Children's home run by Witherslack Group Limited in Westmorland and Furness

Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 1 SC485540 Registered provider: Witherslack Group Limited

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Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The home is run by a private organisation and is registered for the care and accommodation of up to seven children and 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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outstanding

How well children and young people are helped and protected outstanding

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outstanding

The effectiveness of leaders and managers outstanding

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outstanding

The children’s home provides highly effective services that consistently exceed the standards of good. The actions of the children’s home contribute to significantly improved outcomes and positive experiences for children and young people who need help, protection and care.

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outstanding

Date of last inspection: 22 February 2017

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outstanding

Overall judgement at last inspection: sustained effectiveness

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outstanding

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 2

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Key findings from this inspection

This children’s home is outstanding because:

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Key findings from this inspection

 The leadership and management are exceptional. The provider organisation has ensured that the home has excellent resources, including an on-site learning centre and a team of skilled therapists. The registered manager is skilled, confident and dedicated to her work. She is absolutely child-centred and provides a strong lead in managing the home.  All the children and young people make good progress in all aspects of their lives. They are supported to deal with difficulties from their past by the staff and by specialist workers who provide a range of personalised work. The children and young people clearly feel safe and secure in the home.  All the children and young people have excellent attendance at school or college and all of them are making above-expected progress with their education. The education provided is a mixture of core academic subjects and more vocational and practice-based subjects. This approach is very successful.

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Key findings from this inspection

 The staff support the children and young people to improve and maintain their relationships with their families wherever possible and appropriate.  The children and young people are encouraged to participate in a range of leisure activities and other local community activities as well as being prepared for independence.

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

22/02/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 28/06/2016 Full Good 21/12/2015 Interim Improved effectiveness 29/07/2015 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 3

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The provider offers integrated placements at this home. These include on-site education, therapy and care, and the provider asks for placements to be of at least two years in duration. This approach allows time to be given to the children and young people, who often arrive with very low starting points. The quality of the education, the therapy and the care provided are all very high. All three teams work closely with each other to ensure that the needs of the children and young people are fully met. Consequently, the children and young people make very good or excellent progress in all areas of their lives.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The experience of living at the home is also excellent. The staff team is nurturing and dedicated and has very good relationships with the children and young people. The home feels homely from the moment you step through the door and the children and young people thrive and flourish in this home.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Two young people have moved on from the home since the last inspection. Both moves were planned and positive and one young person in particular had thrived at the home. This young person arrived with significant, concerning behaviour and left having gained control of this. The young person gained an excellent college qualification and started an apprenticeship with a large reputable company.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

All the children and young people are making above expected progress at school or college in almost all of their subjects. This is an exceptional achievement considering some of the children and young people arrived at the home having missed substantial parts of their education. One young person is about to go to university and others are clearly progressing very well towards their plans of being able to apply to university.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The staff team and the specialist therapists offer an excellent personalised service. A number of the children and young people have made tremendous progress towards resolving past difficulties and improving their emotional health issues. Several of the children and young people have made huge strides with their confidence while living at the home. Others have significantly changed their behaviour, having learned to deal with their feelings more appropriately. In a report, an educational psychologist said of one young person, that their ‘self-esteem and confidence has improved markedly over the last year; she has achieved a great deal of personal growth and development in a relatively short period of time’.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The children and young people are able, with support from staff, to improve their relationships with their families. Staff go to great lengths to work with families. One young person has been supported to explore their cultural heritage and this has opened the door for them to have closer ties and spend more time with their family.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The staff are very good at recognising and meeting the needs of the children and young people and often it is the smaller actions that are most important. The staff walk with the children and young people to and from school, seeing this time as important even Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 4 though the school is only 100 metres away from the home. The children and young people all have a say in the running of the home. They all have plans to develop some aspect of the home. One young person had taken responsibility for keeping the porch tidy. As well as maintaining the appearance and cleanliness of this area they had, with staff, bought new furniture to ensure that visitors’ first impressions were good. Many of the children and young people volunteer to do household chores and by doing so learn skills that will be useful to them throughout their life. The young people organised a themed charity coffee morning and join local villagers on regular litter picks. They are

