Children's Home run by Keys Child Care Limited in Hertfordshire

Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 1 Registered provider: Broadwood Residential 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 privately owned children‟s home provides care for up to four children who have complex needs and need specialist support. The manager has been registered with Ofsted since 2017.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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requires improvement to be good

How well children and young people are helped and protected requires improvement to be good

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requires improvement to be good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers requires improvement to be good

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requires improvement to be good

The children‟s home is not yet delivering good help and care for children and young people. However, there are no serious or widespread failures that result in their welfare not being safeguarded or promoted.

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requires improvement to be good

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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requires improvement to be good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

02/10/2017 Full Good 13/01/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 15/06/2016 Full Good 10/11/2015 Full Good Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 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 quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who—

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Requirement Due date

understand the children‟s home‟s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children;

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Requirement Due date

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—

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Requirement Due date

help each child to develop resilience and skills that prepare the child to return home, to live in a new placement or to live independently as an adult. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b)(2)(b)(vi)) 30/11/2018

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Requirement Due date

The quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who—

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Requirement Due date

understand the children‟s home‟s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children;

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Requirement Due date

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—

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Requirement Due date

ensure that the premises used for the purposes of the home are designed and furnished so as to—

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Requirement Due date

enable each child to participate in the daily life of the home. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b)(2)(c)(i)(ii)) 05/10/2018 Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 4 The enjoyment and achievement standard is that children take part in and benefit from a variety of activities that meet their needs and develop and reflect their creative, cultural, intellectual, physical and social interests and skills.

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure—

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Requirement Due date

participate in activities that the child enjoys and which meet and expand the child‟s interests and preferences. (Regulation 9 (1)(2)(a)(ii)) 05/10/2018

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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—

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Requirement Due date

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. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(a)(i)) 28/09/2018

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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—

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Requirement Due date

that the premises used for the purposes of the home are located so that children are effectively safeguarded. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(c)) 14/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person may only use devices for the monitoring or surveillance of children if—

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Requirement Due date

the monitoring or surveillance is no more intrusive than necessary, having regard to the child‟s need for privacy. (Regulation 24 (1)(d)) 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that all employees—

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Requirement Due date

receive practice-related supervision by a person with appropriate experience. (Regulation 33 (4)(b)) 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The procedure to be followed in the event of an allegation of abuse or neglect must, in particular— provide for records to be kept of an allegation of abuse or 14/09/2018 Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 5 neglect, and the action taken in response. (Regulation 34 (2)(d)) The registered person must maintain records (“case records”) for each child which—

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Requirement Due date

are kept up to date. (Regulation 36 (1)(b))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that all records are up to date and are legible. 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

After completing a quality of care review, the registered person must produce a written report about the quality of care review and the actions which the registered person intends to take as a result of the quality of care review (“the quality of care review report”). (Regulation 45 (3)) 30/11/2018

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Recommendations

 Children‟s home staff should act as effective advocates for or on behalf of a child who may be experiencing difficulties with education including admissions. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 28, paragraph 5.12) In particular, ensure that information requested by a placing authority is provided in a timely manner.  The ethos of the home should support each child to learn, emphasising the value of independent study and reading for enjoyment. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 29, paragraph 5.18) In particular, ensure that the home‟s education room is an environment that encourages study and reading.  Ensure that each child‟s day-to-day health and well-being needs are met. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 33, paragraph 7.3) In particular, ensure that children are offered varied and nutritious meals.

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Recommendations

 Children‟s homes‟ staff should encourage children to take a proactive role in looking after their day-to-day health and well-being. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 34, paragraph 7.10) In particular, ensure that staff who smoke cigarettes do not leave cigarette ends outside of the home where they are visible to children.  Staff should keep and encourage children to keep appropriate memorabilia of the time spent living at the home and help them to record significant life events. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 62, paragraph 14.5) Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 6

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improvement to be good

The environment has deteriorated. Children‟s bathrooms are uninviting and require maintenance. Some of the children‟s bedrooms require deep cleaning and the flooring needs changing. Blinds in communal areas have been pulled down and not replaced, and damage to areas of the home has not been fixed. The outside garden requires work, such as the lawn mowing, and litter needs to be removed. The environment does not present as a welcoming and homely environment. This does not give children an experience of living at a home that is cared for, and can have a detrimental effect on children‟s welfare and safety.

