Children's Home run by Gloucestershire County Council in Gloucestershire

Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 1 SC415400 Registered provider: Gloucestershire County Council

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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 care for up to six children up to the age of 18 years. The home provides care for children who have physical disabilities and/or learning disabilities. The children’s placements at the home are made under short break arrangements. The children’s home is delivered and managed by the local authority.

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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

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

03/10/2017 Full Good 31/01/2017 Interim Declined in effectiveness 27/10/2016 Full Good 01/03/2016 Interim Improved effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 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

13: The leadership and management standard 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. In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to— use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b) and (2)(h))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the registered managers monitoring needs to be more evaluative to effectively bring about change and development of the home. 31/08/2018

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Recommendations

 Staff skills for safeguarding should include being able to identify signs that children may be at risk, and support children in strategies to manage and reduce any risks. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 43, paragraph 9.10) In particular, staff should receive specific training on identifying and working with children who have been or are at risk of being exploited.  Regulations 35-39 detail the records that must be kept in children’s homes. All children’s case records (regulation 36) must be kept up to date. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 63, paragraph 14.3) In particular, this relates to ensuring that the education care and health plan for children new to the home is updated to reflect the home’s involvement in that child’s care. Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 4

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children receive good-quality individualised care from staff with whom they have built strong, caring relationships. Parents of children who access the home for short breaks say that they feel confident that their child is well cared for. This is due to the good- quality relationships that the staff build with the parents as well as with the child. Excellent admission processes are used and help to provide children and their families with a positive experience. This process is managed at a pace to suit the child and their family. The manager takes great care in assessing and matching which children will be in the home on each night to ensure that the child’s short break is positive and fun. Children are making good progress at developing social and communication skills. In addition, they are becoming more independent. As a result of this progress, their self- confidence is increasing. One of the reasons for this growth is the wide range of

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

purposeful and fun activities that the children enjoy in the home and in the local community. The joy that children demonstrate as a result of these activities is evident in the photographs the staff collate in children’s individual journals. Staff provide children with a safe, nurturing and welcoming environment. Despite the need for specialist equipment, the house maintains a homely environment. Staff take time to prepare the home for each child. Bedrooms are themed and children choose which room they would like to sleep in during their visit. Major building works to the home have now been completed. Children now have access to a large, well-equipped play room and garden. When equipping these areas, staff consulted with children as to what they would like. These ideas have been included in the finished designs. Staff treat the children with care and respect. Personal care is carried out in a dignified

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

way and takes into account how the child wants this care to be delivered. In discussion with staff, they demonstrated a detailed knowledge of the children that they care for and how their individual needs are to be met. Staff frequently said how much they loved their job and the children they care for. One said it is ‘a great place to work’.

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

Safeguarding systems are strong. Staff spoken with demonstrated a detailed working knowledge of safeguarding systems and their duty of care in relation to them. This approach helps to protect children. Children’s behaviour is managed well. Behaviour support plans are detailed and individualised. These plans are regularly reviewed and amended to ensure that they reflect the children’s current behaviours. Staff do not use sanctions, but manage children’s behaviour using positive strategies. Restraint is rarely used and only to protect children from hurting themselves or others. Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 5 Appropriate restraint records are maintained. The registered manager monitors restraint and incident records effectively. Her monitoring has led to changes in staff practices. An excellent example of this is the provision of core teams around some children. As a result, children have become less anxious leading to a reduction in incidents of

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

aggression and self-harming behaviours. Children are kept safe. Parents and social workers support this view. No children have gone missing from the home. Risk assessments are comprehensive and kept up to date. These documents clearly identify the additional vulnerabilities of the children and how staff are to help them.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The manager is very experienced and well qualified for the role. She is an excellent role model who has high standards of herself and of the staff team. The manager’s commitment to providing children with high-quality, individualised care is echoed across the staff team. In addition, the staff team strongly and effectively advocates for the children in its care. The manager has ensured that the requirements and recommendations from the previous inspection have been met. Although the manager does have a clear understanding of the strengths and areas for improvement, her monitoring report is not constantly evaluative. This does not help her to identify ways of further developing the home. The exception to this is the good monitoring of the restraint and incident records. Children benefit from being cared for by an experienced and stable staff team. The staff team receives good-quality supervision, support and training. This enables staff to

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

develop their skills and knowledge which, in turn, improves the service that they provide to the children in their care. Although the staff have had some training on the exploitation of children, this was a small part of general safeguarding training and was, therefore, limited. Staff would benefit from expanding their knowledge in this area. Parents and social workers are extremely positive about the staff and the care that they provide. Consultation with children and their families is a strength of the home. Staff speak with children every day to ensure that they are helped to make choices and that their ideas and wishes are heard. Information from this consultation process is used to improve the home. Children’s records are well organised, up to date and provide staff with clear guidance on how the child’s needs are to be met. The exception to this is an education care and health plan for a child who recently visited the home. This document had not been

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

updated and a review of this plan had not been requested by the manager.

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Information about this inspection

Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 6 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: SC415400 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Shire Hall, Westgate Street, Gloucester GL1 2TG

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Amanda Henderson

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Inspector

Wendy Anderson, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC415400 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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