Children's home run by Horizon Care Limited in Cannock Chase

children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

This home was judged good at the full inspection. At this interim inspection, Ofsted judges that it has declined in effectiveness.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Four young people have lived in the home since the full inspection in May 2016. Two young people are still living at the home and two have moved on.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Young people are no longer making good progress. Their welfare needs are not met and, at times, they are unsafe. Young people admitted to the home since the last inspection have not been well matched. For example, some have been admitted to the home as emergencies with inadequate planning. Large numbers of agency and bank staff are used to provide cover. This compromises young people’s experience of consistency of care. The very small group of core staff lack skills and qualifications. This means that they are slow to make meaningful relationships with young people. As a result, young people do not engage well with staff and they receive little real help with their emotional and behavioural difficulties. Over five months, there have been high levels of running away and bullying. There have also been a number of incidents of violence and unsafe behaviour, both at the home and in the community.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Staff have not adequately addressed young people’s difficulties with going missing from care and the risks of child sexual exploitation. One young person went missing immediately after arriving at the home. She was known to have experienced child sexual exploitation. However, staff were unable to make any meaningful relationships with her to keep her safe. While at the home, she was missing at least 14 times in three months, often for several days and occasionally for weeks. She was able to elude staff and used her mobile phone to arrange to be collected by car or taxi and get to train stations. The manager did not request that the local authority should urgently review the placement. She did not make a positive contribution to the plan for this young person and was not proactive enough to engage the local authority to safeguard her. As a result, the young person’s needs were not met. In addition, staff were not able to prevent another

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

young person from going missing with her. Staff did not always ensure that return interviews took place and, often, the young people had gone missing again before staff or police officers could speak with them. The staff team has consisted of only three or four members during the six months since the last inspection. Only one member of staff and the manager are qualified in residential childcare. One member of staff has been working in residential childcare for two years, but has not yet achieved the required qualification. As a result, shifts are frequently led by either unqualified core staff or cover staff who do not know the young people. Young people have experienced almost daily inconsistencies in their care, because either agency staff or staff from other homes have covered day and waking night shifts. For example, during the month of June 24 different staff were used in addition to those in the core staff team.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Staffing arrangements to safeguard young people are inadequate. For example, two serious incidents have occurred when young people obtained the keys to a car and attempted to drive it onto the main road. Staff failed to manage the second incident quickly, and young people were able to get into the car a second time and attempted to drive it again. Young people also ran off down the main road in the dark and help was needed from the police to ensure their safety. Similarly, staff do not know or follow risk assessments. On one occasion, this resulted in staff taking a young person to see a previous resident at her new home. The two young people had gone missing together many times and were in a relationship. A serious incident happened at the other home that involved an assault on staff and young people, and serious damage. Staff from both homes were unable to work together effectively to manage the arrangements safely.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Young people are not well matched and try to harm one another. Staff have not been able to prevent young people from bullying one another by posting hurtful messages on social media and setting fire to personal belongings. Staff have not always been able to keep young people from entering one another’s rooms and staying up all night attempting to do so. One young person ran away from the home and refused to return until another young person who was bullying her was moved. She said that she did not feel safe. She was away from the home for a number of weeks, staying with various family members. Her placement, and those of other young people, were not urgently reviewed in the light of serious incidents and safety concerns. Instead, young people’s placements drifted and they were poorly prepared for their moves from the home.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

The core staff team and cover staff do not make secure and positive relationships with young people. They lack the capacity, knowledge, insight, creativity, tenacity, and skill to make positive relationships with young people. Some of them show little enthusiasm or aspiration for what young people can achieve, but expect young people to choose to engage. One young person’s recent review report said, ‘There is still a long way to go, and this can only really be done once [young person] has committed to the home fully.’ Without good-quality relationships, young people feel isolated. They move into the home as emergencies, but do not understand their plans. They have no idea what staff are going to do to help them with their problems. They therefore struggle to engage. They either stay in their room, go missing or resort to manipulative behaviour. For example, young people have grabbed the daily log book, unscrewed fixtures and fittings in the house, and

