Children's Home run by HAVEN CARE GROUP LIMITED in Staffordshire

Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 1 SC474179 Registered provider: Acorn Children‟s Home (Burton) 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 privately owned home is registered to provide care for up to four children and young people who display a combination of emotional and behavioural difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

The home does not have a registered manager.

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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

Date of last inspection: 14 November 2017

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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: SC474179 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

14/11/2017 Full Good 12/01/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 02/11/2016 Full Good 29/03/2016 Interim Improved effectiveness Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 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 registered person must ensure 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 requires the registered person to—

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Requirement Due date

understand and apply the home‟s statement of purpose and ensure that staff—

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Requirement Due date

understand and apply the home‟s statement of purpose;

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Requirement Due date

protect and promote each child‟s welfare;

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Requirement Due date

treat each child with dignity and respect;

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Requirement Due date

provide personalised care that meets each child‟s needs, as recorded in the child‟s relevant plans, taking account of the child‟s background. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b)(2)(a)(b)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)) 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 that staff—

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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 Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 4 This is with particular regard to compatibility risk assessments and the matching of children and young people who are admitted to the home.

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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.

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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

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

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Requirement Due date

ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child;

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Requirement Due date

ensure that the home has sufficient staff to provide care for each child;

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Requirement Due date

ensure that the home‟s workforce provides continuity of care to each child;

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Requirement Due date

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. (Regulation 13 (2)(a)(c)(d)(e)(f)) 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must provide for records to be kept of an allegation of abuse or neglect, and the action taken in response. (Regulation 34 (2)(d)) 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain records (“case records”) for each child which are kept up to date and are signed and dated by the author of each entry. (Regulation 36 (1)(a)(b)(c)) 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain in the home the records in Schedule 4. (Regulation 37 (2)) This is with regard to providing a copy of the staff duty roster of persons working at the home, and a record of the actual rosters worked. 28/09/2018

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that records of complaints, 28/09/2018 Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 5 which may be kept in electronic form, are kept in an accessible manner. (Regulation 38 (k))

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Recommendations

 Staff should continually and actively assess the risks to each child and the arrangements in place to protect them. Where there are safeguarding concerns for a child, their placement plan, agreed between the home and their placing authority, must include details of the steps the home will take to manage any assessed risks on a day to day basis. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 42, paragraph 9.5)  Records must be kept detailing all individual incidents when children go missing from the home (regulation 36 (schedule 3(14)). This information should be shared with the placing authority and, where appropriate, with the child‟s parents. Evaluation of missing incidents should be undertaken to identify any gaps in training, skills or knowledge for staff or to record and retain evidence of what worked well. This evaluation should inform the review of the quality of

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Recommendations

care. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 46, paragraph 9.31)  The registered person should plan staffing levels to ensure that they meet the needs of children and can respond flexibly to unexpected events or opportunities. Staffing structures should promote continuity of care from the child‟s perspective. If children complain, or give a view on how the staffing structure could be improved to promote the best care for them, appropriate action should be taken. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 54, paragraph 10.15)  The registered person should monitor and review the patterns and trends of turnover of staff, whether agency or directly employed, and be able to understand and where possible, address any negative trends. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 54, paragraph

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Recommendations

10.19)  The registered person should actively seek independent scrutiny of the home and make best use of information from independent and internal monitoring (including under regulations 44 and 45) to ensure continuous improvement. They should be skilled in anticipating difficulties and reviewing incidents, such as learning from disruptions and placement breakdowns. They are responsible for proactively implementing lessons learned and sustaining good practice. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 55, paragraph 10.24)  Children should be encouraged by staff to see the home‟s records as „living documents‟ supporting them to view and contribute to the record in a way that reflects their voice on a regular basis. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 58, paragraph 11.19) Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 6

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Recommendations

 Staff should be familiar with the home‟s policies on record keeping and understand the importance of careful, objective, and clear recording. Staff should record information on individual children in a non-stigmatising way that distinguishes between fact, opinion and third-party information. Information about the child must always be recorded in a way that will be helpful to the child. („Guide to the children‟s homes regulations including the quality standards‟, page 62, paragraph 14.4)

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improvement to be good

Young people have experienced a lack of permanence and stability due to a high turnover of staff working at the home. Young people who have lived at the home for longer periods of time have experienced several changes in key workers and appear resigned to being cared for by an ever-changing staff team. Young people‟s comments included, „I can talk to staff, but sometimes they leave. Like my key worker. That is the only thing. Can talk to them and learn to trust them and then they leave but I understand that is life.‟

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improvement to be good

Young people were also disillusioned with the previous manager‟s failure to listen to them and resolve their concerns. The manager left with no notice served and this reinforced their disillusionment.

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improvement to be good

Young people have experienced some disruption due to ineffective planning, poor matching processes and inconsistent risk management. This has resulted in unplanned discharges from the home.

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improvement to be good

One young person‟s placement went on for longer than necessary. This resulted in staff feeling unable to manage the young person‟s behaviour, due to poor leadership and a lack of insight into the young person‟s emotional welfare. Ongoing incidents had a negative effect on the other young people living at the home, as they experienced periods of conflict and times when staff were unable to take them on planned activities. The negative situation is also reflected in one young person‟s perception of her care and the lack of respect that she received from staff. A positive transition to another home has now been made in the best interests of the young person.

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improvement to be good

The new manager and responsible individual have taken swift action in an attempt to drive improvement. Despite the previous challenging time, the commitment of staff is clear and is reflected in the majority of young people‟s positive comments about living at the home. Young people value their new key workers and the care that they now receive. They also like the new manager because he listens to their views.

