Agenda item

Consideration was given to the report of the Service Manager, Children’s Services which was presented to inform Members of the progress made by Blaenau Gwent Corporate Parenting Board (CPB) throughout 2020 to improve outcomes and services for our Children Looked After (CLA).

The Service Manager Children’s Services spoke to the report and highlighted the main points contained therein and informed Members that the action plan had been developed in February 2020, prior to the Covid pandemic, and some other measures had been put in place which may have superseded some of the actions because of priorities.

In relation to Key priority 2, the Chair enquired if the Multi Agency Child Exploitation (MACE) meetings had been held on a quarterly basis throughout the pandemic.  The Head of Children’s Services confirmed that the MACE meetings had continued as they were part of the safeguarding structures in place within Gwent.  The Directorate had taken safeguarding responsibilities very seriously, particularly through the pandemic, as children were not being seen as regularly as they would have been through the Education system.  Existing structures and systems continued to be in place.

A Member enquired regarding support for young carers.  The Head of Children’s Services said this report focused on Children Looked After, but informed the Member that the Authority regarded young carers as vulnerable learners and all had been offered places in school hubs throughout the Covid pandemic.  The Families First Team had responsibility for providing services to young carers and they had been actively involved in making contact with that cohort.  Where necessary, face to face visits had been undertaken to ensure that cohort of children were supported.  Effort had also been made to bring this cohort of children together, virtually as a group, so they could provide peer support to one another.

In response to a Member’s question regarding providing laptops to Children Looked After, the Service Manager said an audit had been carried out with parents, guardians and carers of Children Looked After to establish if laptops or Wi-Fi connections were needed.  During March and April 2020 laptops had been bought for each child in the household that needed one so they were ready to go online with their schools.  The Team worked closely with schools and social workers to ensure that these children could do online learning.

A Member referred to Key priority 3, Action 3 – Promote “Children Looked After Friendly Schools” and felt that the wording on this action point should be changed.  The Service Manager said the Children Looked After friendly schools was a policy document, however, the word promote could be changed to - ensure that schools are adhering to the policy.  The Head of Children’s Services explained there was a duty on schools to ensure they meet the needs of Children Looked After.  Action Point 3 referred to a Blaenau Gwent guide, that had been created on what is best practice, for all schools supporting Children Looked After.  The guide had been adopted and was being tested in a pilot area in Blaenau Gwent with the expectation that the guide would be rolled out to all schools in Blaenau Gwent.  The aim was to ensure that schools adopt all the areas in the guidance in order to achieve ‘best practice’ status to make sure that a robust structure was in place and to have a resource that schools could refer to ensure they were doing the best for all Children Looked After.

A Member enquired regarding gathering all the information from different departments and partner organisations in a timely manner to give an accurate measurement of all the information.  He also enquired if a further report would be presented to a future meeting of the Scrutiny Committee.  The Head of Children’s Services said the Corporate Parenting Board met four times a year and was the vehicle to ensure that all the information was brought together via partner engagement.  Task and finish groups were also a driving force in relation to engaging partners.  With regard to the education performance information that was missing, the Welsh Government had not requested information on learners this year, it would need to be established what information would be required to be reported on going forward.  Corporate Parenting information was reported annually to the Scrutiny Committee in January and when that information was available it would be presented to the Scrutiny Committee at that time.

A Member commented that it was a positive report and commended the staff for all their hard work over the last 12 months and enquired if students attending college were included in the provision of ICT equipment.  The Service Manager confirmed that the ICT provision included students attending colleges and one student attending university.

The Committee AGREED to recommend that the report be accepted and endorse Option 1; namely that progress made throughout 2020 and the work of the Local Authority and its partners to improve outcomes for our children looked after as part of our corporate parenting responsibilities be acknowledged.