Issue - meetings

The Panel received the report of the Director, Legal and Governance which provided an overview of performance across Children and Families Services since August 2019.

Councillor Paffey, Cabinet Member for Aspiration, Children and Lifelong Learning; Hilary Brooks, Service Director, Children and Families Services; Sharon Hawkins, Interim Service Lead, Children’s Social Care; and Phil Bullingham, Service Lead, Safeguarding, Improvement, Governance and Compliance; were present and, with the consent of the Chair, addressed the Panel. 

In discussions with the officers, the Panel noted the following:

• Nationally there had been a 78% increase over the last ten years in the number of people who had contacted Children’s Services.
• In Southampton referrals increased by 119% between January and July 2019, compared to the same period in 2018.
• There had been an increase in crime, which had contributed to an increase in referrals from the Police.
• There had also been an increase in low income families in the city. 
• There had also been media coverage of a serious incident where a child was murdered and these events tended to cause an increase in contacts.
• In Southampton the group with the largest increase in referrals was teenagers.  There had also been a significant increase in referrals that featured mental health, domestic abuse and neglect.
• Referrals from schools had also increased and a strategy had been implemented to support community organisations and other services to manage risk in the community.
• The occurrence of repeat referrals remained within normal ranges, the spike in referrals between January and July 2019 had been caused by an increase in new referrals.
• Three peripatetic teams had been put in place to help manage the increase in referrals and assessments.
• Workshops had been held with team and service managers to calibrate the decision making on referrals and assessments across the service.
• Weekly Performance Improvement Boards had been implemented to monitor the progress of referrals throughout the service.
• Ofsted had been kept informed through monthly reports and the Department of Education were interested in the rich learning that will come from Southampton’s Children’s Services management of the high increase in referrals.
• The high number of contacts made to Children’s Services since January 2019 had transferred into a high number of referrals and this had created pressure on the completion of assessments.  Safe planning had been prioritised over rushed planning.
• The retention of social work staff had stabilised and a Smarter Ways of Working refresh was planned for January 2020 as well as a refresh of recruitment webpages.
• A vision for children and a 5 year plan for children in Southampton was in development.