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Improvement board ‘confident’ in changes being made to Nottingham children’s services

By Joe Locker, Local Democracy Reporter

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A Government-appointed improvement board is “confident” in Nottingham City Council’s critical changes to children’s services, a councillor says.

Education watchdog Ofsted rated the Labour-run authority’s children’s services as ‘inadequate’ in 2022.

Inspectors gave the service the lowest rating possible because children had been left at “continued risk of harm”.

Progress is being monitored by an improvement board, appointed by the Department for Education, and regular Ofsted visits are taking place.

The latest visit took place on November 22 and 23, with a focus on the support for children and young people who have left care.

Inspectors met care leavers and council staff to determine whether sufficient improvements had been made.

Speaking during a meeting on November 30, Cllr Cheryl Barnard (Lab), lead councillor for children, young people and schools, said: “Inspectors told us our personal advisors are tenacious and consistent in their practice with care leavers, and act as good parents to them.

“Their health and emotional wellbeing is met, but there is strong support for care leavers with additional vulnerabilities and good links with specialist services, either internal to the council or external.”

However more work needs to be done, councillors were told during the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee meeting.

“We are on an improvement journey and there were areas still identified for further development, so inspectors noted these and noticed that we were already working on these,” Cllr Barnard said.

“That is ensuring pathways are consistent, ensuring monitoring and oversight is constantly recorded and has a positive impact on young people’s plans and the services they receive, and to ensure where all care leavers and workers know where to find the local offer.

“We are continuing that improvement, which is monitored by our children’s improvement board, they scrutinise the progress we are making, and they are confident about the progress that is being made.”

An Ofsted report into the latest visit is expected to be published in January.

Around 700 Nottingham children are currently in the care of the authority, up from just over 600 in 2016.

Costs to support children and young people are rising significantly, and is part of the reason why the council  issued a Section 114 notice on November 29, effectively declaring bankruptcy.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request, by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, recently revealed private care providers were paid a total of £44,990,000 by the council in 2022/23, up from £33,476,000 the year before.

The council is also having to rely on temporary agency staff to fill gaps in its social worker workforce.

Almost a quarter of all children’s social worker jobs are taken up by agency staff, who can earn upwards of £30 an hour, more than the average pay of a permanent council social worker.

The FOI revealed a total of £3,895,726 was spent on agency staff to support children’s services in 2022/23, up from £3,454,479 the year before.

Speaking of the need for agency staff after the meeting, Cllr Barnard told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “The agency staff we use are social workers.

“And so we need the experienced social workers, and if we cannot recruit them, then we have to use agencies.”

She added she did not expect the issuing of the Section 114 notice to have an impact on the continued improvement work.