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improvement to be good

Young people receive good support to attend school. They make good progress, do well Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 7 in education and learn from the activities arranged by staff. One young person looks forward to achieving well in her forthcoming GCSE exams and enthusiastically practises her singing and drama interests. Despite the difficulties with high staff turnover, this young person still thinks the home is „amazing‟. Another young person is proud of his independent travel to and from school, he achieves well, makes friends and fully appreciates the staff support that he receives to go aeroplane spotting, do a gardening project and follow his interests in nature.

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improvement to be good

One recently admitted young person said that the best thing about the home is the staff. His key worker and discussions with other staff have helped him change his mind about living at the home. He was previously negative about it but now likes the home and appreciates the support that he receives to help him attend school and keep in contact with his friends.

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improvement to be good

Young people live in a homely environment and enjoy the privacy of well-personalised bedrooms.

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improvement to be good

Prior to the recent management changes, the registered manager and staff had been unable to appropriately assess and change young people‟s high-risk behaviours. Disorganised and inconsistent implementation of the home‟s risk and care-planning framework have failed to consider the link between significant risks such as going missing from the home, poor mental health and self-injurious behaviours. This lack of connectivity does not support individualised risk management and therefore has had little positive impact on some young people‟s complex needs and their emotional well- being.

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improvement to be good

Some sections of young people‟s compatibility assessments and risk assessments, which relate to high-risk behaviours, are incomplete. Each young person‟s risk and behaviour plans contain extensive chronologies about the young person‟s challenging behaviours. The plans give little day-to-day guidance to an already inexperienced staff team and make very poor and negative reading for the young people who may wish to access their files.

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improvement to be good

One young person‟s perception about the lack of staff insight into the emotional reasons for self-injurious behaviour (and eventual admission to hospital) is reinforced by the process-led strategies set out in her behaviour plan. While a therapeutic approach was identified as needed, there was no information about how this should be provided. Difficult-to-locate, process-led guidance focused on room searches, removal of high-risk items and supervision of the young person‟s spending.

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improvement to be good

Another example of poor risk assessment and planning is that another young person, who has autism spectrum disorder, was admitted when staff did not have training in caring for young people who have autistic spectrum disorder. autistic young people. Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 8 Safeguarding records lack detail and post-event evaluation. While complaints from young people and safeguarding concerns about staff practice have been referred to the local authority designated safeguarding officer, records of the actions taken by the previous manager were not available in the home. Lack of such records mean a full evaluation of young people‟s safety cannot be carried out.

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improvement to be good

Staff acknowledge that they have not received suitable training in the recording processes in the home, not least how to complete a missing from care incident form. While there are concerns about the recording framework, staff provide a consistent response when young people go missing. Staff always follow young people who leave the home without permission and they are aware of the degrees of vulnerability of young people.

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improvement to be good

However, since the recent management changes, young people currently at the home, and the staff, identify improvements in practice and young people‟s behaviour. Staff work hard to provide boundaries for young people. Positive relationships clearly impact on young people‟s social skills and respect for each other. Building positive relationships has become easier, as one young person has recently left the home thus reducing conflict between young people. One young person‟s previous concerns about bullying and the lack of response from the previous manager have now been resolved. All young people are now confident that bullying is not allowed and that the new manager and staff will take action should any concerns arise.

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

Management has been poor. There has been a lack of oversight of the care and safeguarding framework and a lack of assessment of the impact of the high staff turnover on outcomes for young people and the morale of staff.

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

Since the last inspection in November 2017, seven members of staff have left employment and eight new staff have come to work at the home. Ongoing vacancies are sometimes covered by staff from another home. This resulted in an additional eight individuals coming to work at the home. The rota does not give the full names of the additional staff working in the home.

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

The recent and unplanned resignation of the registered manager and a change of responsible individual have brought further uncertainty for the staff team and for young people, who have experienced unacceptable disruption to their lives.

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

Poor recording is reflective of a lack of management input, lack of staff training, high staff turnover and a lack of monitoring by managers.

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

However, the current situation has been well managed by the provider. The new manager and the new responsible individual have quickly brought stability to the staff team and young people. They have reflected on the recent challenges experienced by young people and the staff and acknowledge the need for improvement. They show clear commitment to addressing the shortfalls identified in this inspection report, not Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 9 least by ensuring planned admissions and providing long-term care for young people.

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

Mentoring by a registered manager from another home gives effective support to the new manager. Staff are reassured by the swift action taken by the provider and the skills of the new manager. Staff are invigorated by the approach of the new manager, who has already met with them on a one-to-one basis, booked a team meeting and worked shifts to support staff. This approach is designed to improve the retention of staff who want to work together to drive improvement in the home.

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

Staff training is now planned with a training matrix under regular review by the new manager. Arrangements are also now in place for effective staff supervision. The responsible individual has now set in place a new training provider and all staff are to be retrained across all aspects of their practice.

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

The new manager‟s and responsible individual‟s child-centeredness is clearly evident in the consultation with, and participation of, young people in the running of the home. Young people now understand the home‟s complaints process and are confident in raising their concerns and sharing their views under the new management structure.

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

The new manager has a good understanding and working knowledge of the regulatory and inspection framework and has carried out an immediate review of the home‟s statement of purpose. He is clear about his monitoring responsibilities, including addressing recommendations made in the monthly independent monitoring reports about the home, and has systems in place to continue to audit the operation of the home and drive improvement.

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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: SC474179 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Acorn Children‟s Home (Burton) Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: First Floor, Unit 3, Barberry Court Parkway, Centrum One Hundred, Burton-on-Trent DE14 2UE

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Inspector

Elaine Cray, social care inspector Inspection report children‟s home: SC474179 11 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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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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