Children's home run by New Horizons NW Limited in Sefton

Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 1 SC485956 Registered provider: New Horizons (NW) Ltd

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Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The home is registered to accommodate up to two children, irrespective of gender, aged from 10 to 17. The home specialises in the care of children who present with emotional and/or behavioural problems and/or a learning disability. It is operated by a private organisation

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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good

How well children and young people are helped and protected good

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good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers good

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good

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

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good

Date of last inspection: 23 February 2017

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: Declined in effectiveness

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Enforcement action since last inspection

Widespread failings were found at the last inspection, in relation to poor day-to-day care arrangements to ensure young people’s safety and well-being. As a result, a compliance notice was issued on 14 March 2017 to address these concerns. An unannounced monitoring visit took place on 18 April 2017 to monitor compliance with the notice. The visit found that the compliance notice had been met. Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 2

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Key findings from this inspection

 Some young people remain at this home for far longer than in previous placements and thrive, because they make positive attachments and grow in confidence.  Young people experience consistent care because the core staff team remains resilient and committed in the most testing of times. Young people experience stability, no matter how much they try to break down their placements at this home.  Quality of care is effective, as staff pick up key issues in key working. Young people speak openly about their concerns, and this helps their emotional and mental health.  Effective partnership working between staff, police, the missing from care co- ordinator and the public protection unit promotes a robust safeguarding response. Young people are safer, and there are no direct concerns regarding going missing and child sexual exploitation.  Professionals hold the management and staff team in high regard. They

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Key findings from this inspection

commented, ‘They have stuck with her when a lot of placements have given up and there is a real possibility that [Name] could move to a foster placement in the future and actually settle.’ The children’s home’s areas for development

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Key findings from this inspection

 Consider the use of mediation and specific education sessions when young people express inappropriate racial language against staff.

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

23/02/2017 Interim Declined in effectiveness 17/05/2016 Full Good 16/09/2015 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 3

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Statutory requirements

This section sets out the actions that the registered person(s) must take to 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 person(s) must comply within the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

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

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Requirement Due date

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. (Regulation (8)(2)(a)(vi)) 14/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The premises used for the purposes of the home should be designed, furnished and maintained so as to protect each child from avoidable hazards to the child’s health. (Regulation (12)(2)(d)) 14/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must recruit staff using recruitment procedures that are designed to ensure children’s safety, and full and satisfactory information should be available in relation to the individual in respect of each of the matters in Schedule 2. (Regulation (32)(3)(d)) 14/07/2017 Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 4

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people have good experiences and make significant progress across aspects of their lives and from their starting points. They live in good-quality accommodation and said that the house is ‘five out of five’, just like a normal family home.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people are adamant that the staff are the best thing about the home. They consistently seek out staff for support, and experience positive relationships and have a strong sense of stability.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people experience highly individualised care, and this gives them a good sense of belonging, particularly during periods of turmoil and aggressive behaviour. Highly committed staff have developed strong relationships with young people, so that the young people receive positive attention even when they are struggling.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff identify important improvements in young people’s behaviour. There have been no young people missing from home for seven months. This is a reduction in this aspect of their behaviour and, as a result, they are safer. Their relationships with staff enable them to talk about their worries and risk-taking behaviours. For example, some young people seek out staff to talk about their emotional well-being, and how to seek support to stop self-harming.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The manager and staff work hard to explore young people’s backgrounds and needs. Young people grow in maturity because staff have great respect for their previous experiences and the reasons for their behaviour. They have an in-depth understanding of how historic neglect impacts on young people’s self-esteem and their abilities to make attachments with others. Staff said that this understanding enables them to ‘go the extra mile’ for young people. Staff’s high regard for the mental and emotional health of young people is reflected in detailed key working sessions and the responses of young people in this inspection.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Close liaison with social workers enables focused placement planning across all aspects of young people’s lives. The care planning framework places safety and emotional welfare at the forefront of young people’s support packages. Their care is regularly reviewed to ensure that the home works alongside the placing authority to meet and monitor young people’s needs.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff maintain strong and interactive relationships with young people. Consultation is effective. For example, young people have good self-determination because they and staff discuss and agree activity planners each week. Keeping planners up to date and displayed is very important for some young people’s visual reference. They are less anxious because they can check their plans and look to staff for reassurance.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people also respond well to the emphasis on rewarding positive behaviour. Young people acknowledge that they spend less time on the computer, keep their rooms tidier Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 5 and do not damage property because they work hard to meet their reward targets.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people acknowledge that they may need to be held to keep them and others safe. They appreciate being given time and space to calm down. Young people are reassured that they can talk things through with staff, situations are resolved and relationships with staff remain positive, despite instances of extreme and aggressive behaviours by young people.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people find engagement with education extremely challenging. They attend an alternative education provision for 15 hours a week. The manager also liaises with the local education authority and virtual head to challenge the lack of education planning and a suitable placement. The remaining time is spent in the home and, thus, the manager and staff have failed to facilitate young people’s further learning. Staff try to use young people’s time constructively by enabling young people to develop independence skills. Budgeting and cooking are supported by other practical tasks, like how to register with a doctor, in order to prepare young people for their young adult lives. However, this is ad hoc and there is no structure to the afternoons.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people’s health improves as staff support them to engage with health agencies and address the impact of a history of neglect. Young people enjoy healthier diets and a range of activities and exercise.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Independence planning covers a range of practical skills, but the focus that the home provides for emotional development is essential in enabling young people to manage relationships and is a key factor in their journey to becoming more independent.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff liaise with agencies, such as child and adolescent mental health services, to support young people with their mental health. Robust medication procedures protect children’s and young people’s medical and health needs.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The home offers young people a generally warm and friendly environment. However, following consistent damage, one young person’s room has a mismatch of furniture, stained carpet and bare walls. This is in contrast to other bedrooms in the house, which are modern, homely and well decorated. Regulation 44 visits have also picked up the issue and reported it in the monitoring reports, but to date no changes have been made.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Young people are safe and well cared for due to a good care and safeguarding framework.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Their individual risk management plans are clear about when young people may be missing from home and other risks, such as self-harm, aggressive behaviours, child sexual exploitation, substance misuse and family contact. Clear strategies are in place and consistently implemented to minimise risk and to improve young people’s behaviour. Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 6 Young people are safeguarded by robust protocols and good liaison with partnership agencies. Local police said that the home ‘effectively’ manages young people who go missing from care, and good communication results in young people returning safely to the home. There is an effective response when patterns of missing from care become more serious. The manager is swift in meeting with the missing from care coordinator and safeguarding manager to ensure that the potential for child sexual exploitation is addressed and monitored. There have been no further instances of young people going

