Meeting documents

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Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for absence

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Apologies were received from Mrs P Birchley, Mr A Collingwood, Mrs I Darby, Mr M Hussain, Mrs W Mallen, Mrs J Ward and Ms K  Wood. 

 

The Committee noted that Mrs A Wight was substituting for Mrs P Birchley for the duration of the meeting.

 

2.

Declarations of Interest

To declare any Personal or Dislosable Pecuniary Interests.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Mrs A Wight stated that she was a member of the Corporate Parenting Panel. Mr S Lambert declared an interest in items 7 and 8 as he was a member of the early help review panel.

 

3.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 192 KB

To agree the minutes of the meeting held on 10th July 2018

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Minutes:

The minutes of the last meeting held on the 10th July 2018 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the chairman.

 

4.

Public Questions

Public Questions is an opportunity for people who live, work or study in the county to put a question to a Scrutiny Committee about any issue that has an impact on their local community or the county as a whole.

 

Members of the public, who have given prior notice, will be invited to put their question in person.

 

The Cabinet Member and responsible officers will then be invited to respond. 

 

Further information and details on how to register can be found through the following link and by then clicking on ‘Public Questions’.

 

http://democracy.buckscc.gov.uk/mgCommitteeDetails.aspx?ID=788

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Minutes:

There were no public questions received.

 

5.

Chairman's Report

For the chairman of the Committee to provide an update to the Committee on recent scrutiny related activity.

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Minutes:

The Chairman reported that he had presented the Permanent Exclusions inquiry report to Cabinet on 10th September and all recommendations were accepted, except Recommendation 6. The Chairman reminded members that the Children’s Early Help consultation would be announced soon and encouraged everyone to have their say in shaping this service.

 

6.

Committee Member Updates

For members of the Committee to update the Committee on any issue they are investigating on behalf of the Committee.

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Minutes:

There were none.

 

7.

Cabinet Members Question Time pdf icon PDF 87 KB

For the Committee to ask Cabinet Members questions on current key issues for their portfolios.

 

I.              Mr M Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Education and Skills

 

II.            Mr G Williams,  Deputy Cabinet Member for Children’s Services

 

 

This agenda item will also include an update on the performance of the Educational Psychology Service.

 

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chairman welcomed Mr Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Education & Skills and Miss Sarah Callaghan, Service Director for Education to the meeting. During discussions and in response to Member questions the following main points were noted:

·       Mr Appleyard thanked members who had attended his recent Home to School transport briefing and advised that he would hold further discussions with Members over the coming weeks. A public consultation, in various locations across the County, would be launched following discussions at the Cabinet meeting on 22nd October. Mr Appleyard was keen to reach as many people as possible, who might be impacted by proposed changes.

 

·       A Member asked whether there had been any issues with the recent 11+ exams, as they had been made aware of technical issues. Miss Callaghan stated that officers were investigating whether all students had received fair access and if not, the situation would be rectified. A full resit would be a very unlikely course of action due the stressful effects of re-taking the exams. Members requested an update on the progress in this area.

                                                                      ACTION: Service Director for Education

·       The Chairman discussed the Educational Psychologist update report and queried item number 6, due to the fact that a similar recommendation had been rejected at Cabinet. Miss Callaghan stated that there may be a misinterpretation and named Educational Psychologists for Schools would be unrealistic based on pressures on the Educational Psychology service. Instead the new preventative way of working Schools would be to allocate a named SEND officer and Educational Psychologist who they could contact for advice, support and signposting.

 

·       In response to a question about privately employed Educational Psychologist reports not being accepted by BCC’s Educational Psychology services, Mrs Callaghan said she would investigate, as these reports should be accepted.

                                                                      ACTION: Service Director for Education

 

·       A member queried why EHCP plans took 20 weeks to issue and why only 32% were issued within the set timeframe. Miss Callaghan advised that a number of different assessments have to take place to be able to effectively issue the plan, that the department were still dealing with the existing backlog of assessments and that visits to the child, to perform the assessments, were not possible during School holidays. It would be expected that the County would be in line with national average, by the end of the year.

 

·       The benefits and reasoning behind transferring locum contracts into associate contracts within the Educational Psychologist service were explained. Miss Callaghan reassured the Committee that quality of assessments would be monitored prior to payments being made.  Members were informed that the Senior EP and Head of SEN posts had been filled permanently and the service intended to move towards a preventative model once the back log is cleared and is expected to be sustainable. . A member asked if the timing of assessments could be reduced. Mr Appleyard stated that the overarching assessment must take place to ensure the resulting assessments are the correct ones for each particular child.

The Chairman thanked Mr  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

8.

Children's Services Update pdf icon PDF 158 KB

The Committee will receive an update on recent developments within Children’s Services.

