Children's home run by Thoughts of Others Limited in Birmingham

Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 1 SC464249 Registered provider: Thoughts of Others 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

This home provides care and accommodation for up to two children who have emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. A private provider operates the home. The organisation operates a school nearby and can provide therapeutic services.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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inadequate

How well children and young people are helped and protected inadequate

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inadequate

The effectiveness of leaders and managers inadequate

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inadequate

There are serious and/or widespread failures that mean children and young people are not protected or their welfare is not promoted or safeguarded.

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: Requires improvement

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: None Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 2

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Key findings from this inspection

This children’s home is inadequate because

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Key findings from this inspection

 The arrangements to keep children safe from the risk of fire are inadequate. The fire risk assessment relates to a different building. Bedroom doors were not safe because they did not have fire seals. The provider made the bedroom doors safe immediately.  The registered person has not taken sufficient action to meet six requirements from the last inspection.  Internal and external monitoring is not effective. The registered manager’s quality of care review has not delivered improvement. This includes not securing the views of children and placing authorities in reports. There is, once again, no independent visitor to provide external scrutiny of children’s safety and welfare.  The manager does not review and conclude safeguarding allegations in line with the home’s policy, or evaluate serious incidents, such as disruptions and placement breakdowns.  Policy, procedure and records about behaviour management are still not fit for

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Key findings from this inspection

purpose.  Not all staff have the necessary knowledge and skills to meet the needs of children.  Children still do not have continuity of care because of the high volume of different staff working in the home.  Risk assessments are still incomplete regarding restrictions of movement, children’s restrictions of liberty and information about when children go missing from care.  Information in the statement of purpose does not describe accurately the service operated at the home.  The quality and availability of care planning documents to help staff deliver children’s plans are weak. Staff lack access to key documents. The quality of children’s records is poor and records contain inaccuracies.  The accommodation does not provide enough space for staff to work in or offer a welcoming and nurturing environment for children to live in.  The registered person has not provided evidence to show that they have sought

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Key findings from this inspection

planning permission or council building regulation approval for a new dining room and staff bedroom.

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Key findings from this inspection

 Children benefit from good access to speech and language therapy, music therapy and in-house psychological assessments.  Children learn the value of education, either through home-based learning or at the organisation’s school. They enjoy school and learning. Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 3  Children and staff have good relationships, which help children to grow in confidence.  Staff help children to renew family relationships, keep in touch and have safe, supported meetings.  Children reduce their previous high-risk behaviours, such as self-harm and going missing from care, because of the close care of staff.

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

29/03/2017 Full Requires improvement 01/11/2016 Full Requires improvement 23/03/2016 Interim Improved effectiveness 01/10/2015 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 4

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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 with the given timescales.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that the requirements of that Order (Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005(a)) and any regulations made under it, except for article 23 (duties of employees), are complied with in respect of the home. (Regulation 25(2)(b)) 30/09/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that restraint in relation to a child is only permitted for the purpose of preventing injury to any person (including the child) or serious damage to the property of any person (including the child). Restraint in relation to a child must be necessary and proportionate. These Regulations do not prevent a child from being deprived of liberty where that deprivation is authorised in accordance with a court order. (Regulation 20(1)(a)(b) and (2) and (3)) 30/09/2017

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Requirement Due date

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

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure: that staff 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; that the premises used for the purposes of the home are designed, furnished and maintained so as to protect each child from avoidable hazards to the child’s health; and that the effectiveness of the home’s child protection policies is monitored regularly. (Regulation 12(1) and (2)(a)(i)(d)(e)) 30/09/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that an independent person visits the children’s home at least once a month. The independent person must produce a report, and they must provide a copy of the independent person’s report to HMCI and the placing authorities of children. (Regulation 44(1)(4)(7)(a)(c)) 30/09/2017

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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 helps children aspire to fulfil their potential and promotes their welfare. 09/10/2017 Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 5 In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person: to 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; to ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child; to ensure that the home’s workforce provides continuity of care to each child; to understand 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 and use monitoring and

