Children's home in Manchester

Good

The children’s home provides effective services that meet the requirements for good.

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The children’s home provision is good because:

 The home provides high quality care for children with a range of complex emotional and behavioural needs. It brings stability to children’s lives and helps them to prepare for moving to long-term placements.  The child’s voice is central to their care. Children’s views inform person- centred care planning. Their individual needs and interests are well promoted. They participate in enjoyable community activities where they make friends.  Children’s physical and mental health is well promoted. Over time, they make progress in all areas of their development.  Good safeguarding procedures keep children safe, and dangerous situations are well managed.  The home maintains clear boundaries that help children to feel secure and know what is expected.  The manager and staff are suitably qualified, trained and competent. Staff shortages are covered by a small number of agency staff whom children know well. This promotes consistency of care.

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The children’s home provision is good because:

 Partnership working is good and ensures, in most cases, that children receive the support and specialist interventions that they need.  The registered manager strives to secure appropriate education for children, including asylum-seeking children. Despite this, the arrangements for some children’s education are not good enough. The responsible individual is addressing this with senior managers in the local authority.  There is a clear focus on challenging and reducing bullying. Although much has been done to address this, it remains an issue for some children. The home continues to develop strategies to address bullying with those involved, and seeks advice and guidance from specialist professionals.  Leaders and managers have a good overview of the strengths and weaknesses of the home. They have improved the quality of care by addressing shortfalls identified at the last inspection and by the home’s own

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The children’s home provision is good because:

monitoring processes. Independent visitor reports do not yet provide ongoing helpful, thorough assessments of the arrangements for promoting children’s safety and welfare. This is a work in progress and clear steps are being taken to improve this quality assurance function.

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Recommendations

To improve the quality and standards of care further, the service should take account of the following recommendations:  Ensure that any review of care focuses on the quality of the care provided by the home, and the impact that care is having on outcomes and improvements for children. The report should identify timeframes for how identified actions to improve will be assessed, to enable continuous improvement in the home. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 64, paragraph 15.2)

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Recommendations

 Ensure that any independent visitor makes a rigorous assessment of the home’s arrangements for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of young people in the home’s care. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 65, paragraph 15.5)

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Recommendations

 Do more to reduce bullying. Ensure that staff understand what they must do to prevent bullying of children by other children. Staff should have the skills to intervene, protect and address bullying behaviour effectively, in line with the home’s procedures. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 39, paragraph 8.16)

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Recommendations

 Ensure that the arrangements for staff supervision provide for each staff member to receive supervision of their practice from an appropriately qualified and experienced professional, which allows them to reflect on their practice and the needs of the children in their care. Ensure that one-to-one supervision is carried out and recorded in accordance with the home’s policy. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 61, paragraphs 13.2, 13.3)

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Recommendations

 Ensure that, through a proactive relationship with appropriate school and education support services, when a placement is commissioned in the home, including for an unaccompanied asylum-seeking child, the home establishes clearly how the local authority will provide education that meets the child’s needs. In particular, ensure that all children receive the education to which they are entitled and any delays in accessing education, caused by age assessments, are reduced as a result of effective partnership working. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 27, paragraph 5.5, 5.7)

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Information about this children’s home

This is a local authority home that provides accommodation for up to six children and young people with emotional and behavioural difficulties.

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Recent inspection history

Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

p.5

Recent inspection history

24 February 2016 Interim Improved effectiveness

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Recent inspection history

13 October 2015 Full Requires improvement

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Recent inspection history

11 March 2015 Interim Sustained effectiveness

p.5

Good

The home looks after six children with a wide range of individual needs which staff respond to very well. This promotes their continuing progress. For most children, the home provides short- to medium-term care. It helps children to establish good routines, improve their engagement with education, reduce their challenging behaviour and develop their social skills. By providing stability and consistent boundaries, the home prepares them for placements in foster families or for independent living.

