Agenda item

The Chair invited Councillor M Simmons, Chair of the Corporate Parenting Panel to present the report and informed Council that Billie Tasker and Luke Joseph, two young people co-opted onto the Corporate Parenting Panel were in attendance to speak to the report, supported by Rob Walker, Project Worker for Investing in Children.

Councillor M Simmons, Chair of the Corporate Parenting Panel presented the Corporate Parenting Panel Annual Report for endorsement.

Councillor Simmons thanked officers from the Corporate Parenting Panel (CPP) along with all the young people who made the Annual Report possible.

The Annual Report covered the period April 2022 to March 2023 and covered a wide range of work taking place across the service to support the young people in care, as well as care leavers.

Councillor Simmons alluded to some of the achievements CPP were particularly proud of, including the focus on personalised care, ensuring each young person had an individual care plan detailing how they needed to be looked after to help them get the best from their lives.

Awareness raising work had been undertaken with staff in children’s homes and with foster carers to remind them how young people liked to be treated.  Young people were now on the interview panels for all foster carers and children’s home staff to ensure they helped appoint the best people to the jobs.

Updates had been made to Family Time rooms to help young people have the best possible experiences with their family members, in more natural surroundings

A care leavers scrutiny committee had been developed and the care experienced young inspectors programme helped explore how services were received by young people.

CPP had a commitment to continue to support young people with their transport arrangements.

Finally, the Mockingbird Foster care model which helped support foster families in a way similar to other family networks had been implemented.

The Ofsted inspection results earlier in the year were certainly an achievement, with us being graded as ‘good’ overall with the impact of leaders on social work practice being ‘outstanding’.  In addition, Ofsted noted our Corporate Parenting Strategy as ambitious.

Work was continuing to address the 2023-24 priorities identified in the annual report, which included savings and life skills, and Councillor Simmons looked forward to providing a progress update in the next annual report.

Throughout the year CPP met with young people from the Children in Care Council, who held the Panel to account on the progress being made against priorities, and rightly so.

Councillor Simmons was extremely proud of the work of the Corporate Parenting Panel, and the commitment within the service to ensure the best possible experiences and outcomes for the young people who were in our care.

Billie Tasker, a representative from the Children in Care Council addressed Council.  For Durham to have young people attend meetings of the Corporate Parenting Panel showed young people how forward thinking Durham was as not all regions had this provision in place.  Billie referred to the statement she had published in the Annual Report specifically where she mentioned the Panel had encouraged her to present her ideas and feelings in an unorthodox manner, encouraging young people to present in a way they felt comfortable.  Billie informed Council that she had prepared some poetry for the meeting to express her work with the Council, how she felt about it and how she felt about having her voice heard.  Billie then recited her poetry.

Luke Tasker, a representative from the Children in Care Council addressed Council.  Luke thanked Council for inviting him to speak again.  Luke informed Council that it had been amazing over the last year to work as part of the CPP and representing the Children in Care Council.

Luke thanked everyone for the hard work they had put in over the last year and thought the Annual Report reflected on all efforts and the success being seen from that hard work.

From the support for unaccompanied asylum seekers, which had been amazing, to the support around the entry to care packs, that were now called ‘supply packs’ which had been incredible, it showed how much the council listened to young people and take their ideas on board with ideas that could benefit life for young people from just an idea which he had taken to Children in Care Council under a year ago..

The CPP helped to promote that young people as more than ‘children in care’ and were young people with a range of skills, abilities and talents.  To support this, service leads shared proud moments, and at each CPP meeting to showcase some of our achievements, no matter how big or small.  As Luke was part of the Advisory Board he got the opportunity to travel to London to speak with the Council of Children in Care and always promoted Durham and the work it did as it was a lot different to other councils who did not include young people in their work as much as Durham did.

The Chair thanked and praised both Billie and Luke for their presentations.  Their voice was important to all in County Durham and to everybody who came into the care system.

Councillor S Deinali thanked Billie and Luke for their presentations and thanked officers and staff for a thorough Annual Report.  Councillor Deinali also thanked all staff who worked with and helped to ensure the safety and wellbeing of children in care in County Durham.  It was good that priorities were based around what young people wanted and needed.

Councillor O Gunn thanked the Corporate Parenting Panel for the Annual Report which exemplified and focussed on work which had been developed over many years in terms of Corporate Parenting.  Councillor Gunn considered that without the input of the Children in Care Council this development would have been much slower.

Councillor Hopgood, Leader of the Council thanked Billie and Luke for their presentations and thanked Councillors Simmons, Walton, all Members on the Corporate Parenting Panel and the Children in Care Council for their work.

Resolved:

(a) That the content of the Corporate Parenting Panel Annual Report be noted.

(b) Tat the Corporate Parenting Panel Annual Report, which provided oversight of the work undertaken during 2022-23, and the priorities for the year ahead be endorsed.