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

refused to go to school. A young person who was placed here six weeks ago stays in his room on his own and sometimes only comes out for an evening meal. Another young person will not let staff into her room. Staff cannot persuade her to accept their support to organise her room, yet they still have not decorated it to choice that she made some months ago. Overall, young people seldom engage in the life of the home and make very little progress to overcome their emotional and behaviour difficulties.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Staff are seldom successful in getting young people into regular education where they can fulfil their potential. Only one young people has been in school or college over the six months since the last inspection, but she has never attended on all five days of any week. Staff describe her education placement as ‘very up and down’. Another young person sometimes attends one day a week at an outdoor education provision. Two young people have had no identified school or college placement. Staff and the manager are not proactive enough about advocating for young people to be in education. They do not have effective enough support from their own organisation, or effective relationships with local authorities and education providers. In addition, the work that staff provide the young people with is often given without direct help or engagement from staff. This continues to hold back the development of positive relationships between staff and young people.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

Young people’s emotional health is poor and their psychological needs are not being met. This is because staff have superficial relationships with them and do not know them well. Staff have access to a helpful individual therapeutic action plan for each young person that has been devised by the organisation’s psychologist. However, very few staff demonstrate the capacity to use the advice and guidance in these plans. Young people are not benefiting from helpful, therapeutic relationships with staff. They do not have anything child friendly written down for them about what their plans are and what staff aspire for them to achieve. As a result, young people continue to have very low confidence. They do not know how staff are going to help them to overcome their difficulties.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

The registered manager is struggling to maintain a safe home that promotes young people’s welfare. She is qualified and experienced, but is unable to secure a stable staff team. She has a warm, therapeutic parenting style that young people really respond to. However, she does not have good systems for making sure that young people’s views are heard and acted on. In addition, the manager has not upskilled staff sufficiently to make any measureable difference to their relationships with young people. This means that young people do not want to talk about their problems to staff. Some young people actively avoid being with staff. Others will talk to them about superficial things. Core staff try to teach young people what they need to know and discuss the positive behaviour that they need to develop. They sometimes enlist the support of the police and fire service to do this. However, young people do not feel valued and understood. Their levels of

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

engagement remain low and they talk only to a very few staff. Management cover is often poor when the manager takes her holidays. Serious incidents often occur and systems are not followed properly. Young people have self-harmed, gone missing and become ill yet refused medical attention when the manager is away. Essential elements of the admissions and discharge register were not completed and notifications not sent to Ofsted. Core and cover staff often find it hard to secure helpful management advice and support at these times of crisis. Young people feel unsafe and incidents become even more serious.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

There are so many incidents that the manager sometimes does not treat them seriously or help young people and staff learn from them. This leads to a culture of low expectations in which staff minimise serious incidents as ‘just silly behaviours’. For example, a recent incident occurred when staff had left a young person in possession of a screwdriver. The young person unscrewed fixtures and fittings and staff took an excessively long time to retrieve the screwdriver. The manager did not deem this serious and no incident record was made. This meant that no debriefing of young person or staff took place. There was no notification to Ofsted, no analysis of what went wrong, and no clear learning for future practice. As a result, staff’s skills do not improve and their relationships with young people remain superficial.

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children and young people since the most recent full inspection:

The manager has not met the requirement and recommendations raised at the last inspection. For example, young people are not engaged with their records, have no memorabilia of their time here and are not getting enough help to do well in education.

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Information about this children’s home

The home provides care and accommodation for up to three children or young people with emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. The home is privately owned and operated and forms part of a larger organisation.

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Recent inspection history

Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement 24/05/2016 Full Good 10/11/2015 Interim Sustained effectiveness 08/06/2015 Full Requires improvement 29/01/2015 Full Adequate

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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 within 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: (2)(b) ensure that staff: (ii) protect and promote each child’s welfare; (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; (v) help each child to understand and manage the impact of any experience of abuse or neglect; (vi) help each child to develop resilience and skills that prepare the child to return home, to live in a new placement or to live independently as an adult. 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the education standard, the registered person must ensure: (2)(a) that staff: (iii) understand the barriers to learning that each child may face and take appropriate action to help the child to overcome any such barriers; (viii) help a child who is excluded from school, or who is of compulsory school age but not attending school, to access educational and training support throughout the period of exclusion or non-attendance and to return to school as soon as possible. 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the positive relationships standard, the registered person must ensure: (2)(a) that staff: (ii) help each child to develop socially aware behaviour; (iii) encourage each child to take responsibility for the child’s behaviour, in accordance with the child’s age and understanding; 06/01/2017 (iv) help each child to develop and practise skills to resolve conflicts positively and without harm to anyone; (vi) help each child to understand, in a way that is appropriate according to the child’s age and understanding, personal, sexual and social relationships, and how those relationships can be supportive or harmful; (ix) understand how children’s previous experiences and present emotions can be communicated through behaviour and have the competence and skills to interpret these and develop positive relationships with children; (xi) de-escalate confrontations with or between children, or potentially violent behaviour by children;

