Children's Home run by Meadows Care Limited in Kirklees

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:

 The manager is newly in post and has made insufficient progress in addressing the considerable shortfalls identified at the interim inspection in February 2016.  Five requirements remain unmet. The manager does not escalate the concerns regarding young people’s plans within the placing authority and there continue to be delays in decision-making for young people.  Staff do not receive refresher training for managing missing incidents which would support their knowledge of the necessity and benefits of safe and well checks and return interviews. Staff do not ensure that placing authorities offer return interviews when young people are missing.  Staff do not ensure that young people who are disengaged with education receive robust well-coordinated support to re-engage.  The manager has not developed a monitoring and reviewing system which would lead to continuous improvements and does not respond effectively to

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The children's home provision requires improvement because:

the recommendations of the independent visitor to improve specific shortfalls.  The manager does not ensure that young people receive continuity of care. Staff are redeployed within the organisation, leading to shortfalls in the stability of the home.  There are shortfalls in the safe recruitment of staff, and details about who has worked in the home fail to be recorded.  The manager has not ensured that all staff who have been working in the home since 1 April 2014 have achieved the relevant qualification.  The manager uses monitoring and surveillance within the home, without appropriate individualised risk assessments in place. The use of bedroom door alarms throughout the day does not promote young people’s welfare and safety proportionally to protecting their privacy. This does not promote a homely environment.

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The children's home strengths

 The core staff team develops positive relationships with young people which enables them to talk about what is difficult.  The core staff team really listen to young people and are able to develop highly individualised behaviour management plans as a result.  Staff support young people’s contact with their families and enable them to maintain and develop their sense of identity.  Staff welcome young people who are new to the home sensitively and quickly learn about their experiences and needs. They also support young people who leave the home in an unplanned way to move to their new placements.  Staff always look for young people when they are missing. They follow them and search for them at known places. Staff keep trying to find young people and work effectively with the police in sharing information.

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Statutory requirements

This section sets out the actions which must be taken so that the registered persons meet 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 persons must comply within the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

5: Engaging with the wider system to ensure that children's needs are met

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Requirement Due date

In meeting the quality standards, the registered person must, and must ensure that staff—

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Requirement Due date

(a) seek to involve each child's placing authority effectively in the child's care, in accordance with the child's relevant plans; and

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Requirement Due date

(c) if the registered person considers, or staff consider, a placing authority's or a relevant person's performance or response to be inadequate in relation to their role, challenge the placing authority or the relevant person to seek to ensure that each child's needs are met in accordance with the child's relevant plans. In particular, this applies to the lack of robust escalation within placing authorities to address delays in meeting young people's needs. 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

(1) The protection of children standard is that children are protected from harm and enabled to keep themselves safe.

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Requirement Due date

(2) In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure—

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Requirement Due date

(iii) have the skills to identify and act upon signs that a child is at risk of harm. This is with specific regard to ensuring that staff have refresher training in the management and prevention of missing from home events. 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

12: The protection of children standard 31 May 2016 (1) The protection of children standard is that children are protected from harm and enabled to keep themselves safe.

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Requirement Due date

(2) In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure—

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Requirement Due date

(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. This is with specific regard to ensuring that independent return interviews are held in line with statutory guidance.

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Requirement Due date

13: The leadership and management standard

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Requirement Due date

(1) The leadership and management standard is that the registered person enables, inspires and leads a culture in relation to the children's home that—

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Requirement Due date

(a) helps children aspire to fulfil their potential; and

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Requirement Due date

(2) In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to—

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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. This is with specific regard to taking action in relation to the independent visitor's recommendations and effectively monitoring and reviewing the quality of care provided. 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

(1) The education standard is that children make measurable progress towards achieving their educational potential and are helped to do so.

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Requirement Due date

(2) In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure—

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Requirement Due date

(iii) understand the barriers to learning that each child may face and take appropriate action to help the child to overcome any such barriers; and 31 May 2016 (vi) maintain regular contact with each child's education and training provider, including engaging with the provider and the placing authority to support the child's education and training and to maximise the child's achievement.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain in the home the records in Schedule 4 and ensure that the records are kept up to date. In particular that all relevant information is recorded about temporary staff who work in the home (Regulation 37 (2)(a)-(b)). 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that an individual who works in the home in a care role has attained the appropriate qualification, the Level 3 Diploma for Residential Childcare (England), by the relevant date. In the case of an individual who was working in a care role in a home on 1st April 2014, the relevant date is 1st April 2016 (Regulation 32(4)-(5)). 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

