Children's home run by Lynstead Children’s Services Ltd in Cannock Chase

Requires improvement

The children's home is not yet delivering good help and care for children and young people. However, there are no serious or widespread failures that result in their welfare not being safeguarded or promoted.

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The children's home provision requires improvement because:

 Care plans and risk assessments do not provide clear strategies to guide staff in meeting young people’s individual needs and reducing the potential for harm.   Management monitoring systems are weak and are not identifying shortfalls in care planning and risk management.   The statement of purpose sets out the therapeutic ethos of the home, but staff are not currently receiving the required level of training, supervision and support to apply this approach. Managers are not delivering the ethos as set out in the statement of purpose.   Staff supervision practice does not provide adequate opportunities for staff reflection and support.   Young people do not experience a fire evacuation drill when they are first admitted to the home, which compromises their safety in the event of an emergency.   Although impact risk assessments are in place for young people on admission, it is not clear that their needs are fully considered in relation to

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The children's home provision requires improvement because:

the existing group. The risk assessments do not demonstrate how placement decisions are made to protect young people effectively.   Independent return interviews following an incident of missing are not taking place for all young people. 

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The children's home strengths

 The registered manager and the staff team are well-trained in safeguarding matters. They undertake training with the Local Safeguarding Children Board to ensure that they have up-to-date knowledge of safeguarding issues.   Young people report that they feel safe living at the home and can talk to staff if they have any worries or concerns.   Young people benefit from continuity and consistency of care provided by the stable and committed staff team.   Young people are well prepared for their transition from the home to independent living. 

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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 (England) Regulations 2015 and the Guide to the children's homes regulations including the quality standards. The registered person(s) must comply with the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

6: The quality and purpose of care standard:

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the quality and purpose of care standard, the registered person must ensure that staff:

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Requirement Due date

(2)(b)(iv) provide personalised care that meets each child's needs, as recorded in the child's relevant plans, taking account of the child's background. 30 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

12: The protection of children standard:

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the protection of children standard, the registered person must ensure that staff:

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Requirement Due date

(2)(a)(i) assess whether each child is at risk of harm, taking into account information in the child's relevant plans, and, if necessary, make arrangements to reduce the risk of any harm to the child. 30 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

After consultation with the fire and rescue authority, the registered person must ensure, by means of fire drills and practices at suitable intervals, that persons working at the home and, as far as reasonably practicable, children are aware of the procedure to be followed in case of fire (Regulation 25(1)(d)). 30 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

11: The positive relationships standard:

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the positive relationship standard, the registered person must ensure that staff:

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Requirement Due date

(2)(a)(x) are provided with supervision and support to enable them to understand and manage their own feelings and responses to the behaviour and emotions of children, and to help children to do the same. 30 May 2016 13: The leadership and management standard:

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the leadership and management standard, the registered person must:

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Requirement Due date

(2)(c) ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child;

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Requirement Due date

(h) use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. 30 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

Subject to paragraph (6), the registered person must ensure that the home is at all times conducted in a manner which is consistent with its statement of purpose (Regulation 16(5)). 30 May 2016

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Recommendations

To improve the quality and standards of care further, the service should take account of the following recommendations:

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Recommendations

Ensure that when a child returns to the home after being missing from care or away from the home without permission, the responsible local authority provides an opportunity for the child to have an independent return home interview (The Guide to the Quality Standards, page 45, paragraph 9.30).

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Recommendations

The registered person should only accept placements for children where they are satisfied that the home can respond effectively to the child's assessed needs as recorded in the child's relevant plans and where they have fully considered the impact that the placement will have on the existing group of children (The Guide to the Quality Standards, page 56, paragraph 11.4).

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Information about this children's home

The home is registered to provide care and accommodation for three young people with emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. It is operated by a private organisation.

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Recent inspection history

Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

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Recent inspection history

05/11/2015 Interim Sustained effectiveness

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Recent inspection history

30/12/2014 Interim Improved effectiveness

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Requires improvement

Shortfalls in key areas negatively impacts on the experiences and outcomes for children.