p.6

Good

Over time, children develop strong relationships with staff. They respond well to the clear boundaries and routines and they enjoy their lives more. The home helps children with limited understanding of English to learn the language and arranges interpreters for them to help them to make effective contributions to their own care planning. There are sometimes delays in setting up language tuition, which is frustrating for children who have difficulty communicating in an unfamiliar country and culture. However, staff are persistent in challenging the local authority to provide tutors for children, and they do all they can to help asylum-seeking children communicate their needs and wishes.

p.6

Good

Children’s cultural needs are well met, and they are encouraged and enabled to meet up with others with the same ethnic and cultural background as themselves. This helps children to develop confidence and reduces their anxieties. Children from different faith groups are assisted to follow their religion, participate in religious festivals and attend services in accordance with their wishes. For example, Muslim children follow a strict diet and attend the local mosque, where they are made welcome. This engenders a sense of belonging in the community.

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Good

Children enjoy a range of activities in accordance with their individual needs and plans. They learn new skills and have fun mixing with peers, both in the home and with friends they have met at organised group activities. For example, one child enjoys attending army cadets, which helps her to build self-esteem and resilience and make new friends. Others enjoy trips to the cinema, swimming, trampolining and shopping.

p.6

Good

Staff support children to develop self-care and independence skills and, where appropriate, to go out independently, using public transport and finding their way to the shops and local facilities. Staff use an orientation programme with children new to the area and help those preparing to leave to acquire the skills they need for independent living. Young people ready to move on say that they have learned a lot at the home and are well prepared for the future.

p.6

Good

There has been one new admission to the home since the interim inspection. This was a child who requested to return, following a short foster placement. Transition to the foster placement had been well planned and staff had supported the placement, working in partnership with the social worker and foster carers. However, the child had not settled well and recognised she had built strong relationships with the staff team previously. She had missed the hustle and bustle of life in the home and wished to return.

p.7

Good

Children’s health needs are very well promoted. The home works effectively with the looked after children nurse. This ensures, as far as possible, that health plans are up to date and children receive the health services and treatment that they need.

p.7

Good

Children’s emotional, mental and psychological health needs are well promoted. They receive individual support from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) in accordance with their assessed needs. Children reduce their self-harming behaviour and learn to manage their anger better, over time. One explained: ‘I used to lash out at staff and hit them. I control it a lot better now.’

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Good

A professional from CAMHS regularly attends staff team meetings, and provides advice and guidance on parenting children with attachment difficulties and challenging behaviour. This helps staff to respond more effectively to children who have highly complex emotional and behavioural needs. Some children receive support from independent visitors, such as Coram Voice. This helps to make sure that the child’s needs are central to planning and that the child’s voice is heard.

p.7

Good

Most children express their views confidently. They contribute to their care plans and comment on the care they receive at the home. Those who are not sufficiently confident to attend their case review meetings comfortably rely on staff to represent them and give them feedback on decisions made.

p.7

Good

The children in the current group have difficulty in interacting positively with each other. Staff continually promote positive, shared experiences and encourage tolerance. Through key worker sessions and group meetings, they help children to reflect on incidents and on their part in disputes within the group. There is evidence of some children beginning to have a better understanding of how their own behaviour impacts on others, and they are interacting more appropriately as a result.

p.7

Good

The manager and staff have worked hard to combat the institutional nature of the premises so that, despite the look and layout of the home, it provides a comfortable and homely environment. However, it is not domestic in style and children don’t bring friends home. They said that it is not the sort of place you bring your friends. Three of the six children currently living in the home have very good attendance and attainment at school. The home provides children who are not in school with structure and stimulation during the school day by arranging outings to museums and places of interest, as well as providing children with plenty of opportunities to participate in exercise and in arts and crafts work. Staff encourage children to engage in these activities with varying degrees of success.

p.7

Good

One child is not receiving the education to which he is entitled. The manager has addressed this persistently with the school, the social worker and the local authority virtual head, but their response has been slow. The child is becoming increasingly disengaged with education. No suitable work or home tuition has been provided. A mentor has been supplied for six hours a week, while an education health and care plan assessment takes place. This does not ensure that he gets the best possible education while excluded from school.

p.8

Good

The manager continues to challenge professionals to fulfil their responsibilities to this child, and the responsible individual has raised concerns with senior managers in the local authority. This demonstrates that the home is tenacious in supporting children to receive a suitable education.

