Children's home run by Sandcastle Care Limited in Wyre

Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 1 SC061803 Registered provider: Sandcastle Care 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

The home offers a service to young males who would benefit from a placement in a smaller, single-gender residential setting. The home is underpinned by a philosophy of therapeutic care. Children and young people receive support from a qualified psychotherapist.

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Information about this children’s home

The current manager was registered with Ofsted on 31 July 2017 and holds a relevant qualification.

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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 requires improvement to be 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

Date of last inspection: 12 December 2017

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: not applicable Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

12/12/2017 Full Good 06/03/2017 Interim Improved effectiveness 07/11/2016 Full Good 23/03/2016 Interim Sustained effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 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 education standard is that children make measurable progress towards achieving their educational potential and are helped to do so.

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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

help each child to achieve the child’s education and training targets, as recorded in the child’s relevant plans;

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Requirement Due date

support each child’s learning and development, including helping the child to develop independent study skills and, where appropriate, helping the child to complete independent study;

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Requirement Due date

understand the barriers to learning that each child may face and take appropriate action to help the child to overcome any such barriers;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to understand the importance and value of education, learning, training and employment;

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Requirement Due date

promote opportunities for each child to learn informally;

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Requirement Due date

help a child who is excluded from school, or who is of compulsory school age but not attending school, to access educational and training support throughout the period of exclusion or non-attendance and to return to school as soon as possible;

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Requirement Due date

help each child who is above compulsory school age to participate in further education, training or employment and to prepare for future care, education or employment;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to attend education or training in accordance with the expectations in the child’s relevant plans; and that each child has access to appropriate equipment, facilities and 04/02/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 4 resources to support the child’s learning. (Regulation 8 (1)(2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(viii)(ix)(x)(b))

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Requirement Due date

The positive relationships standard is that children are helped to develop, and to benefit from, relationships based on mutual respect and trust; an understanding about acceptable behaviour; and positive responses to other children and adults.

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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

help each child to develop socially aware behaviour;

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Requirement Due date

encourage each child to take responsibility for the child’s behaviour, in accordance with the child’s age and understanding;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to develop and practise skills to resolve conflicts positively and without harm to anyone;

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Requirement Due date

communicate to each child expectations about the child’s behaviour and ensure that the child understands those expectations in accordance with the child’s age and understanding;

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Requirement Due date

understand how children’s previous experiences and present emotions can be communicated through behaviour and have the competence and skills to interpret these and develop positive relationships with children;

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Requirement Due date

are provided with supervision and support to enable them to understand and manage their own feelings and responses to the behaviour and emotions of children, and to help children to do the same;

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Requirement Due date

de-escalate confrontations with or between children, or potentially violent behaviour by children;

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Requirement Due date

understand and communicate to children that bullying is unacceptable and have the skills to recognise incidents or indications of bullying and how to deal with them and that each child is encouraged to build and maintain positive relationships with others. (Regulation 11 (1)(a)(b)(c)(2)(a)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(ix)(x)(xi)(xii)(xiii)) 04/02/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that a record is made of any complaint, the action taken in response, and the outcome of any 04/02/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 5 investigation. (Regulation 39 (3))

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Recommendations

 Children should have access to a computer and the internet to support their education and learning, unless there are specific safeguarding reasons why this would be inappropriate. In such cases, the home should consider whether and how it can support the child to access a computer and the internet safely. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 29, paragraph 5.19)

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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. Where children have specific health needs or conditions, they should be supported to manage these subject to their age and understanding. When a child needs additional health or well-being support, staff should work with the child’s placing authority to enable proper and immediate access to any specialist medical, psychological or psychiatric support required. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 34, paragraph 7.10)

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Recommendations

In particular, children and young people should be supported to explore and manage their emotional health and well-being. Furthermore, the policies and procedures regarding young people smoking tobacco must be adhered to.

