Agenda item

The Committee received a report of the Director of Children and Young People’s Services which provided an update on Child Neglect in County Durham and a presentation from the Strategic Manager - One Point and Think Family Services (for copies see file of minutes).

The Strategic Manager for One Point and Think Family Services informed the Committee  of the work of the Neglect Working Group that has established a vision ‘to reduce neglect, to reduce the impact of neglect by providing effective help and support at the earliest opportunity.  The service had worked with colleagues in Public Health Data Intelligence and Performance to get a better understanding of what neglect looked like in County Durham.

Members learned that 22% of all referrals into Children’s Social Care was due to neglect.  There were more children on a Child Protection Plan (CPP) than the previous year and more CPPs were due to neglect.  This was higher than both Regional, Statistical neighbours and national figures.  Most children with a CPP were from deprived areas, but it not all children living in deprived areas were on a CPP or suffered from neglect.

Early help conversations with professionals had enabled better help for families, these conversations had been successful in sharing concerns about a child.  Guidance in relation to missed appointments had been embedded across dental and health services in the County to ensure there was a pathway to follow up on any missed appointments to ensure the child received the treatment required.

The Neglect Learning and Development was being reviewed and updated to include new evidence-based resources and tools.  Thematic audits were also carried out with particular focus on re referrals and cumulative harm.  A range of financial support packages were available to struggling families.  

The service was hoping to launch the Neglect toolkit in March 21, which would sit within the Children and Families toolkit.  The graded care profile was a specific tool that looked at the key priorities for a particular child and went into precise detail of where there was neglect.  The tool highlighted where parents were working well and where they could do better, which assisted them to engage.  The service was also working with health colleagues to deliver integrated parent support.

Councillor Coult advised that many families were struggling for a variety of reasons and she recognised the phenomenal work that was being done by teachers across the County who were not just teaching and she hoped that the Council would continue to provide them with advice and support quickly..  The Strategic Manager – One Point and Think Family Services agreed that in addition to teaching, schools were relied upon to identify signs of neglect and during the COVID-19 pandemic if a particular concern about a child was raised, the service had agreed that welfare checks would be carried out.

Councillor Coult praised the holiday activity fund, advising that it was very beneficial to some groups of children and she acknowledged that some brilliant work had been done on support tools for people in the profession and asked how it would be communicated to parents.  The Strategic Manger – One Point and Think Family Services confirmed that work was progressing with the parent update and would be circulated electronically.  In relation to schools the Strategic Manager advised that schools knew their children well and the service did rely on them to raise concerns and works with them very closely.  During the pandemic if a school has raised a concern about a child then a welfare visit would be arranged.

Councillor Jewell confirmed that as a Member of the adoption panel he saw the end result of the safeguarding process and noted the objectives were to reduce neglect, reduce the impact of neglect and to provide support.  With regards to the ‘toxic quad’ which were contributing factors of neglect he asked how successful the service could be at changing this cycle or whether there was a process to mitigate it.

The Strategic Manager – One Point and Think Family Services confirmed that the service had to identify risk and intervene early to change behaviours before they became entrenched.  The new approach with regards to Signs of Safety had created a culture where social workers were open, honest and direct with families about their concerns.   They were more confident and worked with children to explain the reasoning behind their situation and parents were becoming more aware of the behaviours that impacted on their children.

The Strategic Manager –   Families First East, Prebirth and Adoption agreed and advised that language had also been adapted to use less jargon in order for families to understand.  It was hoped that the introduction of the  graded profile tool would assist social workers to identify signs of neglect at an earlier stage and  help families understand the future impact of their behaviours on their children.  When considering the most complex teenagers, had some of the behaviours been identified a lot earlier, some of the outcomes may have been different. 

The Strategic Manager –  Families First East, Prebirth and Adoption,  confirmed that there had been some children subject to a repeat child protection plan or referral. The service had made improvements to identify the risks and concerns which reduced the need for a second or subsequent plan or referrals.  The service had also made improvements to identify when a child could not remain with a family which enabled their plans to progress within minimum delay,  particularly for parents with  previous children placed up for adoption.

With regards to next steps, the Strategic Manager  Families First East, Prebirth and Adoption confirmed that the Service would continue good links with partners, such as substance misuse teams   mental health teams, particularly for young people.  Reducing re referrals was a key priority and the service needed to work with partners in education, health and early years settings to identify risks in order to speed up appropriate referrals.

Councillor Charlton advised that funding for holiday activities had been utilised well in her area and a group that she volunteered for had distributed packs which included fresh fruit to extremely grateful families during the Christmas period.

In response to a question from Councillor Bainbridge on whether neglect would always be an ongoing project, the Strategic Manager – One Point and Think Family Services confirmed that as systems became more sophisticated, the service were getting a better understanding of the demographics, for example, having four or more children was a red flag and knowing how to identify the risks that impacted on parenting would assist the service in investigating sooner.

Councillor Bainbridge asked whether COVID-19 had increased deprivation in areas of already high levels of deprivation and the Strategic Manger – One Point and Think Family Service confirmed that families were struggling more due to a range of issues including redundancy, furlough and childcare as the data showed an increase in financial services offered and free school meals eligibility.  It was correct to assume that the most deprived areas in the County had the highest rate of take up. 

The Corporate Equality and Strategy Manager advised that neglect and deprivation were related it was clear that there were long term structural deprivation issues in County Durham as parts of the County that had remained deprived for longer than 20 years.  The measures had remained the same with similar communities with similar issues, the extent of deprivation changing, but not the geographical spread.  It was difficult to make a direct link with neglect and poverty as not all cases of neglect were in areas of deprivation and low income did not always equate to neglect.

With regards the increase in free school meals, the Corporate Equality and Strategy Manager confirmed that there had already been an increase in the proportion of children eligible prior to COVID-19, and the latest information from the Autumn census indicated a further increase.  There were also further increases in child poverty using free school meals as an indicator and this was disproportionate in areas that already had a high take up and therefore it could be assumed that there was a growing inequality in areas of deprivation.

The Strategic Manager – Children & Families South & East confirmed that the service were improving at identifying signs of neglect from the performance information and this information was constantly reviewed.  They were currently looking at the link between private housing and neglect and poverty.

Councillor Crute stated there was an inarguable link between deprivation, poverty and neglect and confirmed that a recent report on the impact of poverty had been considered by Cabinet in November and would be considered by COSMB later in January.  He referred to the Performance Management Report which confirmed that 4000 children were eligible for free school meals and yet did not take up the offer.  He confirmed that a piece of work had been undertaken by scrutiny in 2016 and a whole range of reasons had been found that may need exploring again in future.  Free school meals were vital to those children eligible and the lack of take up impacted on child nutrition, attainability at school and linked with pupil premium which impacted on school budgets.

Finally Councillor Crute confirmed that the Council needed to get the message out to those families who were eligible to make a claim.

The Strategic Manager – One Point and Think Family Services confirmed that there was a clear gap between those eligible and those that were taking up free school meals and perhaps the service needed to ask parents directly through some of the other work done such as holiday activities and healthy food.  They needed to find out what the barriers were and she would take this up with colleagues in education.

Resolved:

That the report and presentation be noted.