Agenda and minutes
Venue: Committee Rooms 1 and 2, Brent Town Hall, Forty Lane, Wembley, HA9 9HD. View directions
Contact: Bryony Gibbs, Democratic Services Officer 020 8937 1355 Email: bryony.gibbs@brent.gov.uk
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Declaration of personal and prejudicial interests Members are invited to declare at this stage of the meeting any relevant financial or other interest in the items on the agenda. Minutes: There were no declarations of interest. |
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Deputations (if any) Minutes: There were no deputations. |
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Minutes of the last meeting held on 6 October 2011 PDF 155 KB Minutes: The minutes of the meeting held on 6 October 2011 were approved as a correct record. |
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Matters Arising Minutes: There were no matters arising. |
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School places update A verbal update will be provided to the committee. Minutes: Councillor Arnold (Lead Member for Children and Families) provided an update to the committee on the current position regarding school places. A supporting document was tabled for the committee's consideration.
Councillor Arnold advised that 4900 applications had been received for Reception Places from September 2011 and of these, 632 applications had been received from outside of the borough. Of the 4268 applications from Brent residents, 625 applications had been received after the closing date of 15 January 2011. Despite the 260 additional reception year places created since September 2011, there remained as of 7 December 2011, 210 unplaced children for reception year. At this time, there were 58 vacancies across the system for this year group. A further 60 places would be made available in January 2012. All vacancies had been offered to those children without a school place but these had not been accepted due to parental preference regarding the school or location of the school. With regard to 11+ transfers for 2011, Councillor Arnold confirmed that there were sufficient places to meet demand.
Councillor Arnold informed the committee that for primary aged pupils, the only year groups with sufficient vacancies were the current years 5 and 6. To address this, the council would be opening additional classes in schools for year groups other than reception year and would establish projects to provide education to out of school primary pupils in January 2012 using the newly vacant Ashley Gardens Early Learning Centre and the Pavilion. Turning to the subject of out of school secondary aged children, Councillor Arnold drew the committee’s attention to the table set out in the supporting document and noted that as of 2 December 2011, there were 192 unplaced secondary school aged children. The majority of these pupils were new arrivals who would be placed in projects, schools or college courses within the following weeks.
During the subsequent discussion, members raised several issues. Councillor Hirani noted the number of late applications received and queried whether there were lessons to be learnt by the Council. Councillor Arnold advised that many of these applications were late as the families in question had recently arrived in Brent or had moved to a new location within Brent. The number of new arrivals to Brent each month was significant and in August and September 2011 over 100 new arrivals had been recorded. Councillor Hirani further queried whether the local authority should have been better prepared to meet the challenges posed by the demographic changes to the borough. Councillor Arnold advised that whilst the arrivals of new families could not be predicted, the tracking of related data enabled trends to be identified and the factors behind such changes to be better understood. With regard to predicted changes in birth rate, these figures were obtained from the LGA.All London councils were struggling to meet the same challenges as Brent. Brent was currently engaged in lobbying central government regarding the severity of these challenges. In response to a further query it was ... view the full minutes text for item 5. |
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Brent Youth Parliament Update A verbal update regarding the Brent Youth Parliament will be provided to the committee by Brent Youth Parliament representatives. Minutes: The representative of Brent Youth Parliament (BYP) provided an update to the committee on recent work of the BYP. The committee was advised that the BYP Youth Conference took place on 23 November 2011. The conference aimed to help raise political awareness amongst young people in Brent. Invitations to attend the conference were sent to all Brent schools and youth groups. Guest speakers for the day included the Mayor of Brent, the deputy leader of the council, other councillors and council officers. The Youth Conference had been very successful and had attracted around 200 young people who had visited throughout the day. The BYP representative highlighted that the success of the conference had been determined by the hard work of both BYP members and officers of the council.
Elections had recently been held for the primary school BYP members. Inductions for these new members would commence shortly and the BYP representative emphasised that it would be very useful if councillors could attend the induction and other events which were scheduled for the following dates: -
The events would commence at 10.00 am and it was estimated that they would conclude by 3.00 pm.
RESOLVED: -
That the verbal update be noted. |
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Results of Ofsted Safeguarding and Looked After children Services Inspection PDF 53 KB This report provides members with an update on the outcome of the Safeguarding and Looked After Children inspection which took place between 3 and 14 October 2011. Additional documents:
Minutes: Graham Genoni (Assistant Director, Social Care Division) delivered a presentation to the committee on the outcome of the Safeguarding and Looked After Children (LAC) Inspection which took place between 3 and 14 October 2011. The full Ofsted inspection report had been circulated to the committee with the agenda.