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Requirement Due date

review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13(1)(a)(b) and (2)(a)(c)(e)(f)(h)) The registered person must prepare and implement a policy (‘the behaviour management policy’) which sets out the measures of control, discipline and restraint which may be used in relation to children in the home. The registered person must keep the behaviour management policy under review and, where appropriate, revise it. (Regulation 35(1)(b)(2))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, improve guidance about restrictions of liberty and movement, limitations of access to rooms in the house and managerial review of effectiveness of measures of control. 09/10/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that within 24 hours of the use of a measure of control, discipline or restraint in relation to a child in the home, a record is made which includes all elements of this regulation. (Regulation 35(3)(a)) 09/10/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain records (‘case records’) for each child which: include the information and documents listed in Schedule 3 in relation to each child; are kept up to date; and are signed and dated by the author of each entry. (Regulation 36(1)(a)(b)(c)) 09/10/2017

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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; use this understanding to deliver care that meets children’s needs and supports them to fulfil their potential.

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to understand and apply the home’s statement of purpose, and ensure that staff provide personalised care that meets each child’s needs, as recorded in the child’s relevant plans, taking account of the child’s 09/10/2017 Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 6 background. (Regulation 6(1)(a)(b) and(2)(a)(iv))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that staff have ease of access to up-to-date and accurate information about children and that they deliver individual plans. The care planning standard is that children receive effectively planned care in or through the children’s home; and have a positive experience of moving on from the home.

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure that arrangements are in place to plan for, and help, each child to prepare to leave the home or to move into adult care in a way that is consistent with arrangements agreed with the child’s placing authority, and that each child’s relevant plans are followed. (Regulation 14(1)(a)(b) and (2)(b)(iii)(c))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, improve stability in children’s placements by reviewing and learning lessons about early endings. 09/10/2017

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must establish and maintain a system for monitoring, reviewing and evaluating the feedback and opinions of children about the children’s home, its facilities and the quality of care they receive in it. The system referred to in paragraph (2) must provide for ascertaining and considering the opinions of children, their parents, placing authorities and staff. (Regulation 45(2)(b) and (5) 31/10/2017

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Recommendations

 Ensure that restraint records also include interventions that restrict a child’s liberty of movement. Restrictions such as these, and all other restrictions of liberty of movement, should be recorded as restraint. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 47, paragraph 9.42)  Ensure that staff understand that a deprivation of liberty may occur when a child is both under continuous supervision and control and is not free to leave the home. A children’s home cannot routinely deprive a child of their liberty without a court order, such as a section 25 order to place a child in a licensed secure children’s home. In the case of young people aged over 16 who lack mental capacity, a deprivation of liberty may be authorised by the Court of Protection following an application under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 50, paragraph

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Recommendations

 Continually and actively assess the risks to each child and the arrangements that Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 7 are in place to protect them. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 42, and paragraph 9.5)  Ensure respect for children’s privacy and support the other children living in the home to do so. ‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 16, paragraph 3.17.) In particular, protect children’s personal information online.  Ensure that staff understand the importance of careful and clear recording. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 62, paragraph 14.4)  Ensure that the children’s home is a nurturing and supportive environment that meet the needs of their children and is a homely, domestic environment. Children’s homes must comply with relevant health and safety legislations

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Recommendations

(alarms, food hygiene etc.); however, in doing so, homes should seek as far as possible to maintain a domestic rather than ‘institutional’ impression. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 15, paragraph 3.9.) In particular, ensure that the kitchen, new extension and partition meet the local authority health and safety and planning standards. Provide a garden area that takes account of children’s need for active play and for fresh air.  The design of the home should provide staff that sleep in the home overnight with appropriate accommodation and facilities to do so. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 17, paragraph 3.26.)

