Meeting documents

Children's Services and Leisure Overview and Scrutiny Panel
Wednesday 12 December 2007

Web Agenda/Minutes Summary Document

Meeting Name:
Children's Services and Leisure Overview and Scrutiny Panel

Meeting Date:
12/12/2007 Pick

Meeting Time:


Location:


Sub Committee / User Forum etc (if required):




Members Present:

Non-Members Present:

Confidentiality: Part I


Document Type: Agenda


Document Status: Final


N O T I C E

O F

M E E T I N G

CHILDREN’S SERVICES AND LEISURE
OVERVIEW AND SCRUTINY PANEL

will meet on

WEDNEsDAY 12 DECEMBER 2007

at

7.30 pm

in the

ASCOT AND BRAY MEETING ROOMS,
TOWN HALL, MAIDENHEAD

TO: ALL MEMBERS OF THE CHILDREN’S SERVICES AND LEISURE OVERVIEW AND SCRUTINY PANEL

COUNCILLOR LENTON (CHAIRMAN)
COUNCILLOR MRS PITTEWAY (VICE-CHAIRMAN)
COUNCILLORS BASKERVILLE, MRS BURSNALL, J EVANS, MRS LUXTON AND MRS STOCK

SUBSTITUTE MEMBERS
COUNCILLORS MISS BARTON, BICKNELL, MRS HERDSON, MRS HUNT, MAJEED, MRS NAPIER & MRS NEWBOUND
Lloyd White
Head of Democratic Services

Issued: 5 December 2007

Members of the Press and Public are welcome to attend Part I of this meeting.

The agenda is available on the Council’s web site at www.rbwm.gov.uk or contact the
Panel Administrator Andrew Scott (01628) 796028
In the event of the fire alarm sounding or other emergency, please leave the building quickly and calmly by the nearest exit. Do not stop to collect personal belongings and do not use the lifts. Congregate in the Town Hall Car Park, Park Street, Maidenhead (immediately adjacent to the Town Hall) and do not re-enter the building until told to do so by a member of staff.


AGENDA

PART I


ITEMSUBJECT
WARD
PAGE
NO
1APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

To receive any apologies for absence.
2DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

To receive Declarations of Interests from Members of the Panel in respect of any item to be considered at the meeting.
3MINUTES

To confirm the minutes of the meeting of the Panel held on 20 November 2007.
i-iii
4*ANNUAL PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES 2007

To comment upon the report being submitted to Cabinet on 13 December 2007 on the Annual Performance Assessment of Children’s Services.
All
1

* Education Related Item


4. ANNUAL PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT (APA) OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES 2007

CABINET: 13th DECEMBER 2007

MEMBER REPORTING: COUNCILLOR MRS QUICK

1. PURPOSE OF REPORT

To present Members with the final report for the Annual Performance Assessment (APA) of Children’s Services 2007 and the resulting recommendations for future action.

2. MEMBER'S RECOMMENDATION: That Members note the APA 2007 grades given to RBWM by central government and to note that the recommendations for future action will be addressed through the priorities in the Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011 and, where relevant, through the Local Area Agreement 2008.

3. SUPPORTING INFORMATION

3.1 Wards Affected

All wards may be affected by the contents of this report.

3.2 Relevant Matters Upon Which Decision is Based & Reasons Supporting Recommendation

3.2.1 The Annual Performance Assessment (APA) of Children’s Services is the yearly inspection by central government of the performance of the Children’s Services within the Council. The APA sits alongside the broader Joint Area Review (JAR), which takes place every three years, as the two key inspection requirements on Local Authorities resulting from the Children Act 2004 and the Every Child Matters programme. The APA is intended to monitor how services within the Council and the Partner Agencies included under the ‘Duty to Co-operate’ are working together to improve outcomes for children locally focusing on the extent to which children and young people are healthy, stay safe, enjoy and achieve, make a positive contribution and achieve economic well being. Particular focus is also given to contribution of the Council’s Services in maintaining and improving outcomes for children and young people and the Council’s capacity to improve, including the management of services for children and young people.

3.2.2. The APA is a key driver for change. The results give a position statement in relation to the Council’s Children’s Services that is considered in annual priorities meetings with central government. The rating awarded for the APA will be used for the Children and Young People’s block of the Audit Commission’s comprehensive performance of Local Authority services. The findings of the APA also contribute significantly to the scoping of subsequent inspections of Children’s Services. The Local Government White Paper – Stronger and Prosperous Communities (October 2006) outlines that Joint Area Reviews and Annual Performance Assessments will not continue past March 2009: they will be replaced by the Comprehensive Area Assessment.

