Children's Home run by Keys Nhcc Ltd in Shropshire

Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 1 SC020611 Registered provider: New Horizons (Child Care) Limited

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Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This is a privately owned home, registered to provider care and accommodation for up to three young people who have emotional and/or behavioural difficulties.

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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 requires improvement to be 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: 10 October 2016

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: Requires improvement

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Key findings from this inspection

 Staff are child focused. They are committed to meeting young people’s needs.  Young people make progress while in placement. Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 2  Staff are good advocates for young people.  Staff keep young people safe and support them through periods of crisis.  Young people’s risk-taking behaviours reduce.  Risk management plans are good quality. Staff understand young people’s risks.  Staff feel well supported.  Partnership working is good. Staff ensure that young people have access to the services that they need.

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Key findings from this inspection

The children’s home’s areas for development:

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Key findings from this inspection

 Leaders and managers do not escalate their concerns regarding placing authorities quickly enough to ensure that they are fulfilling their statutory responsibilities.  The car used by staff and young people is in a poor state of repair.  Leaders and managers do not learn quickly enough from incidents. They do not always ensure that all of the staff have enough resources to develop their knowledge and skills in a timely way.

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

10/10/2016 Full Requires improvement 07/07/2016 Full Inadequate 27/01/2016 Interim Declined in effectiveness 23/09/2015 Full Requires improvement Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 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

The engaging with the wider system to ensure that children’s needs are met standard is that the registered person must ensure that if they consider, 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. (Regulation 5(c)) 17/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who understand the children’s home’s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children, and use this understanding to deliver care that meets children’s needs and supports them to fulfil their potential. In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to— provide to children living in the home the physical necessities that they need in order to live there comfortably. (Regulation 6(1) and (2)(b)(vii)) In particular, ensure that the car is well maintained. 17/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The leadership and management standard is that the registered person enables, inspires and leads a culture in relation to the children’s home that— ensures that they lead and manage the home in a way that is consistent with the approach and ethos, and delivers the outcomes, set out in the home’s statement of purpose. Regulation 13(1) and (2)(a)) 17/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The leadership and management standard is that the registered person enables, inspires and leads a culture in relation to the children’s home that— ensures that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child. (Regulation 13(1) and 2(c)) 17/07/2017

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Requirement Due date

The leadership and management standard is that the registered 17/07/2017 Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 4 person enables, inspires and leads a culture in relation to the children’s home that— ensures that the registered person understands the impact that the quality of care provided in the home is having on the progress and experiences of each child and use this understanding to inform the development of the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13(1) and (2)(f))

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people receive good-quality individualised care. Staff know the young people. They listen to them and act on their wishes and feelings. ‘Key working’ sessions are good quality, as are young people’s plans, which staff encourage them to be actively involved in. Staff try to understand the reasons for some young people’s behaviours and they support young people to put behaviour management strategies into practice. Staff are committed to ensuring that young people feel cared for. They are tenacious in their efforts to meet all young people’s cultural needs regardless of any language differences. A social worker said, ‘Staff stand out here as they are very, very in tune with my young person. They are investing in him, treat him with respect and value him. They have photographs of him in the home. They are working really hard to engage with him. They recognise barriers and take full responsibility to address these areas...They persist until

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

they get it right and he understands. I can’t fault them.’ Young people make good progress. Staff are good advocates for young people. They motivate young people to find employment or to continue with their education. Staff offer incentives and try to find ways of supporting young people to re-engage with education. Some young people are currently not in education. However, staff work with education partners to try to secure appropriate placements for the young people. When this is not successful, staff engage young people in activities and learning in the community. Partnership working is a strength of this home. Staff have established excellent relationships with the local police teams and share relevant information with them in order to safeguard and protect young people. When some young people have experienced periods of crisis, staff are quick to involve other professionals in reviewing young people’s behaviour management plans. Staff access appropriate training in team

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

meetings. This helps them to offer the support that young people need. A member of staff said, ‘I think we have taken a team that wasn’t experienced and we have changed that and changed the ethos of the home. Since the last inspection, we have a proper child-centred and child-focused view… People understand that making tough decisions regarding boundaries and rules is paramount.’ However, when young people are not receiving the services that they are entitled to, managers have not always escalated their concerns appropriately. Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 5 Relationships between young people and staff are good. Young people enjoy positive experiences with staff and with one another. For example, staff take young people out on activities. They all spend time together, such as eating dinner together and going out to play football or rounders as a group. Staff encourage young people to participate and

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

invest in relationships. There are photographs of young people around the home. A period of redecoration has greatly improved the home environment. However, the car which young people use is not always in a good state of repair. Young people have complained about this. Staff work closely with young people’s parents where possible, encouraging parents to have dinner at the home and be involved in birthday celebrations and other everyday experiences. Overall, young people enjoy positive experiences. Some young people have experienced positive and well-planned transitions out of the home and into supported accommodation. Staff complete independence work with young people and, where possible, transitions are planned.