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The vast majority of weaknesses identified at this inspection relate to recording omissions. This means that the quality of care is difficult to track and that reviewing children’s progress, joint working and decision-making is not easily validated. Despite this, children are making progress and their placing authorities are happy with the quality of their care. However, very poor arrangements to keep children safe from the risk of fire jeopardise children’s care.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Aspects of care planning documents and evidence of the delivery of children’s plans are not good enough. Staff do not have access to good-quality information about children in up-to-date and individualised plans. Children’s files lack key information, such as current risk, education, health assessments, behavioural management plans and statutory review reports. The organisation’s in-house plans do not include the advice of speech and language and music therapists as strategies for staff to use in their care of children. For example, they leave out recommendations on how to support a child’s development of her language and communication skills. Plans lack guidance for staff about how to implement behavioural strategies, how to respond to self-harm incidents or when Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 8 children go missing from care. Plans do not make clear how the home will promote appropriate freedom and choice for children when their local authority has not yet

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

obtained a deprivation of liberty order. This means that staff do not have the best information to help them care for children. Some staff do not always read or implement children’s plans or risk assessments. However, the registered person has taken disciplinary action when they have identified shortfalls in staff practice.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Only one child has a deprivation of liberty order. However, both children have high staffing levels and are always closely supervised by staff inside and outside the home. Little consideration is given to these arrangements to reflect the difference between having a deprivation of liberty order and not having one in place.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The majority of staff working with children are not based permanently at the home. This means that children are not able to develop sustained relationships with people who care for them. The absence of up-to-date, accurate, accessible written plans for children further compromises children’s care experiences. This is because staff lack the knowledge of children’s histories, placement aims and family backgrounds.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The last two children to leave the home did not have a positive ending. Children’s local authorities moved them out when they had concerns about their care. The most recent child to leave the home, moved out sooner than planned. The police are investigating an allegation that a member of staff sexually exploited her. However, the registered manager has not yet reviewed the child’s placement to reflect on why she wanted to leave so quickly or on whether the home had not kept her safe. The lack of positive endings was identified in the full inspection of November 2016.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Since the last inspection, staff have made better arrangements to meet children’s health needs. Staff now respond quickly and make a clear record when children injure themselves. Children are now up to date with their vaccinations. However, the manager does not review whether children are getting the correct help when they feel unwell and in line with their health plans. For example, staff frequently administer pain killer medication, rather than trying to find out what is causing the physical symptoms.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The home is not a nurturing and welcoming environment, although the internal decor is improving. There is no garden at the rear of the property. There is only a small concrete yard with a trampoline and just enough space to bounce a ball. The small strip of garden at the front is untended. Improvements to children’s bedrooms are work in progress. The registered manager has not yet met children’s requests for new curtain poles and new curtains in their lounges, so these look unfinished.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The house is cramped and there is not enough space for the number of adults working and sleeping at the home. The staff office seats only one person. Staff read essential documents and write reports in front of the children. As many as five or six staff and two children share facilities. Staff sleep in children’s lounges. The staff sleep-in room is overcrowded. The bed is covered with children’s furniture, temporary staff mattresses and other items removed from children’s bedrooms for safety. This is potentially a fire hazard. Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 9 The registered person has not sought local authority building control or planning advice before building an extension to the building, which houses the dining room. A recent partition has created an additional staff bedroom in this extension, without a window. This is not in use yet, because the room is full of furniture, staff mattresses and other

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Children are still only able to communicate with anyone outside the house with staff permission. However, this restriction is now clearly recorded in children’s individual risk assessments and agreed with placing authorities as a necessary safeguard.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The most recent child to move in received a good welcome from a director of the company. Staff carry out some lovely, caring things for children. For example, staff read one child to sleep on her first night in the home to help her settle in her new environment. Staff often give children head and back massages to help them sleep. One child told inspectors, ‘Staff helped me settle in. They talk to you and tell you what it is like to live here. They explain that they want me to be safe.’ This is nurturing care. A placing authority social worker told inspectors how her child was thriving because, ‘She loves all the positive praise and attention.’ Children are positive about their choice of key workers and they influence their plans. Key working sessions are better and now show children’s views, wishes and feelings. Children have begun to have house meetings and make suggestions about decor, furniture, activities and meals. One child was responsible for setting up her own weekly

