Children's home run by Outdoor Care Limited in Northumberland

Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 1 SC415548 Registered provider: Outdoor Care Limited Full inspection 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 one child or young person with emotional and/or behavioural difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

The home is described in the statement of purpose as a ‘crisis intervention service’ for one child or young person, with high levels of staff supervision.

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Information about this children’s home

The manager was registered in July 2010 and is appropriately qualified.

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Information about this children’s home

Inspection dates: 13 to 14 December 2018

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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: SC415548 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

29/08/2017 Full Good 25/01/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 12/07/2016 Full Good 23/03/2016 Interim Sustained effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 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

In meeting the quality standards, the registered person must, and must ensure that 

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Requirement Due date

if the registered person considers, or staff consider, a placing authority’s or a relevant person’s performance or response to be inadequate in relation to their role, challenge the placing authority or the relevant person to seek to ensure that each child’s needs are met in accordance with the child’s relevant plans. (Regulation 5(c)) 31/01/2019

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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 the 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

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(2)(b)(iv))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, to ensure that they are cared for in accordance with the aims and objectives of the home as recorded in the statement of purpose. 31/01/2019

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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 

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Requirement Due date

help a child who is excluded from school, or who is of 31/01/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 4 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. Regulation 8(2)(a)(viii)) 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 harm to the child;

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Requirement Due date

take effective action whenever there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare. (Regulation 12(2)(a)(i)(vi))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, to take greater action to address the safeguarding issues identified when a child is missing or absent from the home. 31/01/2019

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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 

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Requirement Due date

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. (Regulation 13(2)(a)) 31/01/2019

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Requirement Due date

The care planning standard is that children receive effectively planned care in or through the children’s home.

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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 arrangements are in place to manage and review the placement of each child in the home. (Regulation 14(2)(b)(ii))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, to ensure that care planning is up to date and that all care plan issues are recognised and actioned in a timely manner. 31/01/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must notify HMCI of any revisions and send HMCI a copy of the revised statement within 28 days of the revision. (Regulation 16(3)(b)) 31/01/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 5 The registered person must appoint a person to manage the children’s home if the registered provider is an organisation or a partnership. (Regulation 27(1)(b)(i)) 31/01/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must recruit staff using recruitment procedures that are designed to ensure children’s safety.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person may only employ an individual to work at the children’s home if the individual satisfies the requirements in paragraph (3).

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Requirement Due date

The requirements are that full and satisfactory information is available in relation to the individual in respect of each of the matters in Schedule 2. (Regulation 32(2)(a)(3)(d)) 31/01/2019

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that skills in safeguarding are gained, refreshed and recorded. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 43, paragraph 9.12)  The registered person must have systems in place so that all staff receive supervision of their practice, which allows them to reflect on the needs of the children assigned to their care. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 61, paragraph 13.2)  Regulation 45 sets out requirements for the registered person to have a system in place which allows them to monitor the matters set out in the regulation at least once every six months; also see regulation 13(2)(h) (the leadership and management standard). The registered person should undertake a review that focuses on the quality of the care provided by the home, the experiences of children living there and the impact the care is having on outcomes and

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Recommendations

improvements for the children. Reviews should be underpinned by the Quality Standards as described in regulations 5 to 14. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 64, paragraph 15.2) In particular, to improve the recording of the opinions of children, their parents, placing authorities and staff. Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 6

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improvement to be good

The home provides crisis placements for children and young people with complex needs in a rural and isolated location. There have been three children and young people accommodated during the inspection period.

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improvement to be good

The children and young people have not made progress and their experience of living at the home has not been positive. There has been a lack of engagement by the children and young people, and staff have been unable to achieve much change. The children and young people have either not wanted to be at the home or have not wanted to participate in reasonable daily routines.

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improvement to be good

There has been a lack of care planning, and placements have drifted. The needs of the children and young people have generally not been met because of this. The staff have not been able to provide sufficient personalised work to meet their needs.

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improvement to be good

One young person, who was approaching their 18th birthday, moved to a semi- independent living situation, which was a planned and positive move. This was after a fairly long-term placement. Other children have either not settled at all or have been slow to settle and have not engaged with any meaningful activity.

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improvement to be good

One older young person did engage with some education, but the other children have had no formal education during their placements. This is partly due to them not engaging and partly due to the staff being unable to access an appropriate education placement. A requirement has been made to address this issue.

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improvement to be good

Some of the children and young people have not engaged sufficiently to allow some health checks and appointments to be carried out, but necessary health treatments have been undertaken when required. Engagement with other specialist professionals has been spasmodic.

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improvement to be good

The staff do understand risk and are able to make good risk assessments. They offer high levels of supervision while the children and young people are in the placement, and therefore keep them safe within the home. However, there have been high levels of children and young people going missing or being absent from this placement. One child was missing or absent for a period of nearly seven months. They spent most of this time with a family member, but without permission. During this time, they were engaged in some drug-taking and criminal behaviour. Although the staff were able to offer an outreach service to this child, they were unable to keep them safe.

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improvement to be good

Other children have also gone missing from the home and have therefore been at risk Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 7 during these periods. The staff have had some success with one child who, after the staff were able to do some work with their extended family, reduced the number of times that they went missing. The staff do provide appropriate boundaries and expectations for the children and young people, and do offer good advice and guidance. When children and young people have engaged with staff this works well, but too often this engagement has not been evident.

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improvement to be good

The staff do provide a range of activities which some children and young people have taken part in. However, other children and young people have chosen not to take advantage of these opportunities, and staff have been unable to change this.

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

Leadership and management have been inconsistent in the period since the previous inspection, and a number of omissions and errors are evident. The registered manager has allowed the objectives of the home to drift away from providing ‘stable, safe, positive and supportive surroundings to young people in crisis’, as written in the statement of purpose.

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

The registered manager has not challenged placing authorities on issues of care planning and education. The impact of this has been that placements have been allowed to drift and children have not had the opportunity to fulfil their potential.

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

The registered manager has not sent an up-to-date copy of their statement of purpose to HMCI.

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

The inspector was unable to see records of recent staff recruitment, as these could not be accessed by staff at the home.

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

The registered manager has also been the responsible individual, but this is no longer appropriate. He has promoted his deputy manager to the acting manager position, and they are now in the process of applying to be registered. This action has not been given sufficient priority and now needs to be completed.

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

There have been a number of other areas where management practice has not been as good as it should. The supervision of staff was not in sufficient depth and was not regular enough. Also, refresher safeguarding training was not sufficiently up to date for all staff. The Regulation 45 report did not contain sufficient evidence of wider consultation. Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 8

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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 difference 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: SC415548 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Outdoor Care Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 16 Bondgate Without, Alnwick, Northumberland NE66 1PP

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Inspector

Colin Imrie, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC415548 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 children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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