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Recommendations

 As set out in regulations 31-33, the registered person is responsible for maintaining good employment practice. They must ensure that staff have the relevant qualifications that meet the regulations. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 61, paragraph 13.1)

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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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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

When children and young people arrive, they have a history of persistent risk-taking behaviours. From the day that they arrive, instances of the risk-taking behaviour reduce Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 6 considerably. Staff work in partnership with the relevant agencies to help keep children and young people safe.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people say that they like living here and that they can identify the progress that they have made. One child said, ‘This is the most settled I have been and I am happy.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people live in a safe and supportive environment. They know that staff care for them and want them to have happy experiences and achieve good outcomes. Children and young people have the opportunity to experience new things, for example holidays abroad.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff support and encourage children and young people to establish and maintain positive relationships with family and friends. Relationships improve with their families. Children and young people enjoy having regular contact with them, which increases over time.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The home benefits from regular clinical support. In most instances, the children and young people respond well to this. However, the clinical ethos identified in the statement of purpose is not fully implemented in the home. Managers identify that this is an area of practice that needs development.

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improvement to be good

Staff have a good understanding of the children and young people’s needs and risks. However, not all assessments, care plans and records are clear. Furthermore, they do not always reflect the individual needs of the children and young people.

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improvement to be good

Children, young people and staff generally get on well with one another and relationships are positive. Children and young people can identify staff that they can trust. They speak positively about the good relationships that they have with the staff.

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improvement to be good

When children, young people and staff do not get along well, staff experience verbal threats and, in some instances, physical harm. These acts are often targeted at specific members of staff. While there is support in place for staff, the behaviours are not routinely monitored, and they continue.

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improvement to be good

Children, young people and staff experience elements of bullying in the home. This is not always recognised as bullying. Consequently, the behaviours are not addressed as bullying. This means that children and young people do not learn to understand the impact of these behaviours on others.

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improvement to be good

The management of behaviour in the home is not robust enough. Staff rely on restricting access to the internet and games consoles to regulate behaviours. Furthermore, consequences are not restorative in nature and do not work effectively in helping to Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 7 change behaviours.

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improvement to be good

Staff do not consistently adhere to safeguarding practices and procedures relating to the access of appropriate computer games and the internet. While there are parental restrictions to the internet, there are no monitoring arrangements in place. Furthermore, children and young people play computer games that exceed their age limit.

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improvement to be good

Children and young people are aware of the complaints policy and use this to voice their concerns. However, staff do not consistently follow the policy and procedure. Furthermore, records do not always reflect the nature of the complaint and the actions taken by the manager and staff.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The current manager was registered with Ofsted on 31 July 2017 and holds a relevant qualification.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The manager is passionate and committed to delivering a good standard of care and support for children, young people and staff. She leads by example and demonstrates good leadership and management skills. Furthermore, she has a good insight into the strengths and weaknesses of the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Staff feel supported and valued. They benefit from regular supervision, and day-to-day support is good.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

On the whole, children and young people speak well of managers and staff. Parents and professionals are complimentary about the home. They speak positively about their relationships with the home. They also recognise that children and young people progress well living here. One parent said, ‘I have found that the communication is great and [name of child] is thriving in his surroundings.’

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Staff receive effective training that enhances their practice. The training helps staff to have a good insight into children and young people’s needs and behaviours. However, the management of these complex behaviours is not consistent throughout the home. Managers identify with this and highlight this as an area for development.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The recruitment and selection of staff are good. However, the consideration and evidence of whether qualifications are relevant, or equivalent, are not clear enough. The provider has made assurances that this area of practice will be improved.

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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 Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 8 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: SC061803 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Sandcastle Care Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 49 Whitegate Drive, Blackpool, Lancashire FY3 9DG

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Inspector’s

Lisa Gregoire-Parker, social care inspector Mandy Williams, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC061803 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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Inspector’s

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Inspector’s

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Inspector’s

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