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

planner for activities. She told inspectors, ‘This is working well. I know when I am going to Rush and when I am going to Star City. Then there are other evenings and days when I do what I feel like on the day.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Therapeutic support, like music and speech and language therapy, helps children to express themselves. Both children have benefited from prompt in–house psychological assessments. This has been valuable to inform the local authority’s plan and to give staff direction. One social worker described this help for their child by saying, ‘Everything is so thorough. It’s the therapeutic side that’s beneficial. She’s getting a psychological service. Very child focused.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Constructive relationships with the registered manager and key staff help children to develop better levels of emotional self-expression and insight into their needs. Staff challenge children’s prejudices and help them to understand differences in society and to celebrate culture. Staff contribute well to children’s medical reviews. For example, staff were able to get one child’s medication reviewed. This led to her medication being reduced.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Children develop household independence skills, once staff judge them sufficiently safe to manage these. Children learn to shop, cook and do their laundry. One child told inspectors, ‘I am cooking in the kitchen. I made hunter’s chicken the other day. Staff said it was really nice.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Staff help the children who have had disrupted education realise the value of going to Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 10 school, socialising and learning. One child has successfully gained a technology qualification. Children quickly establish contact with the organisation’s school. Staff and children see transitions into school as something positive.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Staff make sure that children are able to keep in touch with their parents and members of their families, both face to face and by supervised Skype calls. Staff are sensitive about their supervision of meetings and telephone calls, to make sure that children are not distressed. This renewal of family bonds helps children to feel valued and make sense of their family histories.

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

The registered person has failed to assess the risk of fire and to take the necessary action to prevent it. Ofsted referred this risk to the fire safety authority during the inspection.

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

The fire-safety risk assessment does not relate to this home. For example, it states that the building has a cellar, but there is no cellar. It states that the boiler is housed in a room with one door, but it is in the kitchen that has two doors. It states that there are fire safety measures in place, like fire door closures, but there are no door closures. At the time of the inspection, the registered manager had not made sure the home’s boiler has been serviced annually and was safe. Bedroom doors would have provide no protection in the event of a fire and had no door closures. The yard gate to the street is detailed as an exit in the fire evacuation plan. However, this is kept locked. Fire safety signage is poor. Despite these significant shortfalls, staff are trained in fire safety and they practise fire evacuations with children. This means that they do know how to get out of the building in an emergency.

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

The environment is also not safe in other areas. Staff have secured a door to the garden storage area with plastic piping, rather than with a secure lock. This area was cluttered with discarded, broken household furniture and fittings and posed a risk to children who may pick up items and self-harm. The provider took immediate action to make fire doors and the yard safer during the inspection. The boiler was later serviced and declared safe.

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

A child raised an allegation of being sexually exploited by an ex-member of staff. This led to significant self-harm and the early ending of her placement. This matter is under police investigation.

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

Weaknesses in the documents and managerial overview of safeguarding are still evident. This was a requirement in March 2017. Information in children’s risk assessments have improved slightly. However, they are still not good enough. These documents either are out of date or are not available in the home to help staff. Staff still do not have guidance about what to do after a child self-harms. However, staff do now take prompt action. Staff still do not have guidance in the child’s risk assessment or plan about what they should do if the child goes missing. Information in risk assessments is sometimes inaccurate. For example, one contains a child’s incorrect medication dosage and another provides no information about the legal status of a child who has a deprivation of liberty Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 11 order. One child has more freedom in the house now than is documented in her risk

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

assessment. There has been one occasion when staff have not implemented behaviour management plans and risk assessments. This has led to unnecessary physical restraint in the street to prevent a child running off.

