Agenda item

The meeting welcomed representatives from Northampton Children’s Trust to the meeting, Colin Foster (Chief Executive), Andrew Tagg (Director of Finances) and Olivia Ives (Assistant Director, Corporate Parenting Services).

 

The meeting heard that the service had been through significant change since Vesting Day, with an ambition to make a real, sustainable difference to Children, Young People and Families in Northamptonshire. To that end, a permanent, stable leadership team had been appointed to take the service forward with the following aims:

 

·         To secure a ‘requires improvement’ judgement at the next full Ofsted inspection (Summer 2022), then at least ‘good’ at the following full Ofsted inspection (expected 2025)

 

·         To improve the recruitment and retention of a high-quality workforce

 

·         To deliver the best quality services for the best possible price, including securing of efficiencies through targeted investment

 

·         To improve placements sufficiency

 

·         To deliver the service improvement plan

 

It was noted that although service improvements had been made during the course of the first year, with positive feedback received from Ofsted, expectations of the service required management having twice previously been rated “inadequate” by Ofsted, this being the legacy position of the service inherited from the former county council. One aspect that had seen significant improvement was the reliance on agency staff, with a current figure of 14.7% and an aim to reduce this further still.

 

A breakdown of services provided by Northampton Children’s Trust and the budgetary share of these was detailed to the meeting as per the table below:

 

Service	Budget %
Family Support Services (including Early Help and youth offending services)	5%
Safeguarding (including MASH, Assessment and CiN/CP)	10%
Corporate Parenting (inc. Court, CiC, Adoption, Fostering, DCT)	32%
Commissioning and Quality Assurance (including placements)	43%
NCT support services (internal)	7%
Council support services (NNC/WNC)	3%

 

Key strategic challenges facing the service were detailed as follows:

 

·         Service Improvement Journey, services remain judged ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted

 

·         Placement sufficiency and cost / future demand for services

 

·         Cultural change within the service

 

·         Social worker recruitment and retention

 

·         Developing support services

 

·         Operational efficiency and case management system

 

·         Premises review

 

·         Additional Ofsted inspections (Voluntary Adoption Agencies / Independent Fostering Agencies / Children’s Homes)

 

·         Youth Offending Service inspection (expected at any time over next 12 months)

 

·         Preventative work with partners

 

It was understood that the service required a substantial culture change, and this could be achieved by listening to the existing workforce while understanding the history of the service and historical decisions made to learn from the past to build a stronger future.

 

Members asked questions in relation to the following aspects of the service:

 

·         The financial cost of school exclusions and resulting special education requirements

·         Staff turnover, vacancy levels and staff retention scheme

·         Use of agency staff

·         Ongoing staff training and development

 

The meeting then heard that a monthly financial report was submitted to the Council to better enable the identification of budgetary pressures and trends in timely fashion. The forecast outturn position for 2021/22 was an overspend of £0.622m against the approved budget of £123.348m. The trust planned to partially mitigate this pressure through the use of the carry forward reserve of £0.812m (relating to the financial period November 2020 – March 2021). Additionally, funding bids would be submitted relating to Covid-19 pressures.

 

It was heard that the placements market was exceptionally volatile and challenging and was therefore flagged as an ongoing budgetary pressure risk. It was anticipated that nationally from 2021 to 2025 a 10% increase in the cost of social care for children was expected. A further budgetary pressure was agency staff recruitment, typically costing in the region of 35-40% more than a permanent appointment. It was noted that when staff vacancies had previously been running at 22%, additional agency costs could be offset against the vacancies. As recruitment became more successful there was a thinner margin for offsetting these costs. A sustainable workforce was therefore key to improving services.

 

Following the financial update, Members asked further questions in relation to:

 

·         Unaccompanied asylum-seeking children

·         High numbers of care leavers

·         Emergency placement costs and budgetary pressures associated with these

·         Use of Council assets for service-related accommodation

 

It was heard that regarding costs around placements, strong early intervention social work was required to reduce the need for the use of emergency placements on a regular basis. 

 

A £3.2m savings programme for the service was planned, with investments in services and technology designed to flag pressures to ensure effective lobbying for additional funding. Should the demand for placements increase, this would be approached in a joined-up way in partnership with health and education services to drive out efficiencies whilst reviewing processes and infrastructure to assist in moving away from crisis payments.

 

The Committee thanked the officers for their attendance before it was

 

RESOLVED that:     the Committee noted the contents of the Budget Monitoring report and made comments as outlined above.