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Requires improvement

Educational outcomes for young people are varied. Some young people attend school regularly, while others are not attending education and are not receiving appropriate education support. Plans are being formulated, and an educational psychology report has been completed to inform the need for an education, health and care plan to support a return to education for a young person. Staff show they are committed to supporting young people’s education. One staff member commented that ‘they try their best to provide education within the home but it is very difficult to engage the young person’.

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Requires improvement

Currently, young people are reluctant to engage in activities with staff. Staff offer a range of leisure activities, but young people prefer to go out with their friends. Young people report that they play board games and have been to the cinema. The staff team is committed to promoting the well-being of young people who benefit from continuity of care. Agency staff are rarely employed, which ensures that young people have opportunities to build attachments with staff and to receive consistent care.

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Requires improvement

Young people report that they feel safe living at the home and can talk to staff if they have any worries or concerns. They speak positively about living at the home and say they ‘like the staff’. Young people’s meetings allow them regular opportunities to share their views about the running of the home, activities and menus.

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Requires improvement

Staff monitor young people’s routine health needs and support them to attend health appointments. Young people’s emotional and psychological needs are identified through assessments by a clinical psychologist, who compiles therapeutic plans. However, these plans are not implemented as staff are inadequately trained and supported to meet young people’s complex emotional needs.

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Requires improvement

Staff prepare young people well for their transition from the home to supported accommodation or independent living. Some young people are receiving support from staff in their new accommodation, helping to lessen anxiety and promote self- responsibility in the young people.

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Requires improvement

Although the staff team has a good knowledge of safeguarding issues, care plans and risk assessments do not provide clear strategies to guide them in meeting young people’s individual needs and reducing the potential of harm. Care plans are updated regularly but contain some inaccuracies in relation to current actions aimed at addressing young people’s specific needs. For example, the most recent care plan for one young person states that she is attending counselling with the child and adolescent mental health service when this is not the case. In relation to child sexual exploitation, there are no clear strategies in the care plan to address the suspected involvement of a young person. Consequently, staff do not have accurate information to support young people.

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Requires improvement

The registered manager and the cohesive staff team are clearly committed to keeping young people safe. Through links with the Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) and partnership networking events, the registered manager keeps up to date with safeguarding issues affecting the local community. Staff undertake training with the LSCB, which ensures that they have knowledge and understanding relating to specific safeguarding issues, such as child sexual exploitation, radicalisation and e-safety.

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Requires improvement

Risk assessments are not robust. For example, in relation to substance misuse, the very brief strategies only relate to discouraging a young person from smoking and key working around the dangers of smoking. No strategies are in place to address a young person’s suspected drug-taking behaviour. The risk assessment for a young person frequently leaving the home without permission has only a brief description of possible triggers and ineffective guidance for staff to support the young person to reduce such high-risk behaviour. The risk assessment following an incident of fire setting, although identifying the possible triggers, does not provide any guidance for staff on how to reduce the risk of potentially serious harm. The risk assessment for a young person demonstrating self-harm provides no strategies to reduce risk and to support the young person. A therapeutic plan compiled for a young person following a clinical psychology assessment has not been

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Requires improvement

implemented. Such a lack of clarity in relation to support and risk-reduction strategies does not adequately protect young people or promote positive outcomes.

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Requires improvement

Currently, there are frequent incidents involving young people leaving the home without permission and being reported missing. Robust support plans to guide staff in reducing this behaviour are not in place. Staff follow agreed procedures but there is little evidence of a proactive approach, including follow-up action and understanding the reasons for such behaviour. Independent return interviews are completed for one young person, but no such arrangements are in place for another young person.

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Requires improvement

Key work sessions for young people are sporadic and are not carried out according to any overall plan to provide support. There is little evidence of analysis following key work sessions, of plans for further follow-up work on key issues or of managerial oversight to guide staff.

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Requires improvement

Health and safety checks are up to date. However, there is no recorded fire drill following the admission of a young person, which compromises their safety in the event of an emergency. Arrangements for recruiting staff are safe and effective.

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Requires improvement

The manager has been in post since November 2013. She is registered with Ofsted and is suitably qualified and experienced for the role.