Graham Genoni advised that there was a national inspection regime for children’s social care. The last inspection for Brent’s children’s services was a Joint Area Review in 2006. Officers were aware that since this time significant improvement had been made to service provision. This was recognised in the outcome of the inspection which noted that service provision had improved from a low base. Graham Genoni further explained that the inspection resulted in two separate judgements; one for Safeguarding and one for LAC. The possible judgements which could be awarded to the local authority ranged from Outstanding to Inadequate and Brent had received an adequate rating for both elements. Drawing on the most recent Ofsted report on “local authority children’s service inspections and outcomes”, Graham Genoni noted that 46% of Local Authorities achieved this result for Safeguarding and 53% for Looked After Children.
Graham Genoni advised that the key positive messages arising from the inspection had included that Brent’s thresholds for child protection intervention were appropriate. It had also been recognised that there had been improvements in recruitment and retention of staff since the time of the previous inspection in 2006. At this time, approximately 30% of the staff within the child protection teams had been permanent. In contrast levels of permanent staff now stood between 85 and 90%. The inspector had been particularly impressed with the Advanced Practitioner Role employed at Brent. This role was carried out by very experienced social workers and was in place to support social workers in developing their professional skills. Graham Genoni noted that it had been disappointing that the positive partnership with schools had not been commented upon by the inspectors.
Turning to the subject of the observations included within the inspection outcome, Graham Genoni advised that the number of Common Assessment Framework (CAF) assessments had been deemed to be low and there was limited engagement by Health professionals with these. This comment related principally to other professional agencies with which the authority worked in partnership. The inspectors had also raised a query regarding the level of resources being directed towards early intervention services, of which CAF assessments formed a key part. A further question had been raised regarding the way in which service cuts had been made, and it had been noted that cuts to youth services had not been co-ordinated with other partner agencies which had resulted in similar areas of service provision being affected.
Graham Genoni then drew the committee’s attention to some of the areas which had been highlighted for improvement. Many of the issues highlighted had been already known to the authority and had actively been raised by officers during the inspection. An action plan was being developed to meet the ... view the full minutes text for item 7. |
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Adoption Services in Brent PDF 64 KB The purpose of this report is to provide an update on the key issues relating to adoption in Brent and to give members an opportunity to ask questions in relation to adoption services. Minutes: The Chair advised that she had requested this report due to the current public focus on Adoption and the recent publication of performance data regarding Local Authorities Adoption Services.
Graham Genoni (Assistant Director Social Care Division) presented a report updating the committee on key issues relating to Adoption Services in Brent. It was noted that whilst the information released in November 2011 by the Department for Education (DfE) had encompassed a range of performance data, attention had principally focused on the timeliness of adoptions against which Brent had not performed well. This performance indicator measured the percentage of children placed for adoption within 12 months of a decision for adoption being made. A range of factors influencing this indicator were outlined to the committee and these included the age of the child; whether the child was part of a sibling group; the length of the legal proceedings; and the complexity of the child’s needs.
In expanding upon these factors, Graham Genoni highlighted that contrary to popular understanding, the number of young babies waiting to be placed for adoption was comparatively few. Rather, babies tended to be placed quickly and any delays were generally attributable to the court process. Often, the circumstances of the children being placed for adoption could make the process of identifying suitable placements for those children far more difficult and this was particularly so for children part of sibling groups or with complex needs. The department worked hard to minimise delays for children. Consequently, the option of placing siblings separately would be considered if required and if a suitable placement for children with complex needs was not found within a set period, alternative care plans would be pursued. The council had recognised the need to identify more prospective adopters and at present was assessing 21 prospective families; this represented a significant increase on the 9 families who were assessed during the previous year.
Graham Genoni advised that significant delay was also caused for these children by the length of the legal proceedings to which they were subject. Delay caused by legal proceedings had increased in recent years and this had been recognised within the final report of the Family Justice Review group. That report recommended that urgent action be taken to reduce the average length of legal proceedings from over 1 year to 6 months.