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Requirement Due date

(xiii) have the skills to recognise incidents or indications of bullying and how to deal with them; and (b) encourage each child to build and maintain positive relationships with others. 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: (2)(a) that staff: (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; (iv) manage relationships between children to prevent them from harming each other; (vi) take effective action whenever there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare; (b) arrange and deliver the home’s day-to-day care so as to keep each child safe and to protect each child effectively from harm. 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

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: (2)(a) lead and manage the home in a way that is consistent with the approach and ethos, and deliver the outcomes set out in the home’s statement of purpose; (c) ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child; (e) ensure that the home’s workforce provides continuity of care to each child; (f) understand the impact that the quality of care provided in the home is having on the progress and experiences of each child and 06/01/2017 use this understanding to inform the development of the quality of care provided in the home; (g) demonstrate that practice in the home is informed and improved by taking into account and acting on: (ii) feedback on the experiences of children, including complaints received; and (h) use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home.

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Requirement Due date

In order to meet the care planning standard, the registered person must ensure: (2)(b)(i) that arrangements are in place to ensure the effective induction of each child into the home; (e) that the child’s placing authority is contacted, and a review of that child’s relevant plans is requested, if— (i) the registered person considers that the child is at risk of harm or has concerns that the care provided for the child is inadequate to meet the child’s needs; (ii) the child is, or has been, persistently absent from the home without permission; (f) that staff help each child to access and contribute to the records kept by the registered person in relation to the child. 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that the employment of any person on a temporary basis at the children’s home does not prevent children from receiving such continuity of care as is reasonable to meet their needs. (Regulation 31(1)) 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that individuals who work in a care role have the appropriate qualification for their work within two years of the date on which the individual started working in a care role in a home. (Regulation 32(5)(a)) 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain in the home the records in Schedule 4. (Regulation 37, schedule 4.1(c)) 06/01/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that HMCI is notified without delay if there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious. (Regulation 40(4)(e)) 06/01/2017

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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 emergency admissions are not taken unless the home’s capacity and support systems mean that it has the capability to care for children admitted at very short notice while continuing to offer high quality care to children already living in the home. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 15, paragraph 3.6)

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Recommendations

 Recognise that many children placed in homes may undergo a difficult transition and what should be simple aspects of their care take on a substantial significance in this context. Staff should provide a nurturing environment that is welcoming, supportive, and which provides appropriate boundaries in relation to their behaviour. Homes must also meet children’s basic day-to-day needs and physical necessities. Staff should seek to meet the child’s basic needs in the way that a good parent would, recognising that many children in residential care have experienced environments where these needs have not been consistently met – doing so is an important aspect of demonstrating that the staff care for the child and value them as an individual. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 15, paragraph 3.7)

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Recommendations

 Ensure that children are given a choice about how their personal space is decorated, in accordance with regulation 7(2)(a)(i). (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 16, paragraph 3.19)

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Recommendations

 Ensure that the responsible individual has the capacity to supervise the management of each children’s home that they are responsible individual for. This includes being able to demonstrate that they have the essential skills needed to develop the leadership and management of homes within their remit such that the homes have the capacity and capability to meet the quality standards. There is no limit to the number of homes that a person can be appointed as responsible individual for, but they must be able to demonstrate that they can effectively supervise the management of each home individually, as well as all of the homes overall. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 60, paragraph 12.4)

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What the inspection judgements mean

At the interim inspection we make a judgement on whether the home has improved in effectiveness, sustained effectiveness, or declined in effectiveness since the previous full inspection. This is in line with the ‘Inspection of children’s homes: framework for inspection’.

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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 focused on the effectiveness of the home and the progress and experiences of children and young people since the most recent full inspection.

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Information about this inspection

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 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 0300 123 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

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

T: 0300 123 1231 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted

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