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Requires improvement

A previous recommendation relating to young people having free access to the kitchen has not been met. Staff lock the dining room at night, preventing young people’s access to the kitchen. However, the registered manager has implemented a risk assessment demonstrating that this restricted access is necessary to safeguard them. Another recommendation, made at the last inspection, related to ensuring that young people receive a return interview with an independent person following an incident where they have been reported missing. This has not been met and is repeated.

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Requires improvement

Impact risk assessments are in place for new admissions to the home. However, they do not demonstrate fully how placement decisions are made. The assessments do not clearly consider the impact of high-risk behaviour on young people already living at the home. For example, it is not evident that behaviour resulting in missing from care exhibited by both the newly admitted young person and the existing young person had been carefully considered to minimise the impact on each other.

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Requires improvement

Although staff supervision is regular, current practice does not provide adequate opportunities for reflection and support that would enable them to understand and manage their own feelings and responses to the behaviour and emotions of young people with complex needs. There is a lack of clear direction and specific action for staff to develop their practice and a lack of continuity and follow-up in subsequent sessions.

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Requires improvement

New staff undertake a comprehensive induction and training programme. All staff undertake core training. However, they have not undertaken recent training to enable them to support young people to understand and manage the impact of their past experiences of abuse and neglect, or the effects of trauma and attachment difficulties. In addition, staff have not undertaken appropriate training in self-harm awareness to enable them to support young people displaying such high-risk behaviour effectively.

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Requires improvement

Monitoring reports by an independent visitor lead to actions to address shortfalls. Internal monitoring systems are not wholly effective in identifying weaknesses in care plans, risk assessments, supervision and training needs.

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Requires improvement

The statement of purpose clearly sets out the psychological and clinical support provided to the home. The therapeutic ethos is to ensure that there is high-quality training, support and supervision of the staff team, in order to encourage staff to adopt therapeutically informed parenting practices to meet the complex needs of young people. Staff have not undertaken suitable training and are not receiving the required levels of support and supervision to apply this therapeutic approach. Consequently, managers are not delivering this ethos as set out in the statement of purpose.

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What the inspection judgements mean

The experiences and progress of children and young people are at the centre of the inspection. Inspectors will use their professional judgement to determine the weight and significance of their findings in this respect. The judgements included in the report are made against ‘Inspection of children's homes: framework for inspection’.

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What the inspection judgements mean

An outstanding children's home provides highly effective services that contribute to significantly improved outcomes for children and young people who need help and protection and care. Their progress exceeds expectations and is sustained over time. A good children's home provides effective services that help, protect and care for children and young people and have their welfare safeguarded and promoted. In a children's home that requires improvement , there are no widespread or serious failures that create or leave children being harmed or at risk of harm. The welfare of looked after children is safeguarded and promoted. Minimum requirements are in place, however, the children's home is not yet delivering good protection, help and care for children and young people. A children's home that is inadequate is providing services where there are widespread or serious failures that create or leave children and young people being

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What the inspection judgements mean

harmed or at risk of harm or result in children looked after not having their welfare safeguarded and promoted.

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people living in the children's home. Inspectors considered the quality of work and the difference adults make to the lives of children and young people. They read case files, watched how professional staff work with children, young people and each other and discussed the effectiveness of help and care given to children and young people. Wherever possible, they talked to children, young people and their families. In addition the inspectors have tried to understand what the children's home knows about how well it is performing, how well it is doing and what difference it is making for the children and young people who it is trying to help, protect and look after. This 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 Children's

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Information about this inspection

Homes (England) Regulations 2015 and the Guide to the children's homes regulations including the quality standards. the guidance ‘Raising concerns and making complaints about Ofsted’, which is available from Ofsted's website: www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted . If you would like Ofsted to send you a copy of the guidance, please telephone 0300123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk .

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Information about this inspection

achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children's social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, work- based learning and skills training, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It inspects services for looked after children and child protection. If you would like a copy of this document in a different format, such as large print or Braille, please telephone 0300 123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk . You may reuse this information (not including logos) free of charge in any format or medium, under the terms of the Open Government Licence. To view this licence, visit www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence , write to the Information Policy Team,

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Information about this inspection

The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk .

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Information about this inspection

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Information about this inspection

Store Street Manchester M1 2WD T: 0300 123 1231 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted

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