p.8

Good

One asylum-seeking child waited for eight months for a suitable school place. Local authority delays in completing an age assessment on the child contributed significantly to delays in setting up a suitable education placement. In order to avoid such situations in future, the home has worked with the local authority to implement changes to procedures and with personnel responsible for age assessments. This should minimise delays in future but has not yet been tested.

p.8

Good

The home appropriately challenged the social worker and virtual head to address both the delay in providing education and the failure to provide English language tuition for this child. The local authority’s response was poor and lacked urgency. Consequently, the child had no education for two terms. However, since April 2016, he has enjoyed full-time education and says, 'School is really good’.

p.8

Good

Good, individual risk assessments are based on information in care plans and they provide guidance to staff on how to manage children’s identified risk-taking behaviour. They are regularly reviewed and updated, following incidents. This helps the home to keep children safe and enables children to take age-appropriate risks. Staff supervise children closely and address harmful behaviour quickly. For example, by responding quickly and effectively to fire-setting incidents, the home has protected children from serious injury. Staff are alert to children’s emotional stability and take action to protect them from self-injury and to access professional support from mental health services, where needed. This helps to keep vulnerable children safe.

p.8

Good

Strong safeguarding measures protect children from risks associated with social media, including grooming and inappropriate sharing of personal information and photographs. These include close supervision of children using the internet, and careful assessment of children’s ability to use a mobile phone and the internet safely. Where there are concerns for children’s vulnerability to exploitation, specialist help is obtained through multi-agency working. This means that children are supported by specialists to raise their awareness of how to stay safe. Staff are trained to recognise behaviours that might indicate involvement with unsafe people. There are currently no children considered to be at high risk of exploitation or extremism. Where there are concerns that a child may have been subject to human trafficking, the home refers them appropriately to the National Referral Mechanism for an investigation and assessment of their safety.

p.9

Good

The home seeks help from other professionals where their engagement is likely to promote children’s safety further. For example, the home arranged for children to meet with fire officers, police and youth offending services to address fire safety, antisocial behaviour and bullying.

p.9

Good

Staff follow clear guidance and good systems that promote the safety of vulnerable children who go missing from care. There have been 14 incidents of children going missing since the last full inspection. This relates to four children, of whom two have moved on to more suitable placements. Children are reported missing in line with their individual protocols and their details are shared with the police in advance to ensure that there is no delay in searching for them when they go missing. No children have been missing overnight since the last inspection. Wherever possible, staff maintain contact with missing children by phone. They search the local area, liaise effectively with police and make contact with children’s families and friends. This helps to promote their safe and swift return.

p.9

Good

In most instances, children receive independent return interviews which are arranged by the local authority. Where there are delays in such visits being arranged, the home follows this up with the responsible coordinator. This helps to ensure that children have the opportunity to speak with an independent person on their return from being missing.

p.9

Good

Staff are trained to use restraint safely. They receive refresher training regularly to ensure that they maintain their skills so that the risk of injury during a restraint is minimised. A child explained: ‘When I’m angry I don’t know my own strength. I’ve got anger management problems and I floored a teacher at school. I control it better now. They have to hold my arms and legs to restrain me. They do it safely here.’

p.9

Good

Records demonstrate that restraint is used appropriately and only where necessary to prevent serious harm. Each incident is reviewed by the manager and a debrief is carried out with staff and children in recognition of the distress such an incident can cause. This good practice helps children and staff to reflect on the incident and consider how it can be avoided in the future.

p.10

Good

The home provides clear and consistent boundaries which help children, over time, to develop self-control and more socially acceptable behaviour. Children who have lived in the home for some time recognise how their behaviour has significantly improved and they are managing their anger better. One explained: ‘My behaviour has changed a lot since I’ve lived here. I’m being good more now.’ Staff persistently challenge antisocial behaviour, including bullying. They seek and follow guidance in parenting strategies from relevant professionals and demonstrate commitment and patience in managing children with extremely challenging behaviour.

