Children's home run by Hexagon Care Services Limited in Preston

Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 1 SC482569 Registered provider: Hexagon Care Services 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

The home is privately owned and provides accommodation for up to six children and young people who have emotional and/or behavioural difficulties.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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outstanding

How well children and young people are helped and protected outstanding

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outstanding

The effectiveness of leaders and managers good

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outstanding

The children’s home provides highly effective services that consistently exceed the standards of good. The actions of the children’s home contribute to significantly improved outcomes and positive experiences for children and young people who need help, protection and care.

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outstanding

Date of last inspection: 7 November 2017

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outstanding

Overall judgement at last inspection: outstanding

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outstanding

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

07/11/2017 Full Outstanding 21/02/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 09/11/2016 Full Outstanding 18/01/2016 Interim Improved effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 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 notify HMCI and each other relevant person without delay if—

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Requirement Due date

there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious (Regulation 40 (4)(e)) 29/03/2019

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Staff excel in providing consistent, nurturing care for young people. Highly individualised, tailored care directly leads to consistently improved outcomes for all the young people.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Extremely well-documented records evidence marked improvements in all the young people’s education, emotional well-being and behaviours. For example, all young people significantly improve their educational outcomes because they are encouraged and supported to regularly attend school and college. Young people are provided with alternative learning opportunities on the occasions that they do not attend school. This has led to one young person being successful in securing an apprenticeship, and two young people gaining employment locally.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The young people have lived in the home for more than one year. For some of these young people this is the longest period of stability that they have experienced. The young people spoke about how settled they are in the home and how well the staff value and look after them. They talked about how the staff team helps them to overcome worries and provides support to stop them from engaging in behaviours that would place them at risk.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The staff team is highly committed to helping the young people. Staff establish positive and trusting relationships with young people and demonstrate the ability to support young people who are under extreme stress. All the young people have grown in confidence and maturity. They have developed resilience and an understanding of their Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 4 own circumstances and life events. Some young people have drawn on their own life experiences and produced material that has been shared at local and national events. This has helped professionals to better understand child exploitation. In turn, these young people have developed a sense of pride and self-worth.

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

Staff participate in a high level of safeguarding training. Independent and external clinical supervision regularly takes place to ensure that all staff remain up to date with research developments. Staff spoke positively of how regular one-to-one sessions with qualified therapists support their learning and enable them to critically reflect on their practice and make continuous improvements.

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

Staff have an excellent understanding of how the young people’s previous experiences of trauma and abuse affect their behaviours. Staff’s in-depth understanding of each young person’s circumstances, supported by clear safeguarding policies and procedures, helps to keep the young people safe.

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

Risk assessment and risk management are of the highest quality. The registered manager and staff have well-developed knowledge around the risks and issues for each young person and apply these when moving young people into the home. However, despite these measures the young people and staff recently experienced a challenging and difficult period following the introduction of a new young person into the home. This led to some volatile incidents that had a negative impact on all of the young people. Since then, the new young person has been very well supported. Additional staff were recruited to provide further assistance, and the young person is now settled in the home. Staff worked intensively and were successful in helping the young people to rebuild relationships following this difficult period.

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

Young people who are assessed as highly vulnerable and at risk of child exploitation are supported extremely well by staff to live independently. Concerns are responded to promptly because of the collaborative working relationships with other professionals. As a result, there has been a significant reduction in young people placing themselves at risk when in the community by themselves.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The registered manager maintains high-quality standards of practice. Over the years, she has continued to develop her knowledge and understanding of child exploitation. The registered manager presents at and attends local and national provider forums, for example those run by Barnardo’s and local authorities, to share good practice.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The registered manager has produced and implemented a range of tools to monitor the outcomes of the young people. The learning that is taken from the models of intervention that are applied in the home is shared with other providers and local Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 5 authorities. There is a direct correlation between this learning and sustained improved outcomes for the young people.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

A culture of continuous improvement is encouraged by the registered manager by providing staff with varied learning and training opportunities. Staff spoke positively of the support that they receive from the registered manager and the therapeutic services the manager has secured.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The registered manager’s passion, enthusiasm and dedication to improving the lives of the young people are shared by the staff team. More recently, newly appointed, additional staff have joined the team. The registered manager recognises that several new staff members require further time to embed their learning and develop their approach when working with the most challenging of incidents. Increased training, regular reflective sessions and input for the therapist to analyse incidents are assisting the new staff members to develop their skills.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Monitoring of the home takes place regularly and is of high quality. Professionals spoken with confirm that they have information shared with them routinely and that their relationships with the staff and the registered manager are ‘exceptional’. Records kept indicate a reduction in incidents of young people going missing from the home. However, the registered manager failed to notify Ofsted on several occasions when young people were missing from the home for extended periods. Comprehensive records kept of these incidents demonstrate the rigour applied to secure the safe return of the young people and the learning thereafter.

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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: SC482569 6

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Hexagon Care Services Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 2nd Floor, 1 Tustin Court, Riversway, Preston, Lancashire PR2 2YQ

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Inspector

Linda Bond, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC482569 7 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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