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Agenda item

Review of Fostering Services

The report serves to update the progress being made to improve the Local Authority Fostering Service.

Minutes:

In 2017 there had been a review of Croydon’s Fostering Service which had presented its findings in a Single Inspection Framework report. The recommendations outlined in the report had been reviewed and put into an action plan which have subsequently been progressed. In March 2018, the organisation, Achieving for Children, was commissioned to undertake a second review to understand the progress made against the action plan.

 

Outcomes from the review had been split into two categories, namely areas that were working well and others where further progress was required.  The areas in which good progress had been made included the focus within the service on positive outcomes, good multi agency support and an improved relationship between the fostering and looked after teams. The main concerns raised related to areas of work where actions were still being progressed and included early permanence moving forward and inconsistencies over management oversight. As a result of this review a revamped action plan was now presented to the Panel for its comments.

 

In response to a question about the speed of payment to Foster Carers, one of the Foster Carer representatives on the Panel advised that in their experience Croydon had always been very good with weekly payments and although it was sometimes slower with one off purchases, it was generally considered to be good.

 

It was also questioned whether the number of agency social workers had increased or decreased? It was confirmed that there was still a significant work force issue, with a 40% vacancy level requiring the continued use of a substantial amount of agency staff. In particular there was considerable level of staff turnover in the Assessment and Care Planning Teams, but elsewhere in the Permanence team the staff levels were more stable.

 

The Panel discussed the application process for prospective foster carers, as it was noted that there was dissatisfaction with the number of foster carers coming through the assessment and the quality of the assessment process. It was confirmed that the Council had a three year contract with NRS to deliver this service, which was now coming to an end and it should be acknowledged that during the length of the contract the quality of assessments had improved. As part of the retendering process for the contract the Council was looking to procure a two year contract with a provider who would be willing to work towards the Council’s long term goal of bring the service back in house.

 

In a discussion about staff morale within the fostering team, it was agreed that the significant reduction in sickness could be taken as an indicator that morale had improved.  Furthermore, in both of the reviews conducted in the past year, staff had been happy to participate in the process and had volunteered themselves to be interviewed. The management oversight within Fostering Service was felt to be robust, with further work under way to address identified inconsistencies across the team management.

 

In response to a concern raised about the support available for foster carers when social workers were on leave or absent, it was acknowledged that this was a slight issue as it could lengthen the response time. However if a social worker was going to be absent there email should be set up with an out of office message providing an alternate contact.

 

There was a general level of support for the content of the report, but it was suggested that it would be useful to have specific information relating to staffing included alongside the improvement journey the Council was taking. It was intended that going forward there would be a move to an annual cycle reporting from fostering service and in Spring 2019 the Panel would receive an update on the action plan.

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