3.2.3 The APA required the Local Authority to submit a self-assessment of its progress in meeting its priorities for children and young people in June 2007. New APA guidance this year stipulated that this self-assessment should take the form of a Review of progress against the Children and Young People Plan (CYPP) 2006-2008, which is the key strategic plan for all Children’s Services locally. The CYPP Review was subject to broad consultation with all key stakeholders prior to its submission to Ofsted. Members considered the Review at the Cabinet meeting in June 2007. The self-assessment also included a review of progress of the action taken to address the recommendations arising from the last Joint Area Review of Children’s Services, which took place in 2005.

3.2.4 The Council was also required to submit self-evaluated grades for each of the five Every Child Matters (ECM) outcomes for children and young people as well as the effectiveness of the Council’s Children’s Services overall and the Council’s capacity to improve services for children and young people.

3.2.5 As part of the APA, views of children and young people were gathered through Ofsted’s ‘Tellus 2’ survey. A cross section of schools in the Borough (42 in total) were selected to take part in this piece of work, which required pupils from years 6, 8 and 10 to complete a confidential online survey asking their perceptions about what it is like to live in the Royal Borough in relation to the five ECM outcomes. The results were used by Ofsted, alongside other data as part of their analysis. RBWM achieved one of the highest response rates nationally for this survey – the results are attached as Annex 1.

3.2.6 Following the analysis of RBWM’s written documentation and datasets, an onsite visit from the APA Inspectors took place on 27th September, which involved a number of interviews with the Director of Learning and Care, senior officers and partners to address the inspectors’ emerging lines of enquiry.

3.2.7 Results of the APA

The draft APA results were sent to the Council in October and officers had the opportunity to comment prior to the final APA letter being published on 26th November 2007. The full APA letter is attached as Annex 2. The grades received are as follows and reflect the same grades we awarded ourselves as part of the self-assessment. Grades are on a four point scale where 4 is outstanding, 3 is good, 2 is adequate and 1 is inadequate:
      § Overall Effectiveness of Children’s Services – Grade 3
      § Be Healthy – Grade 2
      § Stay Safe – Grade 3
      § Enjoy and Achieve – Grade 3
      § Making a Positive Contribution – Grade 3
      § Achieve Economic Well Being – Grade 3
      § Capacity to improve, including management of services for children and young people- Grade 3

The report also summarises the strengths and weaknesses under each of these headings and details recommendations for future action. The recommendations are:
      Be Healthy
      § CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service) should ensure that systems are developed for communicating the outcome and progress of referrals.
      § The Council and its partners should develop a comprehensive CAMHS strategy that ensures a fully integrated, multi-professional specialist CAMHS team is in place, with robust assessment and referral processes.
      § The Council and its partners should ensure that all assessed children with learning difficulties and disabilities have multi-agency care plans and an identified key worker co-ordinating their care.
      § The Primary Care Trust (PCT) should review the provision of therapy services to ensure that they are sufficient to meet the assessed needs of children and young people within the borough.

      Stay Safe
      § The Council should develop further the ability to understand trends in demand for child protection services so that early identification and preventative services can be developed and implemented.
      § The Council should develop fostering and adoption services to reduce the numbers in residential care and to significantly improve the numbers of children aged 10-15 years in foster care or placed for adoption.

      Enjoy & Achieve
      § The Council should increase the overall effectiveness of secondary and middle- deemed secondary schools.
      § The Council should increase the percentage of pupils attaining 1 or more A*-G grades.

      Make a Positive Contribution
      § The Council should further develop opportunities for all groups of children and young people to influence the work of the Council.

      Achieve Economic Well Being
      § The Council should consolidate partnership working in order to further develop and enhance 14-19 provision across the area.
      § The Council should ensure that curriculum planning is clearly based on local skills needs and the demand from young people.

      Service Management & Capacity to Improve
      § The Council should ensure that Children’s Trust Arrangements with a joint commissioning strategy are implemented.
      § The Council should improve data literacy amongst all staff groups in order to provide a culture of internal challenge and early identification of problems.

      Next Steps
      Many of these areas were acknowledged in the Council’s self-assessment as our areas for development. Significant steps have already been taken to address these recommendations and work continues through the Children and Young People’s Strategic Partnership (CYPSP).

The APA recommendations have been used to inform the draft strategic priorities for the new Children and Young People Plan (CYPP) 2008-2011, which are currently subject to public consultation, and are due to be published in April 2008. The recommendations will also feed into the Joint Commissioning Strategy 2008 for the emerging Children’s Trust. The recommendations will also be taken forward, where appropriate, through the Children and Young People block of the new Local Area Agreement (LAA) 2008.