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

Overall, young people’s risk-taking behaviours reduce. Staff understand young people’s complex needs and behaviours. They work in partnership with other agencies, such as the child and adolescent mental health service and the youth offending service, to manage young people’s risks. Staff keep young people safe. When young people have periods of crisis, staff manage these incidents well. Staff offer a caring and sensitive approach to meeting young people’s needs. When young people’s risk-taking behaviours increase and change, resulting in staff being unable to manage young people’s needs, leaders and managers recognise this and work with placing authorities to find more suitable placements. A social worker said, ‘I feel the staff at the home have worked well with my young person. They are very proactive and are constantly in touch with me. They follow processes and want to know procedures such as missing from care

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

procedures. Their interactions with my young person are good and they understand the risks, but speak to him fairly and encourage him. They seem child centred. They want him to do as well as possible while knowing the risks.’ Staff encourage young people to take planned risks. For example, staff support young people to have time on their own in the community and to have a mobile phone. Staff ensure that they put into place appropriate safeguards, such as checking where young people are when they are out of the house and checking internet search histories. Staff have regular discussions with young people regarding risk-management strategies so that young people understand the reasons for staff putting such strategies into place. Overall, incidents such as missing from care reduce. However, there has been a recent increase in incidents for some young people, which staff are tenaciously attempting to manage. Managers effectively communicate with local police teams to find out about any

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

safeguarding issues within the local community. This supports young people’s safety. After physical interventions, young people have the opportunity to speak with staff and share their views. Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 6 Managers ensure that staff have appropriate training in relation to young people’s complex behaviours. The organisation has access to its own therapists and a behaviour support team, who come to the home and participate in team meetings. Therapists offer staff debriefs after significant incidents such as self-harm incidents. This helps staff feel well supported. Staff understand young people’s risks.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

There is a new manager in post. She holds a level 4 qualification in working with children and young people and a qualification in integrated centre leadership. She is in the process of being registered with Ofsted. An experienced manager from within the organisation has been overseeing the home pending the full-time appointment of a manager. A highly committed deputy manager, along with a committed staff team, support the manager in her post. Three of the seven members of staff are appropriately qualified. The other members of staff are in the process of completing their relevant qualifications. All staff are trained in first aid. Some aspects of training are not always widely disseminated amongst the staff team. For example, some staff have received training in caring for unaccompanied asylum- seeking children and sexually harmful behaviour, and others have not. This means that potentially not all staff have the knowledge that they need to be able to provide

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

consistent high-quality care. Staff have not received training in radicalisation. However, staff have received training in other important areas such as safeguarding, self-harm, autistic spectrum disorder, substance misuse and gang culture. Staff use team meetings to share information. The organisation’s therapist attends team meetings to provide staff with an opportunity to reflect on their practice and the behaviours of young people. Staff enjoy this and find it beneficial. This helps staff to remain child focused as they try to understand the reasons for young people’s behaviours. Overall, admissions have been planned. However, since the last inspection, a poorly assessed admission led to a failed placement for one young person. The admission was not in accordance with the ethos of the home’s statement of purpose, as the previous manager failed to ensure that she had full and satisfactory information prior to agreeing

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

the placement. Leaders and managers took appropriate action and learned from this, ensuring that further training and supervision was completed with the previous manager. Since this time, admissions have been well planned, with managers gathering as much information as possible, including liaising with young people’s previous placements, prior to agreeing that they can move in. Staff say that they feel well supported by the new manager. They report that morale in the team is good. Supervisions are completed and are of a good quality. When young people raise any issues regarding staff practice, these are addressed swiftly. However, leaders and managers have not always learned swiftly enough from incidents and used this understanding to inform the development of the quality of care provided in the home. For example, on one occasion, leaders and managers did not seek the advice of the physical intervention trainer immediately after a difficult physical intervention.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

Leaders and managers have not always ensured that they have immediately updated risk assessments after significant incidents, and the location risk assessment does not Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 7 rigorously document the environmental risks, which are in close proximity to the home. The manager did, however, ensure that she had updated all staff and provided them with a crisis action plan for them to refer to at the front of a young person’s file. Leaders and managers ensure that staff know the young people in the home, their risks and their needs. Staff have full debriefs with one another after incidents and they are aware of the environmental risks. The staff team has been without a registered manager in post for a significant period of time. Although an overseeing manager has been in the home, staff need to have the stability of a registered manager. While management oversight has been positive,

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

management oversight needs to be embedded into the home to inform staff practice. The manager is aware of the strengths and areas for development in the home. The manager and deputy manager are ambitious for the young people in their care. The manager has appropriately challenged placing authorities when poor care planning decisions have been made. She has quickly established good-quality partnerships with placing authorities and other professionals. The staff team is supportive of the new manager.

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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 who 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: SC020611 8

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: New Horizons (Child Care) Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Hurstwood Court, New Hall Hey Road, Rawtenstall, Rawtenstall, Lancashire BB4 6HR

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Inspector

Hannah Bates, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC020611 9 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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