Agenda item

Report attached.

The Children & Young People’s Services Complaints Annual Report 2015/16 provided information about the numbers and types of complaints handled by the Children & Young People’s Service during the year, as well as Member’s correspondence. It was a requirement under the Children Act 1989 Representations Procedure (England) Regulations 2006 that the Annual Report be published.

There had been a slight increase in the number of complaints on 6% in 2015/16 (&$) compared to 70 in 2014/15, with Ombudsman enquiries in 2015/16 (5) compared to 3 in 2014/15. The majority of complaints were made by parents with just 14% (10) being made by children directly or via advocate. There had been a continuing trend with Stage 1 complaints                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              increasing; however Stage 2 complaints were reducing with the positive outcomes achieved through meeting with complainants.

The Committee had concerns at the increase of 25% in complaints regarding ‘attitude/behaviour of staff’ which were mainly in relation to decisions made, although there were also issues around ‘lack of communication’. The Director of Children’s Services acknowledged these concerns and advised the Committee that one of the key issues facing the service was the stability of staff, there had been an high turnover of staff during the year. Things were improving now there was a permanent leadership team in place and work was progressing on appointing a permanent middle management team. This would help with stability and help with the communication issues.

Many of the interactions between the service and clients were at times of greatest stress for the client and they did not always agree with the services decisions. The way to reduce these tensions was to improve communication.

The Director of Children’s Services also informed the Committee that because of the increase in the volume of clients the service had tended to rely on process to mitigate/manage risk.  Staff were being encouraged to work closer with families to reduce the level of risk.

The Committee highlighted concerns that the highest increase in complaints had been among children that were ‘Mixed White and Black British in 2016/17 (88%) with a reduction in those that came from ‘White British’ background. Officers explained that whilst these percentages seemed high it was only a small number of complaints. The Committee asked for a breakdown in figures rather than percentages.

The Committee looked specifically Looked After Children complaints of which there had been 33. The most common complaints were about communication with staff members (42%) and decisions made about their case (39%).

The Director of Children’s Services informed the Committee that the recent Ofsted inspection had confirmed the need to improve service and provide a higher level of service. Statutorily the Council were required to provide service to care leavers up to 21, and to 25 for those with Learning Difficulties. The Pathway would now provide a service to all care leavers up to 25 yrs of age. The team providing this service had been strengthened and now included trained social workers as well as specialists in drug and alcohol awareness. In response to a question from the Committee the Director of Children’s Services confirmed that at present the Mind of My Own (MOMO) was only available to children whilst they were in care. The intention was to extend its availability to all participants up to the age of 25 yrs. additionally the service was looking to strengthen its approach to advocates and Independent visitors.

The Committee:

1.    Noted the contents of the Annual Report and the continued efforts made by the service to learn from complaints with the increasing demand on the service with the number of children having some involvement with Children and Young People’s Services; and

2.    Noted that the recommendations identified from complaints and continued monitoring of these to ensure that actions were implemented to evidence service improvements.