Agenda item

The purpose of this report is to provide information to the Council’s Corporate Parenting Committee about the Children’s Commissioner’s 2018 Stability Index for Children in Care. This report also provides a summary of activities undertaken to achieve stability for looked after children in Brent.

Nigel Chapman (Operational Director, Integration and Improved Outcomes) introduced the report on the Children’s Commissioner’s 2018 Stability Index (SI). The SI was launched in 2017 by the Children’s Commissioner as an annual measure of the stability of the lives of children in care. The 2018 SI primarily used the data from 2015/16 and 2016/17 and provided an analysis based on several data measures such as change of placements, change of schools and change of social workers for looked after children in Care. The 2018 SI found out that whilst many children in care had stable arrangements, too many experience instability in different aspects of their lives. Some children were reported to experience repeat changes of placements, of school or with social workers. The SI has established that some children are more likely to experience instability such as those with additional behavioural and emotional needs, who have recently entered care, whose legal status indicates higher risk or who are in pupil referral units.

Nigel Chapman outlined the findings for Brent from the 2018 SI, noting that these related to three key stability indicators: changes of placement; changes of school; and changes of social worker. With regard to the first of these indicators, Brent had 14 per cent of children who had experienced two or more placements, compared to ten percent nationally. Nigel Chapman advised that this largely resulted from a higher proportion of older children in care in the Brent LAC population and explained that often older children in care exhibited more challenging behaviours. It was emphasised however, that the council was working to reduce this percentage. With regard to the number of changes of school places, Brent had eight percent of children who had experienced a mid-year school move in 2016/17 and four percent with at least one school move in both 2015/16 and 2016/17. The national average for this was ten percent and four percent respectively. This reflected the work of Brent’s virtual school, foster carers and social workers in supporting children to remain in their school places, and in particular, to avoid exclusion. In addressing, the number of social worker changes for Brent’s children, Nigel Chapman highlighted that this was not as good as the national average, emphasised that this was an issue for many London Boroughs due to the London labour market and the pay differential between agency and permanent social workers. Brent had made significant improvements with regard to the proportion of agency staff over the last few years and additional measures had recently been approved by the council to offer welcome payments and retention payments for certain hard to recruit to social worker positions. It was anticipated that this would lead to further improvements by the following year.

The Chair thanked Nigel Chapmen for his introduction to the report.

In the subsequent discussion, the committee sought details of the support offered to LAC to prevent them from being groomed by gangs. Questions were raised regarding the recruitment and retention of social workers. Members welcomed the realignment of CYP social work activity which meant children did not have to transfer to a different team and therefore a different social worker when reaching the age of 13. The committee questioned whether placement breakdowns could be avoided with greater resources. Members sought clarity on whether foster carers were recruited with Brent’s particular placement needs in mind and a member of Brent’s Care Leavers in Action questioned how Brent ensured that applicants entered into fostering for the right reasons. Questions were raised by Brent Care Leavers regarding additional support being developed for care leavers and how this would be communicated to them. A member asked whether tenancy breakdowns had occurred for any Brent Care Leavers and care leavers expressed that earlier support and information about how to cope living independently would be beneficial.   

In response to the issues raised in the discussion, Gail Tolley advised that some young people might enter care due to vulnerability to gang recruitment or involvement in gang activity. In such cases, young people would be placed with carers outside of the area. Risk of gang affiliation was also contributor to placement moves for young people in care. Onder Beter added that specific programmes and support were provided to children according to their individual needs.

With regard to the recruitment and retention of social workers, Nigel Chapman explained that the council was doing a lot of work to continue to improve the proportion of permanent social work staff. In addition to the welcome and retention payments previously referred to, the council had implemented a different social work structure which provided a closer relationship between management and social work practice. The new structure also provided better support and progression routes for newly qualified social workers.

Nigel Chapman advised that foster carer recruitment followed a thorough process which took at least six months to complete. Foster carers’ approval was reviewed annually by the Fostering Panel. The council also undertook robust commissioning in the use of Independent Fostering Agencies which recruited and reviewed their own foster carers. Nigel Chapman expressed that more could always be done with additional resources and noted as an example that housing was often a limiting factor in being able to foster a child and therefore more fostering households could be created by improving housing opportunities. The council had recently created a rapid response team to provide better out of hours support for parents, with the aim of helping to prevent children needing to enter the care system. This new team however had been created by redirecting an existing resource and was a reprioritisation of the existing support provided by the council.

Onder Better addressed Members’ questions regarding support for care leavers, noting the introduction of ‘stay put arrangements’, which allowed young people to remain within their fostering placement after leaving care. Members were informed that regular workshops were held for care leavers on tenancy issues and money management. Gail Tolley emphasised that there had been no tenancy breakdowns for Brent’s Care Leavers’ in recent years. Onder Better further advised that additional workshops, facilitated by Public Health, on a range of health issues faced by care leavers including physical health, relationships and substance abuse would shortly be available. A new post had been created in the team to support placement stability. The purpose of the role was to identify placements where additional support may be needed for the carer and young person. Onder Beter highlighted that mental health support for care leavers was lacking nationally and whilst this was an issued being looked at by the government and by CCGs the council was not funded to provide additional support. The council’s current provision was therefore resourced via the Virtual School and through grand funds. This provision included projects such as the Element project which aimed to build confidence and self-esteem through the arts and crafts. A further post had been created, staffed via the Brent CCG, to direct the relevant mental health support services for those young people placed out of borough. Gail Tolley added that foster carers played an important role in preparing young people for independence after care and the council would need to identify how it could better support foster carers in this role.

The Chair thanked everyone for their contribution to the discussion.

Along with usual channels of communication such as via social workers and personal advisors, the care leavers Whats App group could be used to inform care leavers of any new support available. Offices welcomed any additional suggestions from care leavers about the best way to let them know of new forms of support.