Officers in RBWM and partners on the CYPSP will be using the valuable information from the ‘Tellus 2’ survey as part of our continuing work to ensure the views of children and young people are listened to and to shape the development of the new Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011.

Detailed action plans will be developed for each of the recommendations as part of the Children and Young People Plan and will be monitored internally through the CYPSP/RBWM’s Children’s Trust and Learning and Care DMT.

As detailed earlier, the APA is a key inspection of Children’s Services. The Council is obligated to take forward the recommendations in order to improve outcomes for children and young people locally. It is appropriate that the recommendations are understood by Members and if considered appropriate, approved.

3.3 Options Available and Risk Assessment
    Option
    Comments
    1. To note the content of the APA report and that the recommendations for future action will be addressed through the new Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011 and the Local Area Agreement 2008 where appropriate. The Council has a duty to comply with the inspection processes from central government and to act on its recommendations. It is appropriate for these to be taken forward through the CYPP 2008-2011 and the LAA 2008.
    2. Do nothing The Council has a duty to comply with the inspection processes from central government. Therefore to do nothing would not be in line with this duty.
3.4 Relevant National/Regional Guidance

The integrated inspection framework of Children’s Services, which currently consists of the Joint Area Reviews (JARs) and Annual Performance Assessment (APA) of Children’s Services was part of the Children Act 2004 and commenced in 2005.

Information on the APA process for 2007 is detailed in the government guidance ‘Annual Review of the Children and Young People Plan’ published in January 2007 and in the ‘APA Handbook and Arrangements’ documents published by Ofsted in April 2007.

3.5 Relevant Council Policies/Strategies

The APA will inform the strategic priorities to be included in RBWM’s new Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011 and the Children and Young People Block of the LAA 2008.
    The recommendations contained in this report also contribute to the Community Strategy in the following ways:

    Relevant?
    Yes / No
    Key Themes:
    Supporting Children & Younger PeopleYes
    Supporting Adults & Older People Not directly but may have cross cutting links
    A Thriving, Cleaner, Greener BoroughNot directly but may have cross cutting links
    Safer & Stronger CommunitiesNot directly but may have cross cutting links
4. CONSULTATION CARRIED OUT

The draft strategic priorities for the Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011 have been drawn up in consultation with all key stakeholders in Children’s Services and informed by the APA recommendations. The CYPP priorities are subject to public consultation from 19th November to 17th December 2007. An open Consultation Event on the draft CYPP priorities took place on 29th November. Consultation is also taking place with children and young people on the draft priorities and a ‘Speakeasy’ Event for young people was held on 20th November around the 4 key themes Healthy Minds, Staying Safe, Bullying and Healthy Schools. The information collated from this event, alongside the results of the ‘Tellus 2’ Survey be looked at carefully and will shape the full version of the Children and Young People Plan 2008-2011, which will go out to further consultation early next year before it is published in April 2008.

5. COMMENTS FROM OVERVIEW AND SCRUTINY PANEL

TO BE COMPLETED AFTER THE OVERVIEW AND SCRUTINY COMMITTEE HAVE MET.

6. IMPLICATIONS

6.1 Financial
The Local Authority has a duty to form Children’s Trust arrangements and produce a Joint Commissioning Strategy detailing how the resources of the Council and Partner Agencies in the Children’s Trust will be directing and targeting resources towards the priority needs of children and young people locally. The Joint Commissioning Strategy will be published in April 2008. The APA recommendations and the Children & Young People Plan 2008-2011 priorities are fundamental to this Strategy. The resources to be committed by the Council to this strategy will be within the Learning & Care’s Directorate’s budget allocations for this period.

6.2 Legal
Relevant legislation also includes the Children Act 2004, the Education and Inspection Act 2006 and the Children Act 2006

6.3 Human Rights Act
The Convention Rights under the Human Rights Act relevant to this report are none.

6.4 Planning
There are no planning implications arising from the present report.

6.5 Sustainable Development
There are no sustainable development implications arising from the present report.

6.6 Diversity and Equality
The Review of the CYPP 2006-2008, which formed the self–assessment for the APA was subject to a full EQIA. The new CYPP 2008-2011 will also be subject to an EQIA before it is published in April 2008. In terms of the Council’s Equality Impact Assessment Policy, the recommendations in this report have no significant negative impacts on equality target groups and in addition there are potential benefits to vulnerable groups of children. Any negative impacts have been minimised and opportunities for promoting equality have been maximised.