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improvement to be good

Children generally make progress in their educational attendance and achievements. One child has completed their compulsory education and is considering further education. Staff have supported the child to apply for college placements. However, a delay in staff‟s response to provide the information requested from the placing authority has delayed the process for a second consideration at the college of the child‟s choice. The children have a dedicated room to support their educational study. However, the room is neither stimulating nor inviting. The environment and a lack of enjoyable reading books fail to encourage children to continue their education outside of school.

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improvement to be good

Children are not consistently provided with a varied and nutritious diet. Although the menu devised during the children‟s meetings and the food that is purchased are healthy, the food eaten by children on occasions is not nutritious. For example, chips are offered over consecutive days, and records indicate that a child ate sweets for their evening meal. Over a period of time, meals were not home-made. No children smoke at the home. However, outside of the home a large number of cigarette ends were evident, having been scattered around the building by staff. This does not provide good role modelling for children, and is unsightly.

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improvement to be good

Children are encouraged to develop their independence in line with their age and ability. However, staff have not proactively encouraged children who are of leaving-care age to sufficiently develop their independence skills. This has potential to have an impact on children when they leave the home to live independently.

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improvement to be good

Children enjoy trusting and meaningful relationships with the staff. The staff know the children well and how to engage with them. A child said, „If you ever want to talk to someone, there are always staff to talk to.‟ The provider embraces the children‟s hobbies and interests. For example, one child has violin lessons. However, over the summer period, although activities were offered to children, there was a lack of imagination and enthusiasm to help children to take part in activities.

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improvement to be good

Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 7 Individual risk assessments support the staff to work with children effectively. However, not all of the risk assessments give staff a full picture of the risks, or the actions that they need to follow, and the assessments are not consistently reviewed following incidents. This means that the staff could miss important information needed to safeguard children.

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improvement to be good

The home‟s location risk assessment is poor because it fails to identify known risks to the children and the action required to reduce these risks. These risks include incidents of children accessing the home‟s roof, the close proximity to a busy main road, places close to the home and vehicles that pose a risk. Children lack the understanding and ability to manage such risks, and the assessment fails to inform staff of the risks and the actions required to keep children safe.

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improvement to be good

The home uses alarms on the bedroom doors to monitor all of the children‟s movement at night. Although there may be a need to use alarms for some children who may go missing at night, for others it is unclear why these are in use.

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improvement to be good

The staff use negative and positive consequences to help the children to manage their behaviours and make good choices. There is a good balance of positive and negative consequences. Physical interventions are rarely used. Staff successfully encourage positive behaviour through the use of incentives.

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

The registered manager has been absent from the home for a few months. The provider has ensured that there is sufficient management oversight to provide stability and support for the staff. During the inspection, it was not possible to access records in respect of an allegation that the registered manager had investigated. Therefore, it was not possible to demonstrate the effectiveness of the investigation undertaken.

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

Some of the children‟s psychologist-informed assessments provide staff with clear strategies and information. However, not all children‟s plans contain this required information, and therefore staff may not be aware of how they need to respond to fully support the children. Some children‟s records are hand-written and are not easily legible. This may make it difficult for children, staff and external professionals to read what has been written about the child.

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

The staff have access to learning and development opportunities. However, the staff have not received regular supervision for a period of time although, since June 2018, this has begun to improve. Lack of regular supervision does not provide the staff with the support that they need to carry out their roles.

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

Internal monitoring provides an overview of the home, including when placements have ended, incidents, and feedback from children. However, the monitoring document fails to provide details of identified trends and patterns, the reasons for placements ending and why contact with police during one month was high. The monitoring fails to describe the action required to reduce the risk of recurrence, or identify actions that worked well. Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 8 Since the last inspection, the staff have failed to consistently collate memorabilia for the children. For those children who may not want to go on activities and outings as much as others, a more imaginative way of gaining memories for children is required.

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

There are some signs of improvement. The home has recently settled and the current staff team provides stability for the children.

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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: 1164089 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Broadwood Residential Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Maybrook House, 2nd Floor, Queensway, Halesowen, Worcestershire B63 4AH

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Inspectors

Natalie Burton: social care inspector Kristen Judd: regulatory inspection manager Inspection report children‟s home: 1164089 10 achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children‟s social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children‟s services, and inspects services for looked after children, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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