Children's Home run by Stockton on Tees Borough Council in Stockton-on-Tees

Unique reference number SC035387 Inspection date 01/08/2012 Inspector Steve Pearson Type of inspection Full Provision subtype Children's home

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Date of last inspection 24/02/2012 Website: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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This document may be reproduced in whole or in part for non-commercial educational purposes, provided that the information quoted is reproduced without adaptation and the source and date of publication are stated.

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Brief description of the service

The children's home is provided by a local authority and is registered to care for up to six young people with emotional or behavioural difficulties. The home aims to provide short to medium term care.

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The inspection judgements and what they mean

Outstanding : a service of exceptional quality that significantly exceeds minimum requirements Good : a service of high quality that exceeds minimum requirements Adequate : a service that only meets minimum requirements Inadequate : a service that does not meet minimum requirements

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Overall effectiveness

The overall effectiveness is judged to be adequate .

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Overall effectiveness

The Registered Manager and staff provide a high standard of care. They focus on the needs of young people and are proactive in dealing with challenges and concerns effectively. The standard of care they provide is high and is what would be expected of a good parent.

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Overall effectiveness

Relationships between the manager, staff team and young people are friendly and supportive. Outcomes for young people are mostly very positive and they make good progress after coming to live in the home. However a very serious incident with a very negative outcome has arisen since the previous inspection.

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Overall effectiveness

There are some shortfalls in the quality of care and in arrangements relating to leadership and management. Important information required by legislation is not being routinely recorded and children's residential plans are not suitably detailed or personalised.

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Overall effectiveness

The home is breaching legislation by not displaying the latest certificate issued to the registered provider. The staff team are qualified, skilled and experienced. They are well-supported and receive suitable training. A significant proportion of the training received by the Registered Manager is out of date and due for renewal.

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Overall effectiveness

There are three requirements and two recommendations to address as a result of this inspection.

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Statutory Requirements

This section sets out the actions which must be taken so that the registered person/s meets the Care Standards Act 2000, Children's Homes Regulations 2001 and the National Minimum Standards. The registered person(s) must comply with the given timescales.

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Reg. Requirement Due date

(2001) maintain in the children's home those records required by legislation. In particular, a record of all children's admission and discharge addresses; a record of the reason why any visitor calls at the home; a record of stock levels of different strengths of medication and a record of the disposal of all medications (Schedule 4, items 1, 5 and 13) (Regulation 29 (1)) 15/08/2012

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Reg. Requirement Due date

2000 display in a conspicuous place the registration certificate sent to the registered provider on 28 June 2012 (s.28 Care Standards Act 2000 ) 08/08/2012

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Reg. Requirement Due date

(2001) ensure that the Registered Manager shall undertake from time to time such training as is appropriate to ensure that he has the experience and skills necessary for managing the children's home. In particular this means completing a significant proportion of the 11 training courses that are currently overdue. (Regulation 9 (3)) 01/02/2013

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Recommendations

To improve the quality and standards of care further the service should take account of the following recommendation(s):

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Recommendations

 ensure that the emotional needs of each young person is recorded in their residential placement plan (NMS 3.7)  detail each child's health needs in their residential placement plan. (NMS 6.5)

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Outcomes for children and young people

Outcomes for children and young people are adequate .

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Outcomes for children and young people

Most young people make good progress from the point of admission to the home. Educational attendance improves and health concerns are addressed successfully. For example, one young person said, 'my education is a lot better now. I never used to attend school but now I go five days a week.’ Long term health concerns are also successfully addressed after admission to the home.

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Outcomes for children and young people

A very serious issue arose since the previous inspection leading to very poor outcomes for one young person. This is reflected in the rating of this judgement area.

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Outcomes for children and young people

Young people gain emotional well-being by being enabled to have regular contact and overnight stays with their family and friends. Young people said, 'the staff help us to visit and stay with our families and friends.’ Young people also gain knowledge and skills which will be useful to them when older. The staff show them how to budget money and how to shop for food, clothing and toiletries. Young people also help the staff to prepare and cook meals.

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Outcomes for children and young people

Young people also feel positive and settled because of the quality of relationships with the staff team. One young person said, 'I love living here. The best thing about it is that it's like a real home, it's like a family here.’

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Quality of care

Young people have a significant say in how the home is run. Young people said, 'we have house meetings and say what we think. The staff try to do the things we ask for if possible. At one of the meetings we asked to go to Alton Towers and the staff arranged it for us.’

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Quality of care

Young people know how to complain. The Registered Manager investigates concerns appropriately and they clearly record the details of the investigation and whether the complaint is upheld. Two people from an independent support agency also spend an evening each week with the young people. This helps to promote advocacy and openness.

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Quality of care

Young people said, 'we get on well with each other and with the staff.’ Observations during the inspection clearly showed that the Registered Manager and staff are skilled at interacting and communicating effectively with young people. They set appropriate boundaries which help young people feel secure.

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Quality of care

The aim of the home is to provide short to medium-term care before young people move on to longer term placements. Much of the work with young people is therefore task-centred around education, health, family relationships and esteem- building. The team carry out this work effectively and there is positive collaboration with other agencies that specialise in areas such as emotional health, education, substance misuse and specialist counselling.