Graham Genoni further explained that adoption was only one of the options pursued by the local authority in securing the permanent placement of children with alternative carers. Special Guardianship Order (SGO) was an option which was increasingly relied upon by local authorities. SGOs did not remove the birth parents’ rights in quite the same way as in adoption and for this reason, it could be a preferable option both for prospective carers and the child in question. It was emphasised to the committee that when SGOs were taken into consideration alongside adoptions, Brent had performed above its statistical neighbours. It was emphasised that matching between children and their carers was ... view the full minutes text for item 8. |
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Review of policy for the provision of early years full time places PDF 98 KB This report responds to matters raised by members of the Children & Young People Overview & Scrutiny Committee held on 6th October 2011. Minutes: Sue Gates (Head of Integrated and Extended Services) presented a report updating the committee on the provision of full-time Early Year’s Places to disadvantaged children and responding to issues raised by the committee at its meeting on 6 October 2011.
Sue Gates briefly outlined the background to the policy and explained that in February 2010, the Executive had decided that free full-time (30 hours per week) early years places should be allocated on a priority basis to disadvantaged children aged 3 to 4 years old. However, due to an anticipated growth in demand for places for children aged 2 to 3 years old, an alternative proposal was developed in early 2011. This proposal envisaged the provision of the statutory part-time (15 hours per week) places only but was subsequently rejected by the Schools Forum in June 2011. Consequently, following this, work re-commenced on the implementation of the original decision taken by the Executive in February 2010.
Sue Gates explained that an Early Years Funding sub-group had been established and a two stage admissions process was developed. This process proposed that at stage 1, schools would still apply their own local admissions criteria and those children that met the criteria would proceed to stage 2 of the process. At stage 2, children that lived in Brent and that met the free school meals criteria could be offered funded full-time places. Schools were consulted regarding this proposed process in October 2011. Responses were received from 7 of the schools with full time places and these confirmed that most schools were happy to manage the admissions process locally and merge it with normal admissions practice. Some concerns had been raised regarding the additional administration arrangements and it was felt that advice would be required on validating eligibility claims on dealing with appeals. The committee was advised that the admissions process would be in place for January 2012, for applications for September 2012. Some schools which had been offering full time places had decided to offer only part time places from September 2012.
Turning to the subject of the provision of Early Years Places for children aged 2 to 3 years old, Sue Gates informed the committee that the government had created a statutory entitlement of 15 hours per week of free childcare integrated with early education for children deemed vulnerable. This was due to commence in 2013. It was currently proposed that eligibility for this provision would be determined by the free school meal criteria. Whilst the exact number of children who were eligible for the provision could not be provided, Sue Gates explained that based on the number of children living in the most deprived areas of Brent, it was estimated that there could be around 3,000 children who would qualify for the provision. Based on this estimation, it was evident that there would be insufficient places to meet demand and consequently several options for expanding the number of places available had been explored. The issue was further complicated by the government’s ... view the full minutes text for item 9. |
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Provision of services for children with learning and physical disabilities A verbal update will be provided to the committee. Minutes: Graham Genoni (Assistant Director Social Care Division) provided an update to the committee on the provision of services for children with disabilities. This was a standing item on the committee's work programme, following the decision taken by the Executive at its meeting on 23 May 2011 to restructure the short term break offer provided by the Council. The restructure of the service encompassed the closure of the centre at Crawford Avenue and the provision of an enhanced service at the centre on Clement Close. On 23 August 2011 a judicial review had been filed against the decision of the Executive to close the centre at Crawford Avenue. The judicial review had since been concluded in the council’s favour. There was a period of time within which this judgement could be appealed and the council had decided to take no further action until this period had passed.
RESOLVED: - that the verbal report be noted.
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Items from the Forward Plan and Work Programme PDF 79 KB Additional documents: Minutes: Andrew Davies (Policy and Performance Officer) advised that there were two items on the Forward Plan which related to Children and Young People; an item on Children Centres and another regarding the Islamia Primary School.
Turning to the committee’s work programme, it was noted that there were several items already scheduled for the next meeting of the committee. It was agreed that the Chair would liaise with the lead officers to manage the agenda for the forthcoming meeting. |
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Feedback from One Community, Many Voices Event PDF 111 KB The One Community Many Voices event was held during Local Democracy Week on the 10th October. Feedback from the event is attached for members' information. Minutes: Andrew Davies (Policy and Performance Officer) advised the committee that this feedback report had been put to all the scrutiny committees for information. Members were advised that several issues had been raised via the event which interacted with the committee’s remit and were asked to view the report with a view to considering future work programme items. |
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Date of next meeting The next meeting of the Children and Young People Overview and Scrutiny meeting is scheduled for 2 February 2012. Minutes: The committee noted that the date of the next meeting was 2 February 2012. |
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Any other urgent business Notice of items raised under this heading must be given in writing to the Democratic Services Manager or his representative before the meeting in accordance with Standing Order 64. Minutes: There was no urgent business.
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