Children's home run by A Wilderness Way Limited in Cumberland

Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 1 SC441978 Registered provider: A Wilderness Way 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 children’s home is run by a private organisation. It is registered to provide care and accommodation for up to three young people who may 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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good

How well children and young people are helped and protected 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: 30 January 2018

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: outstanding

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

30/01/2018 Full Outstanding 06/03/2017 Interim Improved effectiveness 30/11/2016 Full Good 23/03/2016 Interim Sustained effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 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 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

are familiar with, and act in accordance with, the home’s child protection policies. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(a)(vii))

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Requirement Due date

This relates specifically to checking visitors on arrival, making sure they have a legitimate reason for visiting the home, and ensuring that a record is made of the visit. 01/05/2019

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Requirement Due date

After consultation with the fire and rescue authority, the registered person must—

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Requirement Due date

ensure, by means of fire drills and practices at suitable intervals, that persons working at the home and, so far as reasonably practicable, children are aware of the procedure to be followed in case of a fire. (Regulation 25(1)(d))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, make sure that visitors working at the home are aware of the arrangements should the fire alarm sound. 01/05/2019

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Requirement Due date

within 48 hours of the use of the measure, the registered person, or a person who is authorised by the registered person to do so ("the authorised person")—

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Requirement Due date

has spoken to the user about the measure; and

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Requirement Due date

has signed the record to confirm it is accurate; and

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Requirement Due date

within 5 days of the use of the measure, the registered person or the authorised person adds to the record confirmation that 01/05/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 4 they have spoken to the child about the measure. (Regulation 35 (3)(b)(i)(ii) and (c)(iv)) 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)) 01/05/2019

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Recommendations

 When a child returns to the home after being missing from care or away from the home without permission, the responsible local authority must provide an opportunity for the child to have an independent return home interview. Homes should take account of the information provided by such interviews when assessing risks and putting arrangements in place to protect each child. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 45, paragraph 9.30)

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Young people and staff share positive and productive relationships. Staff create an environment that promotes mutual respect and encourages open and honest communication. Because of this, young people feel that they are valued and know that their views and wishes are important and are listened to. Placements are usually time-limited and focused on helping those young people in crisis and imminent danger, for example from child sexual exploitation, violent gang-related activities and drug trafficking. Staff involve young people fully in their care planning and seek their contribution to develop their own activity and learning programme for the duration of their placement. This helps young people to buy into the care and support provided and motivates them to achieve and make good progress. Young people’s educational needs are supported within the context of their overriding need for safety. Most young people take part in an outdoor programme of education

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

alongside some formal curriculum-based learning that is designed to meet their individual assessed need. For many young people who have not attended school for some time, this successfully reintroduces them to learning and provides a sense of achievement that has been missing from their lives. Young people benefit from a wide range of adventurous outdoor activities that are both stimulating and challenging. Young people successfully achieve new skills and generally gain a good mix of accredited recreational and vocational awards. Young people feel pride in their achievements and their newly discovered talents. This raises both their confidence and their self-esteem. Young people’s health needs are well met. They have good access to all routine healthcare services. Local support and counselling services help in promoting young Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 5 people’s mental health and emotional well-being. Staff support young people to

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

understand the importance of healthy lifestyles to improve their personal safety and well-being. For example, staff support young people to identify healthy relationships, to learn how to protect their sexual health, and to minimise harm from misuse of drugs and other substances. The strength of this home is its good track record in building young people’s resilience and helping them to reflect on their past and future choices. Since the last inspection, several young people have successfully returned to the care of family members or moved on to supported living arrangements. Professionals and parents speak highly of the quality of care provided and the support young people receive. One parent commented, ‘I can’t believe it’s gone so well. She has settled down and completely changed. She understands that in the past she made poor choices. She’s learned. I just can’t thank them enough.’