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

The registered manager does not review or analyse allegations against staff or identify learning from outcomes of safeguarding incidents. For example, neither the registered manager nor the organisation’s safeguarding officers have taken an overview of a regular pattern of allegations by one child in restraint. They see this as a behavioural issue, yet the child’s behaviour management plan does not mention this.

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

The registered manager now has access to all documents about safeguarding matters, and there is a better record kept in the home. Staff now take effective action when there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare. Staff make referrals to the local authority safeguarding team within timescales. They now follow their own, and the local area authority’s, safeguarding policy. The local designated safeguarding officer has no concerns about current referral practice. However, they have advised the registered person about their responsibility to share safeguarding information about dismissed staff in the references that they give to future employers.

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

Managers are making some progress in improving accountability and transparency in staff’s approach to managing children through constant supervision, restriction and deprivation of liberty. However, this does not always translate into records.

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

The responsible individual has taken some action to improve both the statement of purpose and the organisation’s behaviour management policy. This was a previous requirement. The responsible individual has inserted a paragraph that clearly explains that any local authority seeking a placement for a child must obtain a deprivation of liberty order to allow for the high level of staff supervision and because staff will stop them leaving the house. However, the policy does not yet make clear the difference in the application of any restriction of liberty on children who do not have a deprivation of liberty order and on those who do. The manager and staff are still not clear about the legal distinction or about how any restrictions of movement and limitations of access to certain rooms in the house should be recorded. This was a previous recommendation in March 2017, to ensure that all restrictions were recorded as restraint.

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

Staff have restricted children’s liberty without a deprivation of liberty order, inside and outside the house, to manage behaviour and to prevent a child from running away. This was not recorded as a restriction of liberty. The registered manager has not conducted any subsequent overview or analysis of patterns of restrictions and their effectiveness on children. She is not clear, therefore, about whether they are all necessary and proportionate.

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

Behaviour management plans do not include children’s own programmes for self- management, as described in policy. Some children do not have these active individual reinforcement plans. The level of planned restrictions of liberty used as measures of control is not explained in behaviour management plans or risk assessments. The lack of Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 12 clarity in records about individual approaches means that staff may apply blanket rules when children have very different needs and legal status.

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

Records of discussions with children after they are physically restrained have improved. Some of these records show staff insight, particularly that of the registered manager and of her positive relationships with the children. The log of physical restraint is better, and there is evidence of managerial review of individual events and that gaps have been identified. However, these gaps remain unexplained. There is a separate record of the discussion with staff after a restraint. However, another member of staff, rather than a manager, sometimes records this. There is sometimes no reference to the date of the actual restraint, and this leads to confusion.

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

Despite the shortfalls, children’s safety has improved. No child has gone missing, because staff prevent children if they try to leave. The registered manager now notifies Ofsted of all significant incidents, including all allegations about staff. Staff keep children safer than they were in previous placements. Children are learning to talk about their anxieties. Staff help children to talk about why they self-harm and to avoid that level of distress. Restraints and self-harm have decreased for one child.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

. The failure to assess the risk of fire is a significant weakness that puts everyone at risk.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager has been in post since February 2015. She is experienced and is well qualified. She has been absent for unavoidable reasons and will have an extended period of absence beginning in the autumn. The deputy post is unfilled. The responsible individual plans to appoint and register a temporary manager to cover the manager’s absence. The responsible individual plans to improve leadership and management arrangements by removing the manager from being included in the staffing numbers on shift.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager has taken action to meet four of the previous 10 requirements made at the last inspection. It remains for the registered manager to meet the other six previous requirements and to improve the four new areas of weakness identified at this inspection.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The statement of purpose now contains clear information about how the organisation will require any placing authority to seek a deprivation of liberty order. However, elements of the statement of purpose are still inconsistent with the operation of the home. For example, the statement of purpose states that the home will provide ‘a classroom with IT facilities’. However, there is no classroom available at the home. It presents that a healthcare professional, a qualified learning disabilities nurse, can provide therapeutic services, yet that person neither is a registered nurse nor employed in that capacity. The registered manager was unable to present any qualitative analysis of behaviour, or information about the effectiveness of the therapeutic approach, as described in the statement of purpose. Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 13 The registered person has still not ensured that or evaluated whether the workforce

