To review the progress of the corporate parenting strategy.

The cabinet member children and families introduced the report and noted the key achievements in 2018/19. She reminded cabinet members of the seven corporate parenting principles in the Children and Social Work Act 2017 and stressed the importance of doing everything possible to support children in the care of the council and care leavers.

The director for children and families endorsed the comments from the cabinet member and noted that this report covered the second year of a three-year strategy. He outlined a number of areas of progress since the end of March 2019 to update cabinet since the end of the financial year.

In discussion of the report, cabinet members noted that:

·         A wide range of initiatives were in place to help recruit and retain social care staff including an individual training allowance, market forces supplement, clear career pathway and one-off payments for agency staff converting to permanent contracts;

·         A social work apprenticeship scheme was planned for introduction in February 2020;

·         A recruitment agency micro site had been established and the director was proactive in contacting individuals who expressed an interest in working in Herefordshire;

·         The council had a good record on retaining permanent staff, with most changes a result of agency workers coming and going or permanent staff moving to other children’s social work roles within the council;

·         A number of councillors had attended the alternatives care panel and all councillors were encouraged to attend to see the work that took place, councillors were also welcome to attend the corporate parenting board;

·         The numbers of children coming into care had been stabilised but was still comparatively high;

·         It was proposed to establish an edge of care service as it was felt this would be beneficial in reducing LAC numbers, the service would work with families when they were at a point of requesting that the children be taken into care and also work to enable children to return home safely;

·         special guardianship orders (SGOs) gave carers parental rights for children up to the age of 18 and were usually granted to extended family members, the same financial assistances was now given to those with a SGO as to foster carers;

·         children were being placed with adoptive families much sooner;

·         it was not viable for the Refugee Action service to continue as numbers were so low, the council would need to consider whether it was viable to commission a replacement service;

·         it was important that the views of children in the care system and care leavers were considered in developing services.

Group leaders were invited to present the views of their group. The update on the strategy was welcomed but concern was expressed regarding the continuing high numbers of LAC. It was noted that:

·         there were a number of ways that councillors could contribute to supporting children in care, including ensuring that services were performing well;

·         looked after children wanted to have normal experiences and did not necessarily want their status as LAC highlighted;

·         it was important to listen to staff who worked with children in care as they often had good ideas on how best to support LAC;

·         the report could be more explicit about the initiatives to improve recruitment.

It was suggested that all councillors receive a hard copy of the current strategy so they could see what was expected and encourage ownership of the strategy in its next revision.

It was resolved that:

the progress of the corporate parenting strategy as outlined at appendix 1 to the report was considered and cabinet did not identify any further actions required to improve the delivery of the strategy.