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

Young people say they ‘feel safe’ and most understand that they have been placed in this home for their safety and protection. Young people say staff are friendly and take time to talk and explain things. They feel comfortable in their company and trust them in sharing their concerns. Young people’s individual risk assessments provide staff with clear guidance that helps them to better understand young people’s risk-taking behaviours and their vulnerabilities, and how these should be supported and managed. Young people contribute to this assessment and planning process, explaining what triggers their behaviour and what they know works well. Because of this, young people have a strong understanding of the concerns that exist, their personal vulnerabilities and the actions that they and staff can take to minimise risks to their personal safety. Young people, particularly those at risk of child sexual exploitation and ‘county lines’

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

drug trafficking, are educated to understand exploitation. Staff help them to identify predatory behaviours, explore their own vulnerabilities and work out how, together, these factors can compromise their safety. Consequently, as young people’s understanding of exploitation improves, they become more resilient and learn strategies that help keep them safe. Staff rely on the positive relationships that they build with young people to help promote mutual respect and positive behaviour. Staff encourage young people to talk about their frustrations and manage their anger appropriately. Physical intervention is only ever used as a last resort and in accordance with safe practice. On an isolated occasion, delays were noted in the timing and recording of the staff debrief process. This failed to support best practice but did not compromise young people’s safety. Staff provide a high level of supervision during both daytime and night-time hours.

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

Because of this, young people rarely go missing. However, on the rare occasion that this happens, staff act swiftly and work in good cooperation with the police to search for young people to make sure they are returned to the safety of the home as soon as possible. Staff recruitment and selection processes are robust. These processes have been Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 6 improved recently and now reflect young people’s participation in the interview process. Young people have contributed their ideas, identifying what they believe is important to know about prospective new staff. This has added value to the process and allowed young people another opportunity to have their views heard and influence their care experience. During this inspection, it was identified that visitors to the home are not routinely challenged for identification. Although this did not compromise the safety of young

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

people on this occasion, this needs to be firmly embedded in staff practice to ensure that young people are kept safe from adults that may pose a threat to them. Additionally, visitors are not routinely advised about fire safety arrangements – in particular, what to do should the fire alarm sound. Again, this did not pose a problem on this occasion, but this should also be embedded in staff practice, ensuring people’s safety when visiting the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The manager has been in post since September 2017 and was registered with Ofsted in December 2017. Both the manager and his staff team have a thorough knowledge and understanding of the young people in their care. Young people’s progress is well understood and captured in several ways, including reports, pictures, activity videos and young people’s personal feedback books. Together, these provide a clear picture of the varied achievements and good progress young people make. Young people’s feedback books give staff opportunities to record praise and positive highlights of their time spent with the young people. Young people are encouraged to share their comments too, often highlighting positive activities and enjoyment of spending time with staff. Staff are well supported with regular supervision, staff meetings and extensive training to ensure that they are up to date with current practice, maintaining and improving their

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

professional development. Young people’s records are held electronically, improving ease of access for staff to record events when away from the home on activities. The records provide a good account of young people’s plans, day-to-day experiences and achievements. Young people looking at these during their placement or sometime in the future will have a good understanding of their time in care at this home. Good monitoring arrangements exist. The registered manager maintains his own regular monitoring activity and responds well to any recommendations made by the independent person who provides external scrutiny, reporting regularly to Ofsted. These reports, along with the registered manager’s six-monthly quality of care review reports, provide Ofsted with a good evaluation of young people’s progress and the home’s performance on a regular basis. The registered manager is aware of the home’s strengths and

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

weaknesses and is using this knowledge effectively to inform development planning to support continuous improvement of the home. The home generally has a good track record of keeping Ofsted notified of any incidents that occur. However, it was identified during this inspection that there was an incident of Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 7 concern that Ofsted was not notified of. Although the incident was managed to a positive conclusion, the lack of notification was contrary to regulation and lessened the usual good transparency between the home and Ofsted.

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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: SC441978 8

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: A Wilderness Way Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Manor House, Brisco, Carlisle, Cumberland CA4 0QS

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Inspector

Gillian Walters, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC441978 9 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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