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

provides continuity of care. The registered manager provided inspectors with a statistical staffing breakdown for the previous month during the inspection. She had previously done this at the March inspection. The latest breakdown showed that there had been an increase in the numbers of staff from other homes, ‘floating staff’, who work with children here. The core staff team has shrunk to 13 from 15 people. An increasing number of 40 ‘floating staff’ have worked at the home in July, compared to a lower figure of 34 people in March. Thus, compared to the period examined at the last inspection, children experience even less continuity in the number of people caring for them.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered person identified a lack of staff leadership quality on shift as a critical feature in the disciplinary judgement of three staff, yet has not made any improvements to this aspect of staff deployment. Staff still do not possess all the skills they need to care for children. In particular, these deficits relate to child sexual exploitation, going missing and radicalisation, and keeping children safe on the internet. Staff have now had on-line awareness training about understanding self-harming behaviour. The registered person recognises the need to overhaul staff induction and the organisation’s training programme. This includes training in the home’s new system of physical intervention. However, at the time of the inspection, these had not been fully implemented. Despite this shortfall, the number of staff achieving a level 3 qualification in residential childcare is increasing. Approximately half the permanent staff team has achieved the award and

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Systems to ensure good staff performance are not yet effective. Just under half the staff has not had an appraisal. The registered manager does not supervise the majority of staff working at the home. This is because a number of staff who work in the home come from other homes in the organisation. This creates a barrier in the manager’s ability to use supervision to guide and support staff in how to work with the children living at the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered person is still not using monitoring and review systems effectively to make continuous improvements in the home. The service is again without external scrutiny of children’s safety and well-being. For three months, there was an independent visitor. However, this person has now been recruited as a manager in the organisation. The registered person has not secured a new independent visitor. The registered manager has not met the requirement made in November 2016 to consult with stakeholders and consider the views of children in the six-monthly quality review. The most recent report still does not include the views of those who use or are connected with the service. However, the organisation does employ a children’s advocate who reports on a monthly basis about the service.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager does not take effective action in response to concerns raised by professionals. The registered manager told inspectors that there had been difficult relationships with two placing authorities, one of which told the independent visitor that their care was, ‘neglectful.’ In her March 2017 quality of care review, the registered manager identified an improvement area – to escalate any concerns with the placing Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 14 authority. There is no evidence that subsequent concerns raised by the children’s advocate or by a placing authority have been investigated or resolved. The registered person has missed opportunities to improve practice or take a strategic view about the development of the service, based on feedback from the people who experience it.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Records are now securely stored and locked away. However, the quality of these records is still poor. Children’s in-house plans are inaccurate and unreliable documents, with duplication and inaccuracies. For example one ‘cut and paste’ plan, written by a senior manager in the organisation, contains the highly sensitive details of another child. Another record states that one child has a history of making allegations against staff, following being restrained. However, this was found to relate to another child. These inaccuracies compromise the purpose of the plan in helping staff to understand the child’s needs and how best to support and care for the child. Staff have not considered how to protect children’s personal information stored on a communal electronic tablet. This means that others may breach their privacy or important information may be lost. These records do not show the necessary level of staff knowledge to work with the

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

children or that they have thought about the children as individuals.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager does have a good grasp of children’s lives. She promotes good relationships and a positive atmosphere in the home. She has a plan for improvement and expressed frustration with the pace of improvement and the mistakes in children’s records.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Ofsted will return to monitor progress in relation to safety within eight weeks.

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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: SC464249 15

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Thoughts of Others Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Thoughts of Others, 99 College Road, Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands B73 5DL

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Inspectors

Christy Wannop, social care inspector Dawn Bennett, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC464249 16 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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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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