Agenda item

To question Cllr Anntionette Bramble, Deputy Mayor and Cabinet Member for Education, Young People and Children’s Social Care on policy areas within her service portfolio.

5.1 Cabinet members who have responsibility for children and young people's services are invited to the Commission annually so that members can scrutinise services within their respective service portfolios.  The Commission may identify up to three services or policy areas on which to focus questioning.  For this session, the Commission requested that Cllr Anntionette Bramble, Deputy Mayor and Cabinet Member for Education, Young People and Children’s Social Care respond to questions on 3 policy areas:

·  The Hackney Offer to socal schools - and the quality and outcomes of this work;

·  Children placed in temporary accommodation - impact on welfare and support available;

·  Children who go missing from care.

 

5.2.1  In relation to Young Hackney the Commission set out the following questions for the Cabinet member;

·  How does Young Hackney assess the quality and outcomes of this work with local schools?

·  How does the Young Hackney offer interrelate with other school support services such as CAMHS, WAMHS and the Re-Engagement Unit?  Are these services effectively coordinating provision to support children and local schools?

·  Not all schools equally engage with the universal offer by Young Hackney, how does Young Hackney work with those schools which may be reluctant to engage and refer children for support?

 

5.2.2 The Cabinet Member response to the above is summarised below:

·  14 secondary schools in the maintained sector have an attached Young Hackney link worker and other schools can also refer children into the programme.

·  At primary level, the main area of support is to help children transition from primary to secondary school settings as this can be challenging for a number of students.

·  There is a programme of PSHE support for schools where officers provide advice, support and training to staff as well as session delivery to year groups or the whole school.  This covers a wide range of subjects including relationship education, substance misuse, bullying and addressing racism and homophobia.

·  Young Hackney also offers an extensive programme of activities for young people during the holiday period which can help maintain support to vulnerable children and families;

·  There are also drop-in sessions held at a number of maintained schools where children can get advice and support on a range of issues including help with exams, dealing with stress or help in preparing a CV. There are also drop in sessions at 3 schools for young carers (Cardinal Pole, Mossbourne Academy, Clapton Girls).

 

5.2.3  Members raised the following supplementary questions:

a) Are the 14 schools provided with a link worker across primary and secondary school settings?

·  Most secondary schools have a dedicated Young Hackney link worker as the nature of support required is different to that of primary school children. There were 3-4 schools which did not have a dedicated link worker which was due to resource limitations, but they could still refer children to the Young Hackney programme of support. All support to primary schools from Young Hackney is provided through a hub model with a worker covering a number of schools.

 

b) Do all schools engage with the Young Hackney offer?

·  Most schools do engage with the Young Hackney offer, but where they don't this is picked up in termly visits by Hackney Education School Improvement Team.  Here schools are reminded of the offer available from Young Hackney.

 

c) How does YH review the quality and effectiveness of its work?

·  A protocol is in place between YH and a designated school lead (or singular point of contact) who will meet termly to review interventions with pupils and assess outcomes.  These meetings will identify any actions which may need to be picked up by the Multi Agency Team (MAT) where they will look at how the level of risk and vulnerability has been reduced.  For group work, as delivered through PSHE, this is evaluated after each session by staff and students where prior and post knowledge is assessed.

 

d) How does YH interface with other school support programmes such as the Re-integration Unit, WAMHS and CAMHS?

·  A dedicated lead in the school provides a link to all these agencies be it CAMHS, WAMHS or REU and will liaise with them in determining which is the best service to support identified students and where cooperation is required across agencies to meet their needs.  This helps to build a team around the child.

 

e) What role does Young Hackney play in supporting children’s interaction with local policing? 

·  Hackney Education has been developing further guidance in relation to policing in schools in relation to the outcomes of Child Q Safeguarding Practice Review and was working with DfE to get national guidance updated.  The Community Safety Team, Youth Offending Team and Account have also undertaken initiatives to bring young people together with policing representatives to help build trust and confidence.  Hackney Education would review the impact of the new guidance for schools during the summer term.  A booklet has also been developed with the police to ensure that children know their rights if they are stopped and searched.

f) The single point of contact for Young Hackney alongside termly meetings is a fairly new process, and as a number of secondary schools have had reservations about the consistency and quality of services provided by Young Hackney, will this be reviewed?