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

clearly proud of their home and proud of the registered manager and were absolutely delighted that she had been recognised as an outstanding manager. One young person told the inspector how much they enjoyed mentoring the younger children in school and staff confirm that this has helped their self-confidence.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The inspector received compliments about the home and staff from everyone spoken to. One social worker described a staff member as ‘amazing’ and the manager as ‘fantastic’. Another said the care of their child was ‘outstanding’. One parent said that the home and staff were ‘absolutely brilliant’ and ‘outstanding’. Another social worker said they were ‘extremely pleased’ with the care of their child. They could all describe progress made by the children and young people they were speaking about.

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

The children and young people are kept safe and clearly feel safe and secure living at this home. The staff understand risks well and make good plans for minimising ongoing risks.

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

The staff provide clear boundaries and expectations for the children and young people and these work well. One young person told the inspector that this home was better than other homes because the rules are better. They said that if they did something wrong that there would be a consequence. They clearly appreciated the staff efforts to care for them by having clear expectations.

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

The staff do not use many sanctions but do use some physical interventions when required. These have all been appropriate and over a short timescale. Staff clearly understand the reasons for the behaviour that leads to such incidents. One child became very anxious around family contact and often their behaviour became aggressive and required a short physical intervention. The staff worked with this child to help them deal better with their anxieties and this has had the effect of decreasing the number of challenging incidents.

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

There have been very few safeguarding concerns at this home over the inspection period. When they have happened, staff respond quickly and effectively to limit the possibility of harm occurring. Likewise, when young people have self-harmed, staff respond appropriately and help the young person to deal with the underlying issues.

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

Levels of going missing from the home are low and continue to decrease following some excellent safeguarding work carried out by staff. Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 5 In general the staff provide a lot of personalised safeguarding work for all the children and young people in a variety of ways. One child arrived at the home with a history of self-injurious behaviours, which included frequently climbing on high building roofs. The staff addressed these concerns in a number of ways, one of which was to channel their energies into indoor climbing. This has proved successful. The child, who loves the sport, told the inspector how they were now taking their level 3 indoor climbing award, having passed the first two levels already.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager is experienced and appropriately qualified. She ensures that the home meets the aims and objectives as laid out in the statement of purpose. She is confident and dedicated and at all times has the welfare of the children and young people at the forefront of her mind. She knows each child extremely well and has an excellent understanding of their needs. She is ambitious for them all and enjoys their achievements with them. A young person spoken to said the home and the manager were ‘the best’.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager provides exceptional leadership to the staff team members, who are very complimentary about her. She understands their strengths and weaknesses and continually strives to develop them and the service. One staff member described the registered manager as ‘dedicated’, ‘supportive’ and ‘all for the kids’. The registered manager provides good support in supervision and the training for staff is also very good.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager makes good professional relationships with external workers and they commented to the inspector on the clarity of communication and information shared. She is very able to challenge others when necessary. During the inspection the inspector witnessed the effectiveness of the registered manager in challenging other professionals on behalf of young people.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

A requirement from the previous inspection to improve resilience and independence skills in young people preparing for independence has been met. The registered manager has put formal and informal systems in place to address this issue. Young people are now well prepared for independence. In addition, the team now uses a recognised resilience assessment tool to check on the progress of the children and young people. A recommendation to undertake more development planning for the home has also been met.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

No requirements or recommendations are made at this inspection. Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 6

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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 differences 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: SC485540 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Witherslack Group Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Witherslack Group, Lupton Tower, Lupton, Carnforth LA6 2PR

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Marcia McLoughlin

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Inspector

Colin Imrie, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC485540 8 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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