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Quality of care

Young people benefit from a wide range of activities which help them to keep stimulated and fit. This also enables them to develop new skills and abilities. One young person summed this up saying, 'the best thing about living here is the activities…I'm never bored here.’

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Quality of care

The staff are effective in enabling young people to attend and achieve in education. One of the staff team has special responsibility for promotion of education. Attendance is monitored closely and young people receive rewards for success. Young people have their own computer and there is a range of books, games and a daily newspaper to keep them stimulated. The team are also effective in helping to ensure physical and emotional health needs are well met. Good progress has been made in addressing long term health conditions.

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Quality of care

The home is appropriately maintained and decorated. It is particularly homely with nice touches such as flowers in planters on the outside of the building. Internally, the staff have painted and decorated much of the house with young people having a say and being involved.

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Quality of care

The needs of young people and the role of the staff in meeting these needs are described in residential placement plans. These are not always adequately detailed or personalised to the young person. For example, emotional and physical needs which were of significant importance for one particular young person were not mentioned in their residential placement plan. This lack of detail may limit their speed of progress and it provides less external accountability that children's needs are being identified and met.

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Quality of care

The home operates a clear policy of ensuring that children's needs relating to their culture and identify are met. A member of staff said that there is a high emphasis on providing young people with one-to-one time with their key worker. This helps to ensure individual concerns or issues are resolved as they arise.

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Safeguarding children and young people

The service is good at keeping children and young people safe and feeling safe.

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Safeguarding children and young people

The staff are skilled and knowledgeable about how to respond to challenging behaviour. They rarely need to restrain young people and the use of sanctions is fair. Young people said, 'the staff are fair and they always warn us first if we're likely to get a sanction. This helps us stop before it's too late.’

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Safeguarding children and young people

Young people are safe, and they feel safe. There is no bullying and this was summed up by one young person who said, 'there is no bullying…it doesn't even come close to bullying as the staff don't allow it.’ There are some occasions when young people go missing. The team operates a proportionate risk-based approach based on national and local guidance in collaboration with the local police. The staff record all the necessary information which helps them to identify concerns and deal with further episodes safely.

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Safeguarding children and young people

The premises are maintained in a safe condition. Professional technicians regularly service the electrical equipment, gas appliances and equipment for preventing, detecting and extinguishing fires.

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Safeguarding children and young people

Appropriate arrangements are in place to ensure that staff recruited to work with young people are suitable and safe. The Registered Manager is aware of how electronic application forms need to be improved to ensure all necessary information is captured.

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Leadership and management

The leadership and management of the children's home are adequate .

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Leadership and management

At the previous inspection Ofsted rated the home to be making satisfactory progress and made one requirement and two recommendations. These have now been met and as a result the arrangements for the running of the home are clear with an appropriate annual development plan in place. Children's safety is now being safeguarded more robustly because all the relevant information relating to occasions when they go missing is recorded. Ofsted is also able to monitor significant concerns better because the home now informs it of all serious incidents involving the police.

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Leadership and management

The home has a clearly defined Statement of Purpose and the staff are clear about the aims and objectives of the home. Children receive a children's guide when they first come to the home. One young person said, 'the guide was useful as it told me about the home and how it works.’

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Leadership and management

The home is led by an experienced and fully qualified Registered Manager. They provide a clear sense of direction and the staff said they were supportive and approachable. The staff team are also fully qualified and receive a wide range of mandatory training which is refreshed every one to two years. A significant proportion of the training undertaken by the Registered Manager is past its date for renewal. This training is important to help them maintain appropriate levels of knowledge and skills.

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Leadership and management

The quality of care is monitored effectively. An external visitor monitors the quality of care on a monthly basis and seeks the views of young people, their parents and carers and staff. The reports are strong on the evaluation of progress in education which is an important outcome. The reports now clearly record any recommendations which the visitor checks at the next visit. This provides for a good capacity to improve an enables the manager to monitor progress.

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Leadership and management

The Registered Manager also monitors the quality of care on a monthly basis, seeking stakeholder’s views and assessing the issues required by legislation.

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Leadership and management

The home is not recording or maintaining important information about young people. Specifically, the addresses from where young people have been admitted or to where they are discharged to are not always sufficiently detailed; a record of the disposal of all controlled drugs is not complete; the stock levels of differing strengths of a controlled drug are not recorded separately and the reasons for why visitors call at the home are not always recorded. All this information is required by legislation should it be needed in the future. Its absence therefore leads to a potential loss of accountability.

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Leadership and management

The home is legally required to display an up-to-date certificate of registration. Ofsted updated the home's conditions of registration and sent a new certificate to the home's registered provider more than four weeks ago. However the provider has not forwarded it to the home.

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Leadership and management

The staff inform Ofsted of all significant events in a timely manner, as required by legislation. This helps the regulator to keep up-to-date about important issues and to check the home has dealt with concerns effectively.

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About this inspection

The purpose of this inspection is to assure children and young people, parents, the public, local authorities and government of the quality and standard of the service provided. The inspection was carried out under the Care Standards Act 2000 to assess the effectiveness of the service and to consider how well it complies with the relevant regulations and meets the national minimum standards.

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About this inspection

The report details the main strengths, any areas for improvement, including any breaches of regulation, and any failure to meet national minimum standards. The judgements included in the report are made against the Inspections of children’s homes – framework for inspection (March 2011) and the evaluation schedule for children's homes.

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