p.10

Good

Children say the home is ‘alright’ but they would prefer not to live here. Some children say they do not feel safe when staff are not present. This is because they are frequently subject to assault and name-calling from a younger peer. For example, one said, ‘I’m worried I might hurt myself if he says things about my Dad,’ and another said, ‘It’s difficult to live with him. He keeps punching us when staff are not there and that makes me upset and low and angry.’

p.10

Good

The home is proactive in addressing this with the children concerned immediately following each incident. In addition, bullying is regularly discussed at children’s group meetings and key worker meetings. The manager arranged a group session focusing on bullying, which was led by a youth offending officer. Further individual sessions are to be held with one child, in recognition that the child needs more help to reduce his bullying behaviour. This shows that the home takes bullying behaviour seriously and takes action to reduce and eliminate it. The home maintains close supervision of this child to reduce the likelihood of assault on others. All children’s placement plans are kept under regular review, and consideration of bullying and antisocial behaviour is a key element when reviewing the continuing suitability of the placement.

p.10

Good

The home’s manager is suitably experienced and qualified. She has managed children’s homes for this local authority since 2007 and took over as manager of this home in 2013. She competently leads a well-established team of mostly qualified carers and is ably assisted by an experienced, effective deputy manager. Unqualified staff are appropriately engaged in qualification training and are thereby developing their skills.

p.11

Good

Together, the staff team provide consistent, nurturing care. Two staff members have left since the last inspection. Recruitment drives have not been successful in sourcing suitable replacements. Three agency and relief staff work full time at the home to cover shortfalls in the rota. This ensures that children are looked after by consistent carers whom they know well.

p.11

Good

The manager is closely supervised and supported by the operations manager and together the management team is driving all-round improvement in the home. The manager produces regular governance and scrutiny reports which inform strategic developments within children’s residential services. These provide senior managers with good qualitative and quantitative information about the operation of the home and how well the authority is fulfilling its duties to children and meeting their needs. This helps to promote improvement in the local authority’s children’s services. A recommendation made at the last inspection to improve the quality of the manager’s reviews on the quality of care remains outstanding, as the next report is not yet due.

p.11

Good

Leaders and managers know the strengths and weaknesses of the home. The workforce development plan addresses staff training needs and focuses on ensuring that staff are suitably skilled to meet children’s needs. Staff keep up to date with changes and developments in the social care sector and renew their core skills regularly. This helps them to understand how to meet children’s diverse and wide-ranging needs.

p.11

Good

Children benefit from being looked after by staff who are well supported through regular team meetings and guidance from a clinical psychologist. This helps staff to understand children’s individual parenting needs and promotes consistent responses to challenging behaviour. In addition, the manager’s open-door policy ensures that staff have access to ongoing, informal supervision and support, which helps them to respond effectively to everyday challenges. The arrangements for individual one-to-one staff supervision are less good, and some staff do not have supervision in line with the home’s policy. This limits their opportunities to reflect on their practice with a line manager, or to review the quality and impact of their relationships with children.

p.11

Good

The improvements evident at the interim inspection in February 2016 are increasingly well embedded, and good progress has been made in relation to shortfalls identified. The arrangements for independent review of the home are being strengthened. A newly developed training programme is shortly to be presented to independent visitors. This should equip them with improved skills to monitor the operation of the home and the quality of care, but it has not yet been tested.

p.11

Good

The home has strong relationships with other agencies, including the police, health professionals and some schools. Regular case reviews and multi-professional meetings ensure that all relevant professionals contribute to placement planning and decision making. Disruption meetings are held when there are concerns about children’s safety and wellbeing. This ensures that children’s needs are central to practice and are under continuous review.

p.12

Good

Leaders and managers actively challenge other services to improve when children are not receiving the service to which they are entitled. They also work with local shops and services to ensure that children are kept safe in the area. This is effective in promoting children’s safety, including their online safety.

p.12

Good

The home operates in accordance with its statement of purpose. The manager maintains regular oversight of children’s experiences and progress. She ensures that children move on to more suitable placements quickly, when this is in their best interests.

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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 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 children looked after 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

Interested in our work? You can subscribe to our monthly newsletter for more information and updates: http://eepurl.com/iTrDn .

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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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