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

missing since 4 December 2016. One social worker commented, ‘I am impressed with the progress [Name] has been making, particularly since January.’

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Young people benefit from safe contact with family members. Staff work hard to embrace and maintain positive relationships with parents and grandparents. As a result, parents with a history of poor relationships with social care services now liaise with staff to ensure that contact arrangements are agreed.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Behaviour management plans are detailed and place the child at the centre of staff practice. Attention to detail is good and strategies connect to each individual young person. For example, some young people are significantly safer, as staff closely monitor their mobile phone and the comments made via social media on a computer tablet. They understand how staff will help them to manage their behaviour. Strategies such as individual reward charts enable young people to break down each day into a series of manageable targets. They grow in self-esteem because staff are quick and enthusiastic in the praise and rewards they give.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Some young people’s behaviours are significantly challenging and may require physical intervention as a last resort. A debrief with the young person is an integral part of behaviour management, and this allows young people to reflect on their behaviour. Individual sessions on particular types of behaviour, for example racial language, can be slow to be delivered by staff. This dilutes the impact of these sessions on changing the behaviour.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

Staff training in behaviour management promotes safe practice when positive reinforcement and reward do not work. Talking about behaviours and restraint helps young people to understand how their behaviours can impact on the safety of themselves and others. There is no reliance on the police to manage difficult situations. Discussions between young people, social workers, youth offending workers and staff give young people good opportunities to rectify challenging behaviours, to make amends and to avoid criminalisation.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: good

The home, on occasion, uses agency staff for a waking night shift. There is a clear induction sheet for agency staff members to ensure that they are aware of the young people’s behaviours and of how to keep the young people and themselves safe while on duty. However, on one occasion, this was not completed. Furthermore, the head office had failed to send the staff member’s profile, including a photograph of the agency staff, so that when they arrived on duty showing their identification this could not be matched to records held about them at the home. This fails to ensure that visiting staff procedures are sufficiently robust. Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 7

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The registered manager has managed this home since January 2017. He holds a level 5 qualification and has extensive experience of working with young people.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Staffing arrangements in the home meet the needs of the young people. The clear strength of the cohesive and long-term staff team is that it is effective in maintaining stability for young people. Staff are qualified to work with children in a residential setting. They also receive specific training according to the needs of the young people, such as training on self-harm and mental well-being. Regular staff meetings and handover discussions embed consistent practice across the staff team, thus promoting the home’s statement of purpose.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Individuals receive good information about the service because the home’s statement of purpose is kept up to date. Young people also appreciate the information that they receive in the young people’s guide. For some, this booklet, was very useful as part of a planned transition to the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Managers have a clear understanding of the service’s strengths and areas for development. The company has development days when outcomes from inspections are discussed and areas of improvement are identified and actioned.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Young people grow in confidence and develop good social skills because they are encouraged to, and regularly do, express their views. They experience a positive rapport with staff who calmly listen, but also remind young people about manners and boundaries.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Young people have confidence in the manager and staff because they are good advocates. The manager and staff are willing to challenge placing authorities when placement planning is not effective. For example, the manager consistently challenges the local education authority in terms of finding appropriate education arrangements. This sense of challenge ensures that young people have the most appropriate placements.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The home improves because the manager and staff are open to scrutiny from independent monitoring, to the views of other professionals and young people, and to formal inspection. Shortfalls identified in this inspection were already being addressed, as the manager accepts and works on feedback from other agencies. Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 8

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people. Inspectors considered the quality of work and the difference made to the lives of children and young people. They watched how professional staff work with children and young people and each other and discussed the effectiveness of help and care provided. Wherever possible, they talked to children and 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.

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Information about this inspection

Using the ‘Social care common inspection framework’, this inspection was carried out under the Care Standards Act 2000 to assess the effectiveness of the service, how it meets the core functions of the service as set out in legislation, 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’. Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: New Horizons (NW) Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Horizons House, 52 Bath Street, Southport, Merseyside PR9 0DH

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Inspector

Elaine Clare, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC485956 10 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, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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