·  It was a new system and this will be reviewed to make sure that everything is working ok with the new system.  Whilst individual relationships between Young Hackney and the schools is important, the  focus should be on the quality of the offer.

 

g) Can the Cabinet member look into the numbers of cases where work by Young Hackney cannot progress because the parent / carer does not give their consent?  This leaves schools in a difficult position as to what course of action to take and an ongoing challenge in being able to support the child.  Could more creative processes for engaging young people and their families be developed to engage and involve parents to get their traits and approval?

·  Consent is a real challenge to the service and Young Hackney works with families to understand what barriers they may be facing which inhibit their engagement with Young Hackney and to allow officers to work with and support their child.  This is being monitored.  Early help work was dependent on consent and at this stage of an intervention was not about blame but to help address concerns before interventions escalate and may become statutory.

 

5.3.1 In relation to children placed in temporary accommodation the Commission set out the following questions:

·  How many children placed in temporary accommodation are being supported by Children and Families Service (children in need, on a child protection plan or supported by early help)?

·  What are the social care, health and education accountability arrangements for those children that are placed in temporary accommodation outside the borough?

·  Is there a clear and consistent welfare offer which is systematically presented to children and families living in temporary accommodation - so that they know what help is available and how they can access it (e.g. early help)?

·  What standards and protocols are in place to ensure that families with children are not placed in inappropriate temporary accommodation (e.g. safeguards for shared facilities, childcare access, accommodation with stairs for families with buggies, Wi-Fi access, easy access to laundry facilities etc.)?

 

5.3.2 The Cabinet Member responses to the above is summarised below:

·  Children’s Social Care and Housing Service work closely together in helping to minimise the number of children who are placed in temporary accommodation.  An alert system has been developed between housing services and children's social care in which families with children who are at risk of becoming homeless are notified to social services.

·  As of April 2023 there were 3,621 children in temporary accommodation in Hackney of which 123 were in receipt of some form of social care intervention;

·  Of the 517 Children in Need 41 were in temporary accommodation

·  Of the 193 children on a child protection plan 15 were in temporary accommodation;

·  Of the 735 children being supported through Early Help services 30 were in temporary accommodation;

·  Of the 380 looked after children in Hackney, 4 were in temporary accommodation.

 

5.3.3  Members raised the following supplementary questions:

a) In terms of the alert system in place where potential homeless families are referred to children’s social care, what is the likely outcome?  Does the CSC service have any influence on housing outcomes?

·  Primarily the outcome of the alter system is to develop awareness across the system as the social care team cannot intervene in housing offers to families.  If the children and families are known to social care services this can be made known to housing services who can then factor this into their assessments under their statutory duties.  The big challenge is that there is simply not enough housing stock for families in need.

 

b) Also, could these figures be masking higher rates of social care interventions as if families are placed in housing out of the borough then social service teams in the location of temporary housing may be picking up referrals and cases?

·  When a family is placed outside of the borough, the local authority in which they are resident is notified if there is social care intervention, and will be responsible for continuation of care.  If there are existing interventions the social workers in Hackney will link and liaise with new social services teams for continuity of support (depending on the nature of the intervention).  In general however, if a family is placed outside of the borough, the new local authority in which they are resident will become responsible for any new social care support / intervention required.

·  When a child is placed out of the borough the new local authority will undertake a child protection assessment, and if there are any existing plans or interventions by Hackney these will be transferred over to the new authority.  It can be frustrating as not all services provided by Hackney will be provided by the new authority.

 

c) Can you explain why 4 looked after children for whom the council has a corporate parenting role, are currently living in temporary accommodation?

·  This is mainly in relation to Interim Care Orders issued by the courts and the court has agreed that the child may continue to live at home and these families may be in temporary accommodation whilst the court proceedings continue.

 

d) Do children in year 11 who are about to sit exams receive any protections from being placed in temporary accommodation outside of the borough?

