Agenda item

Purpose:

The purpose of the report is to provide details of a proposed re-alignment of Monmouthshire Children’s Services delivery model specifically in regards tothe Placement and Support Team (PAST) and to highlight progress against the targets identified within the initial business case previously endorsed by Cabinet including an outline of next steps.

Recommendation:

1. That Select Committee provides pre-decision scrutiny regarding:

·         The proposed reconfiguration of 2 assessing social worker posts from the establishment within the PAST.

·         The transfer of resources released from 1 of the posts into the creation of a social worker post within the Support and Protection Team.

·         The transfer of resources released from the 2nd post into a spot-purchasing budget to procure independent assessments as and when required.

·         To progress with reviewing 3 other posts also created within the initial business case i) Psychologist ii) Special Guardianship Worker and iii) Placements and Contracts Officer Post.

·         To transfer the Contact Team from the line management of the PAST to the Service Manager Early Help and Assessment as part of the realignment of Family Support and Edge of Care services.

2. Select members are requested to consider these proposals in the context of:

·         The National Fostering Framework which sets out the direction for more regional approaches to fostering services across Wales (see background papers).

·         The increasing demands and pressures across Monmouthshire Children’s Services as set out within the Workforce report.

·         There continues to be an upward trend in the numbers of children Looked After Children, children on the Child Protection Register and Children subject to court proceedings, with corresponding budgetary pressure.

·         The two parallel papers presented regarding Family Support and Workforce.

Key Issues:

1. In 2014 council approved a business case to include as follows:

·         To employ 2 full-time Social Workers with the intention of recruiting more Monmouthshire Foster Carers

·         To employ a part time psychologist to assist with the recruitment and retention of foster carers and promote placement stability

·         To create a Placements and Contracts Officer post to assist with finding and maintaining placements for children in foster care

·         To create a Special Guardianship Order worker to support / increase Special Guardianship Orders within the authority.

2. The PAST Project Board was established in early 2017 to work within the overall Delivering Excellence Programme for Children’s Services and specifically to:

·         Review progress against targets in the business case

·         Review the additional posts that had been created within the business case

·         Develop an improvement plan

·         To consider different service delivery options.

3. The Project Board carried out a range of activities in accordance with its aims including:

·         Benchmarking against other Local Authorities and regional partners

·         Development of team dashboards and performance indicators for the PAST

·         Gaining feedback from foster carers

·         Caseload analyses and productivity over the last 5 years

·         Gaining feedback from colleagues in the wider Children’s Services arena

4. Outcomes from the review

·         The original business case assumed that increasing staff would, amongst other targets, increase foster carer recruitment and retention and allow more placements to be made with in-house foster carers. However, this was found not to be the case.

·         The review data informed us that in comparison to other Local Authority fostering teams our caseloads and productivity remained low.

·         That kinship carers were often required within tight timescales of court work, which could make it difficult to manage peaks & troughs. This was found to create delays within the completion of generic fostering assessments.

·         The review concluded that further work around systems and processes for the PAST could help improve efficiency.

·         In summary, the objectives within the 2014 business case were not fully on target to be met and were therefore not having the required impact on the service. Consequently, the low number of Monmouthshire Foster Carers continues to make us over-reliant on independent fostering agency carers which creates additional budgetary pressure, and does not improve outcomes for our Looked After children and young people.

·         The Fostering Project Board is now structured around separate workstreams. Targets are set around the increase in generic carers and the transfer of independent foster carers to Monmouthshire carers.

5. Current Proposals

·         Following the overall workforce analysis of demand versus resources, we propose to release one full-time social work resource from PAST to assist with addressing the pressures within the wider Children’s Services area where demand currently exceeds resource.

·         We propose to reconfigure one full time social work resource to create a budget for spot commissioning Foster Carer Assessments on an as needed basis. This is to help the team manage the peaks and troughs around demand and reduce delay in the completion of generic assessments.

·         In line with the Family Support review we propose to move the Contact Team from the management structure of the PAST into that of the Early Help and Assessment service area. This is to achieve a managed network of support services that can be utilised in a more efficient and effective way by coming under the umbrella of one Service Manager.

·         In line with the original business case (2014) we propose to continue to review the posts to ensure that the are best aligned to the overall aims of the service and specifically the Fostering Project

·         If the proposals within this report are agreed by Cabinet implementation will move forward between January and April 2018.

6. 

Member Scrutiny:

Members carried out pre-decision scrutiny considering the three reports together relating to “Delivering Excellence in Children’s services – The Next Phase…”