Purpose

This report sets out several initiatives
requiring capital and revenue investments which, when aggregated,
reduce the financial impact of providing children’s
residential care.

Content

RESOLVED
that:-
 
In-year funding in 2024-25 to rapidly commence children’s
residential care demand management and capacity
building:
 
1.       Cabinet approve the
relaunch and scale-up of a foster carer recruitment campaign in
Northumberland to grow foster care capacity, working in tandem with
the regional ‘Foster with North East’ collaborative
partnership, £0.045m in 2024-25;
 
2.       Cabinet approve an
uplift on the weekly Skills/Fee payment made to foster carers from
£183.49 to £210 per week per child, £0.446m in
2024-25; and
 
3.       Cabinet note plans
to put in place project management resource to accelerate and meet
milestones of existing children’s homes capital schemes which
have not progressed sufficiently rapidly to date and to support
future capital schemes, £0.034m in 2024-25 funded from
existing capital schemes.
 
In-year funding in 2024-25 to accelerate SEND developments and
more routinely comply with statutory processes:
 
4.       Cabinet approve
investment in the SEND team to meet increase on statutory
assessments, reduction of mistakes, mitigation of fines, and
support service transformation - enabling meeting statutory duties
with two 9month fixed term roles, £0.038m in 2024-25 funded
from NCC funds released by capitalising salaries;
 
5.       Cabinet approve the
development of a team underpinning our statutory duties comprised
of 4 SEND Inclusion Consultants, 3 of those being at band 6, and
one with supervisory responsibility at Band 7. The team will be
modelled on a comparable and successful team established in early
years and will work with children and families upstream, before
they become entrenched in complex and stressful assessment
processes, to provide advice, guidance, and support in a more agile
way to those making choices for their children’s education,
£0.082m in 2024-25 funded from Dedicated Schools
Grant;
 
6.       Cabinet approve
commencement of the development of a digital Education, Health
& Care Planning system, £0.019m in 2024-25 (phase 1
development) funded from Early Years Block and unused Disability
Access Funding;
 
and,
 
7.       Cabinet note that
the in-year 2024-25 funding requested is to enable immediate
progress with longer-term initiatives which are forecast to deliver
a significant reduction in projected cost escalation and to
mitigate the challenges which are set to continue.