The registered person may only allow an individual to work at the home if the registered provider has full and satisfactory information available in relation to the individual in respect of each of the matters in Schedule 2 (Regulation 32(3)(d)). 31 May 2016

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Requirement Due date

The registered person may only use devices for the monitoring or surveillance of children if it is for the purpose of safeguarding and promoting the welfare of the child concerned, or other children, and it is no more intrusive than necessary, having regard to the child's need for privacy (Regulation 24(1)(a) and (d)). 31 May 2016

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Information about this children's home

The home is registered to provide care for three children with emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. The home forms part of a large social care company.

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Recent inspection history

Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

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Recent inspection history

25 February 2016 Interim Declined in effectiveness

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Recent inspection history

20 January 2015 Interim Improved effectiveness

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Requires improvement

The period since the last inspection has been characterised by increasing risk taking by young people and disengagement from their staff. Staff endeavour to remain physically and emotionally available to young people. This has been compromised by a lack of continuity of care for young people, as core staff team members are removed to cover shortfalls elsewhere in the company.

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Requires improvement

Staff develop positive relationships with young people. They are able to talk about what is difficult with staff, although their behaviours show no signs of progressing or risks reducing. For example, some young people with poor hygiene routines make little progress in understanding the need for regular bathing, and some young people who are involved with the youth offending service fail to answer bail or attend appointments. This does not promote their welfare or improve their outcomes.

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Requires improvement

Young people do not receive 25 hours of education. Staff do not record the actions that they take to support young people to progress or their interaction with education providers. One young person’s attendance is 0.96% for the last term, and there are no plans detailing staff’s actions to progress this. There are no records of concerns being escalated within the placing authority or to the virtual school headteacher. Consequently, some young people who are at crucial points in their education – year 11 – are not receiving education.

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Requires improvement

Staff support young people to prepare for independent living. Some young people engage with staff and develop skills in cooking, washing their clothes and managing their money. Other young people do not engage and, despite staff’s efforts, they disengage and do not have the emotional resilience or practical skills needed for their transition to adulthood and independent living.

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Requires improvement

Staff promote healthy living, and young people have access to universal health services. Therapeutic intervention is provided through direct work with young people and through support to the staff team. Some young people engage with therapy in a meaningful way, and this results in improved family relationships. Other young people refuse to engage in therapeutic intervention and, as a result, they make no progress in improving their emotional resilience or tackling their risk- taking behaviours.

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Requires improvement

Staff support young people’s contact with their families and friends when that is safe and in their best interests. They work effectively with placing authorities to coordinate responses so that young people are able to develop and maintain family relationships and their senses of identity. Staff invite young people’s friends into the home so that they are made to feel welcome. Staff support young people to make positive decisions about choosing healthy relationships. Staff ensure that young people’s cultural and religious identities are promoted. They are sensitive to both parents’ and young people’s wishes about observance of their religion.

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Requires improvement

Staff ensure that the physical environment of the home is well-maintained and that appropriate health and safety checks are made. They display photographs of young people around the home and encourage them to invest in the home through their decoration of their own bedrooms. This creates a homely and safe environment.

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Requires improvement

Staff understand the risks to individual young people regarding their missing behaviour, substance misuse and criminal activity. Staff attempt to engage with young people to address these behaviours through individual sessions and through referrals to specialist child exploitation and substance misuse services. However, young people do not engage, and the manager gives notice on young people’s placements when staff are unable to keep them safe.

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Requires improvement

Staff look for young people when they go missing and try to maintain contact with them. They look in known places and work with other children’s home staff, as young people frequently go missing with their peers from the organisation’s other homes. A placing authority social worker said, ‘I would say staff did their best to safeguard my young person when she was placed there. They were hot on her heels whenever she absconded and had protocols with the local police and train staff to return the young person anytime she absconded.’ Staff do not ensure that records of missing episodes are well kept, and there are gaps which prevent oversight and improvements in strategic responses. These include staff not ensuring that placing authorities conduct return interviews or understanding that these are required.

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Requires improvement

Staff work effectively with the police. They share information with them to help to keep young people safe. The police value their efforts to keep young people in sight and describe this as ‘brilliant’. This ensures a coordinated response when young people are missing from home.

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Requires improvement

Young people’s risk-taking behaviours do not reduce. Young people continue to misuse substances and to be sexually exploited as they obtain illegal substances. Young people experience significant negative effects due to using illegal substances, but are not deterred from continuing to misuse them.

