented the Year-End Integrated Performance Report 2024/25, highlighting key performance measures and challenges.

Key challenges included delays in the provision of the Teleton Academy³ and the implementation of support for children with SEMH⁴ needs. Positive performance aspects included an increase in the percentage of children with an EHC plan attending a mainstream school and the number of resource provision places available.

A key challenge remains the completion of education, health, and care plans within the statutory 20-week target, which is remaining stubbornly low.

Councillor James Norris said he was shocked at how low the figure was for EHCPs being completed within the statutory deadline of 20 weeks. He asked when the 50% target would be met, and whether the portfolio holder was happy with 50% as the target.

Johnny Kyriacou said that nationally, last year it was 50%, and that the demand for EHCP plans had significantly risen. He said that the key issue is that no child is disadvantaged as a result of going beyond the 20 weeks.

Sir Ross Caws said that they would be going through in the training what they expect, what they call the graduated response, how the EHC plans connect to that, and then some of the reasons within the 20 weeks why there have been delays.

Councillor Norris said that a target in any walk of life is an aspiration and it helps you to move forward.

Councillor Jennifer McAllister asked whether the 50% average was an average or a target, and whether the council was talking to those counties that are doing much better than 50%.

Johnny Kyriacou said that they are talking to those other local authorities, and that it needs a broader discussion of how the system works.

Councillor Sarah Feeney, Leader of the Labour Group, asked what the council was doing in terms of lobbying central government.

Nigel Minns, Executive Director for Children and Young People, said that lobbying central government on the SEND crisis has become almost a full-time job. He said that he chairs the health care and additional needs committee of the association of directors of children services, and in that capacity has met with ministers of the last government and the current government directly to raise issues about this.

Councillor Norris agreed with Nigel Minns, saying that a target in any walk of life is an aspiration and it helps you to move forward.

Achievement of Warwickshire Children and Young People in Statutory Assessments 2024

Leah Adams and Sophie Thompson presented a report on the achievement of Warwickshire children and young people in statutory assessments in 2024. The report covered the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), Key Stage 2, Key Stage 4, and Post 16 results.

Key points from the report:

• Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS): 68.2% of pupils achieved a Good Level of Development (GLD), slightly above the national average.
• Phonics: 79.4% of Year 1 pupils met the standard, slightly below the national average.
• Key Stage 2: 59.6% of pupils reached the expected standard in Reading, Writing, and Maths (RWM), below the national average.
• Key Stage 4: 48.6% of students achieved grades 5 or above in English and maths GCSEs, above the national average.
• Post 16: Students outperformed their peers nationally in A Level performance.

The report also highlighted disparities in achievement among disadvantaged pupils and variations across different districts and boroughs.

Councillor Nicki Scott asked about the difference between the support for maintained schools and academy schools, and whether academy trusts need less support, and so can some of that resource be moved into those maintained schools that need it. She also asked whether there is a difference in the attainment of disadvantaged pupils between academy trust and maintained schools.

Leah Adams said that there is a distinct difference between how they work with maintained schools and academies. When they are building intelligence, pulling in data, finding out information about our schools, that can look very similar depending on whether they're an academy or maintained. When they get to the point when they then move into team around the school and they're starting to risk assess each school at an individual level, they do that differently.

Johnny Kyriacou cautioned about when we do data, because we don't want to create a divide in our schools between academies versus maintained schools, and the landscape is very complex. He said that their approach has been to almost be sort of colour blind when it comes to schools, and that whether they're a maintained school or an academy is irrelevant to them, but they look at their data individually, they treat them as individual schools, they challenge them as individual schools, and they bring them together as individual schools.

Councillor Jennifer McAllister asked whether the data was driven by the school location or where the student lives. Leah Adams said it's school location.

Councillor Judy Falp said that she hates the free school meals measure, and that we shouldn't highlight that they have free school meals. She also asked whether there is more work that we can do to make sure all our children are achieving roughly the same percentage.

Leah Adams said that when they are working with schools, free school meals is not that one stop measure. She said that they are working really closely with their partners in all services to really be clear about that definition of disadvantaged as well, because that free school meals measure is quite narrow.

Councillor James Norris asked whether there has been a decline of falling back for our students versus their peers in other counties, and if so what can we as a county be doing to supporting all of our students throughout all schools in the county and putting us back up to where we were and maybe even doing better.

Leah Adams said that yes, the data is the data, but that she'd like to provide a little word of caution because each of those measures are for incredibly different reasons and have different contexts. She outlined some of the activities that they're doing to try and tackle some of those things.

Customer Feedback Annual Report

Ruth Rollings and Corinne Harding presented the Children, Families, and Education Services Customer Feedback Annual Report, which provided an overview of complaints, comments, and compliments received during the year.

Key highlights from the report:

• Complaints decreased by 43% overall.
• Compliments increased by 43%.
• Comments increased by 89%.

The report also detailed the top categories for complaints, the percentage of complaints closed within timescales, and the remedies provided.

A councillor asked whether the council measures how many queries and inquiries that councillors bring to the departments. It was explained that no, because it's one complaint so you're only going to get one outcome.

A councillor asked what the targets were for complaints closed within timescales, and whether there are customer satisfaction targets. It was explained that the target would be 100%, and that customer satisfaction targets are some future work they're looking at.

Work Programme

The committee discussed the work programme and items on the forward plan. It was agreed that SEND would be on the September agenda. The committee also discussed which items could be removed or deferred to a later date due to time constraints. It was agreed that the post 16 participation report and the time to talk impact report could be distributed as information items, and that the youth justice annual report could come in November. It was also agreed to add the early outcomes for the 2021 to an extra meeting in October.