 

Contributors:

Mr Gareth Williams, Deputy Cabinet Member for Children’s Services

Mr Tolis Vouyioukas, Executive Director, Children’s Services

Mr Richard Nash, Service Director, Children’s Social Care

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chairman welcomed Mr Tolis Vouyioukas, Executive Director of Children’s Services and Mr Gareth Williams, Deputy Cabinet Member for Children’s Services to the meeting. During discussions and in response to Member questions the following main points were noted:

·       Mr Williams promoted the upcoming early help consultation and encouraged everyone to get involved. He also highlighted recent visits he had undertaken to other Councils to share best practice. An additional children’s home would be opened in 2019 and Members were advised that the number of looked after children in Buckinghamshire continued to grow, placing pressure on fostering services and the budget.

 

·       A Member asked how confident the Deputy Cabinet Member and Director of Children’s Services were that the Medium Term Financial Plan for 2019/20 would be sufficient, given that the current year’s budget was stretched, due to the delay in implementing early help changes and increased numbers of looked after children.  In response, the Deputy Cabinet Member emphasised that as the service was demand led it was difficult to predict the largest cost areas, but the management team had budgeted for an increase in numbers for next year, based on an analysis of the cohort of young people currently on Child Protection plans.  Mr Vouyioukas assured Members that budgets would not determine the outcomes for any child.

 

·       In response to a question about staffing at the Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH), the Director of Children’s Services explained that there were some vacancies as it was a particularly demanding environment to work in, but managers were supporting MASH staff as best they could.

 

·       Currently Buckinghamshire had 505 looked after children and 634 children with Child Protection Plans. The number of looked after children was below the national and south east average, but the number of Child Protection Plans was higher than expected and this could lead to an increase in the looked after cohort. The Early Help consultation would run for 10 weeks. Independent guidance had been sought on the timing and length of the consultation and consultation documents had been designed to explain three options, with one preferred option clearly stated.  Public meetings were also being held to ensure the public could ask further questions.

 

·       A member stated that the percentage of repeat referrals was of concern and asked what actions were being taken to reduce them. Mr Vouyioukas explained that repeat referrals usually happened when a child had particularly complex needs or if a crisis occurred within the family to trigger a second referral. It was noted that there had been an increase in referrals involving domestic violence over the past few months.

 

·       The Chairman noted that some targets in the performance report had been reduced.  Mr Vouyioukas explained that whilst key performance indicators (KPI) have their place, both Ofsted and the Commissioner had commented that it was important to strike a good balance between data and KPI targets the quality of social work practice and improving outcomes for young people.

 

·       A member asked for reassurance that the number of looked  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

9.

Review of Performance Report - Q1 2018-19 pdf icon PDF 591 KB

For the Committee to review and ask questions of Cabinet Members about any underperformance.

 

Contributors:

Mr G Williams, Deputy Cabinet Member for Children’s Services

Mr M Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Education & Skills

Mr T Vouyioukas, Executive Director, Children’s Services

 

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Items 8 & 9 were considered together, please see above

 


10.

Voice of the Child and Young Person Inquiry - Progress on Implementation of Recommendations 18 months on pdf icon PDF 467 KB

For the Select Committee to receive an update on progress regarding implementation of Recommendation 4 of its 2016 Inquiry Report; that a specific Voice of the Child and Young Person website hub is developed.

 

Contributors:

Mr G Williams, Deputy Cabinet Member for Children’s Services

Mr T Vouyioukas, Executive Director, Children’s Services

Mr R Nash, Service Director, Children’s Social Care

Mr J Fowler, Youth Service Manager

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chairman welcomed Mr James Fowler, Youth Services Manager, to the meeting.

Mr Fowler updated the committee on the development of the Youth Voice website, to ensure that the views of young people would be heard. The Chairman and several other members commended Mr Fowler on the comprehensive report and the work on the website, which was visually appealing and easy to navigate.

·       Mr Fowler highlighted a national campaign called Make your Mark, where young people were asked to identify and rank key issues or concerns for them as they grow up.

·       There was a short discussion about the ‘You said, we did’ feature on the website. Mr Fowler said it was important to feedback to young people how their views directly lead to changes. The Deputy Cabinet Member flagged that this could be a useful page for the Select Committee to monitor. The Chairman thanked Mr Fowler for attending the meeting and the Committee confirmed that recommendation 4 of the Voice of the Child Inquiry had been successfully implemented.

 

11.

Committee Work Programme pdf icon PDF 69 KB

For Committee Members to note forthcoming agenda items.

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Minutes:

Members noted the future work programme.

 

12.

Date of Next Meeting

To note the next meeting of the Children’s Select Committee on 27th November 2018 at 10.30am in Mezzanine Room 1, County Hall, Aylesbury.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The next meeting will take place on 27th November at 10:30am in Mezzanine Room 1, County Hall, Aylesbury