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Requires improvement

The home uses electronic monitoring which includes bedroom door alarms. The manager does not ensure that these are individually risk assessed, to reflect individual young people’s welfare and safeguarding concerns. Consequently, the bedroom door alarms are on all day and night, regardless of the proportionality of this or the impact on young people’s privacy. This creates an institutionalised feel in an otherwise homely environment.

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Requires improvement

Some young people report feeling safe in the home. They understand how to complain, but there have been no complaints by young people. One young person told the independent visitor, ‘There is nothing staff can do to prevent the risk of me going missing. They follow me and know where I am so I go missing less.’ The manager responds in a timely manner to neighbours who complain about noise late at night and police and ambulances frequently being called to the home.

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Requires improvement

Staff reward positive behaviour. They are skilled in de-escalation and distraction techniques and, as a result, physical intervention has not been used by staff for over a year. Staff introduce reward systems to improve behaviours, but these are of limited use with young people failing to engage.

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Requires improvement

The current manager has been in post for two months and is beginning to address the shortfalls in the home. The manager has previous experience of managing children’s residential care, and has obtained the appropriate qualification in leadership and management for children’s homes. She has not yet submitted her application to be registered by Ofsted.

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Requires improvement

The current manager has started at a point of significant difficulty within the home, with increases in risk-taking behaviours among the three young people in placement. She has recognised when staff have not been able to meet young people’s needs to keep them safe, and has served notice on these placements. Senior managers in the organisation have been informed of these concerns, but they have not been escalated within the placing authority in order that decisions could be made in a timely manner to keep young people safe. The manager has not ensured that the staff’s refresher training on missing from home addresses the necessity for safe and well and return interviews to take place as required by guidance (‘Statutory guidance for children who run away or go missing from home or care’, Department for Education, 2014). Return interviews do not always take place and, when they do, there is inconsistency in how these are recorded. This

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Requires improvement

means that important opportunities to gain information to inform strategic planning of how to safeguard that young person are lost.

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Requires improvement

The manager does not have in place a system, which ensures that the quality of care is effectively monitored and reviewed. She has not responded robustly to the recommendations of the independent visitor in relation to her accurate identification of shortfalls, for example, regarding staff training, substance misuse, missing episodes, or timely reviews of risk assessments to reflect accurately young people’s current behaviours. The manager has ensured that there are sufficient staff and there has been recruitment to the team. However, there is a lack of continuity of care when staff are redeployed within the organisation to cover shortfalls in other children’s homes. This is detrimental to young people’s welfare, as they disengage from staff and exploit situations of unfamiliar staff’s vulnerability.

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Requires improvement

The manager has addressed five of the ten requirements raised at the interim inspection. She ensures that Ofsted is notified of significant events and the steps being taken to try to prevent the recurrence of young people’s risk-taking behaviours. She ensures that staff are proactive in engaging with young people’s friends and their families, to safeguard young people effectively. The manager ensures that strategy meetings take place, in order that there is a multi-disciplinary approach to safeguarding young people, and that placing authorities review their care plans when young people are frequently missing and staff cannot keep them safe.

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Requires improvement

Young people are not making progress across all areas of their development. One young person engages in increasing levels of substance misuse, resulting in her experiencing a seizure and the need for hospital care. Some young people do not make educational progress, and those who are at key points in their education – Year 11 – are not receiving education from a school placement or engaging with tutors in the home. There is no evidence that the manager has escalated these concerns to senior managers in placing authorities or virtual school head teachers. Some young people, who are aged over 16 years, are not making progress educationally. There are no robust plans in place to engage them in college or work.

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Requires improvement

There are shortfalls in safe recruitment and staffing. The manager does not ensure that she has complete employment histories for staff, or that convictions, which are disclosed as part of the disclosure and barring checks, are adequately risk assessed. Not all staff who have been employed for over two years have completed their relevant level 3 diplomas, as regulation requires. New staff have been recruited to work in the home, showing that the manager is taking steps to improve the lack of continuity of care. The core staff team endeavours to provide care in line with the statement of purpose and to work in partnership with the in-house therapists to provide nurturing care for young people. Staff understand how to manage allegations made by young people and the role of the local authority designated officer. There have been no allegations since the last inspection. Staff are aware of child protection issues and refer any concerns promptly.

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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 children looked after 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 that 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 whom 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, workbased 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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