·  Temporary accommodation sites such as hostels will have Wi-Fi provided so young people moved there can continue to maintain connections with schools and education.  There is however no guarantee that the Cabinet member or the housing service would be able to ensure that a child will not be placed in temporary accommodation in their exam year.  As much as possible officers will work to reduce the disruption in families lives when temporary accommodation is needed.  The Housing Allowance has been capped however, which means that many properties in Hackney are unaffordable for families dependent on benefits.  Numbers are low however and officers do work hard to mitigate the impact of temporary accommodation.

 

5.4.1 In relation to children who go missing from care the Commission set out the following questions:

·  Does the Children and Families Service analyse (both individually and collectively) why children go missing from care - and how support is adapted in response  (i.e. is CFS alert and responding to the circumstantial risks when children go missing)?

·  What does the Children and Families Service know about disproportionalities within the cohort of children who are going missing from care?

·  What support is provided to foster carers when children in their care go missing from care - both the in-house team and those working for independent foster carers?

·  How many Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children (UASC) go missing, are there any additional safeguards for this cohort?

 

5.4.2 The Cabinet Member responses to the above is summarised below:

·  There was generally more awareness now of children who go missing from care and the reasons and context in which this may happen and there were sound protocols in place to manage this.

·  From 1/4/22 to 10/3/23, 98 looked after children were reported missing a total of  816 times.

·  76% of those children who were reported missing were aged between 16-17 years of age.

·  71% of the instances of going missing were for a period of 1 day or less.  The longest period for which a child has gone missing was 96 days (this child is still missing and likely to be remanded upon being located).

·  Even if a social worker has located a missing child, if the address or location of where they are at cannot be verified (visit) then the child is still reported as missing.  Children who go missing sometimes do not want the social worker or police to visit the place where they may be staying because they may be in a location at which they may be prohibited or visiting an adult with whom they have been told they cannot associate.

 

5.4.3  Members raised the following supplementary questions:

a) Are officers able to determine the level of risk in the cases of children who do go missing?  Is there any data or records as to whether children may be engaged in county lines, likely to be subject to sexual exploitation or perhaps visiting their family?

·  A recently established process now ensures that the Director of Children’s Social Care, Group Director for Children and Education, the Cabinet Member, Mayor and Chief Executive are automatically informed of children who go missing from care, their age, gender and why they are believed to have gone missing.  This data is collated and distributed to named officers regularly.  A child of 5 was reported missing recently, though this was with their mother.

·  The recording requirements of children that go missing from care are necessarily stringent, but there is some element of over recording.  For example, children that return home late by more than an hour are required to be reported as missing by foster carers and other care homes. An Extra Familial Risk Panel has been set up to look into the context in which children go missing and to provide additional support and or disrupt the activities where these are not beneficial or harmful to the child.  There are also multi-agency panels to forensically assess the cases of children who do go missing.  Any child that goes missing is of course a concern, but recent trends suggest that the number of children who go missing (weekly) was less than 10 (including those where the location of the child is known but cannot be verified).

 

b) How are foster carers supported when the child they are looking after goes missing?

·  There is dedicated support for foster carers in this context.  There are social workers available for out of hours support until 10pm. After this time, they can then talk to the Emergency Duty Team for help and advice.  The foster carers can also notify the Children's Rights Officer for additional support for their child.  Police are automatically notified if a looked after child goes missing.  The Children’s Rights Officer or the Social Worker will then follow up with the child the next day after they have returned.  Police and the Children's Rights Officer offer training to foster carers as to what they can do when their child goes missing and providing advice on policies and procedures.  This service has good feedback from foster carers.  Each foster carer has an allocated social worker to support them.

 

c) What happens when a looked after child is reported missing but is believed to be with another relative and how can this be accurately verified?

·  Government sets out the regulations of data recording children missing from care and local authorities are required to comply with these regulations.  Whilst some of the processes may seem to inflate incidences, it is important that all cases of where children who do go missing are recorded.  Locally, there is no assumption that if a child goes missing it will be with a family or friend unless this can be verified and officers are always alert to potential safeguarding risks.

d) How many UASC go missing from care?

·  From 1/4/22 to 10/3/23 of the 98 children who went missing 2 were young unaccompanied asylum seekers.  One of these children went missing 4 times and the other 1 time.  One of the children who went missing was an Albanian child who had received a negative outcome from the asylum process.

 

5.5 The Chair thanked the Cabinet member for attending and responding to questions from members of the Commission.