Agenda item

Consideration was given to the report of the Head of Children’s Services which was to present the refreshed Safe Reduction of Children Looked After Strategy 2020-2025.

The Head of Children’s Services spoke to the report and highlighted the main points contained therein.

In relation to budgets, a Member enquired if the underspend for 2019/20 was a direct result of extra funding received or reduced demand for the service.  The Head of Children’s Services explained that there had been an increase in the budget into Children’s Services because of the significant initial overspend in 2016/17 and this had prevented a continued overspend and stabilised the budget.

A Member referred to page 27, Figure 1: Children Looked After population broken down into placement types and enquired regarding unregulated homes for 16/17 year olds and how Blaenau Gwent’s independent living placements were monitored.  The Head of Children’s Services assured the Member that there were no children in Blaenau Gwent placed in unregulated homes.  All children were placed in regulated homes overseen by the Care Inspectorate Wales and were subject to inspections, as were the local authority’s homes, and had to abide by various regulations and standards of care.

A Member raised concerns regarding children from other Authorities coming to live in small private care homes in Blaenau Gwent and enquired if these homes were regulated by Blaenau Gwent or by the Authority that the children came from.  The Head of Children’s Services explained that there were a number of private children's homes that had been established within Blaenau Gwent, and if that home was under a certain occupancy planning permission would not be required and the Local Authority would not be aware of it, but the private provider would have to register that home with the CIW and adhere to all of the different regulations and standards in law that were required to open a children’s home.  The CIW would inspect the home prior to opening to ensure all relevant policies, procedures and a suitably qualified workforce was in place.  Blaenau Gwent was not responsible for any of those homes, however, if there were safeguarding concerns that occur as a result of that child living in Blaenau Gwent then Children’s Services would have a responsibility to investigate those safeguarding concerns in partnership with the Authority from which that child was placed.  She clarified that the Authority which placed that child would always maintain overall responsibility for that child’s care and for monitoring the placement to ensure it meets that child’s needs.

A Member enquired if Children’s Services would be made aware of any safeguarding concerns at any of these homes.  The Head of Children’s Services explained that Ofsted was the regulatory body for England and the CIW was the regulatory body for Wales, Children’s Services had received alerts from Ofsted regarding different homes in England where there were concerns, however, they had never received any alerts from the CIW in relation to children’s homes in Blaenau Gwent.

The Chair commented on the sterling work that had been undertaken since the strategy had been introduced, previously it was the most significant cost pressure and the Directorate had performed extremely well to bring it to this position.

The Committee AGREED to recommend that the report be accepted and endorse Option 2; namely that the report as provided be accepted.