Children's home run by Phoenix Children’s Homes Limited in North Devon

Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 1 SC368137 Registered provider: Phoenix Child Care 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 registered to provide care and accommodation for up to two children and young people who may have emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. The home is operated by a private provider of education and social care.

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Information about this children’s home

At the time of this inspection, no children or young people were living in the home.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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inadequate

How well children and young people are helped and protected inadequate

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inadequate

The effectiveness of leaders and managers inadequate

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inadequate

There are serious failures that mean children and young people’s welfare is not promoted or safeguarded and the care and experiences of children and young people are poor and they are not making progress.

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: declined in effectiveness

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

06/03/2019 Interim Declined in effectiveness 01/11/2018 Full Good 25/10/2017 Full Requires improvement to be good 03/01/2017 Interim Improved effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 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 of engaging with the wider system to ensure children’s needs are met, the registered person must, and must ensure that staff—

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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))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that all necessary information is obtained from the local authority regarding new referrals, before any decisions are made. 31/05/2019

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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 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; 31/05/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 4 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; and

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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. (Regulation 8 (1)(2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(viii)(x))

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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

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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

ensure that staff work as a team where appropriate;

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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

use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b)(2)(b)(e)(h)) In particular:  record all complaints and concerns raised collectively so that the outcome of these can inform improvement of the home  embed management quality assurance, oversight and monitoring systems, including organisation and review of staff supervision arrangements; team development; review of risk management documents; the missing protocol and guidance for staff  hold regular team meetings with staff and record these  ensure that the home is well maintained and repaired so that it is a welcoming environment for young people. 28/06/2019

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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; and 14/06/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 5 have a positive experience of arriving at or moving on from the home. (Regulation 14 (1)(a)(b))

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Requirement Due date

In addition, leaders and the manager need to ensure that impact risk assessments are detailed and where shortfalls are identified in these by the responsible individual, these are addressed and then reviewed by the responsible individual.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must compile in relation to the children’s home a statement (‘the statement of purpose’) which covers the matters listed in Schedule 1.

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Requirement Due date

keep the statement of purpose under review and, where appropriate, revise it. (Regulation 16 (1)(3)(a)) 14/06/2019

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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

employ an individual to work at the children’s home—

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Requirement Due date

if the individual satisfies the requirements in paragraph (3).

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Requirement Due date

full and satisfactory information is available in relation to the individual in respect of each of the matters in Schedule 2 (Regulation 32 (1)(2)(a)(3)(d))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure all checks, such as verification of references, are completed before staff start their employment. 31/05/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that all employees—

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Requirement Due date

undertake appropriate continuing professional development; and

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Requirement Due date

receive practice-related supervision by a person with appropriate experience. (Regulation 33 (4)(a)(b)) 31/05/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 6 Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 7

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The young person who was living in this home has recently left at her own request. Her time in the home was fraught with incidents, which resulted in staff members being assaulted and considerable damage caused to the home. The young person was not settled in the home and received one hour a week of education.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Some parts of the home were repaired while the young person lived there, but not all. The unrepaired areas include splashes of different coloured paint throughout the stairs. For over a month, the young person had to live with the reminder of a particularly difficult incident, as a decision was made not to replace the carpet until she left. The home is now being repaired and redecorated throughout.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Risk management documents did not cover all the young person’s needs or properly guide staff in how to provide the help she needed. At times, staff did not respond to the young person with a nurturing approach, which contributed in part to the frequency and extent of the incidents. At times, the young person had a confusing experience and was not given clear messages by the staff.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The manager and staff team, however, did show commitment to the young person they cared for; they did not end the placement even when there were considerable difficulties. They have since continued to support her in alternative accommodation. The logistics as to how this will be managed when a new young person moves to the home have not been resolved.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

At the time of the inspection, managers had started to plan for another young person to come into the home, without enough referral information to make a safe decision in the best interests of that young person. Communication between managers, staff and the young person’s social worker led to confusion about the way forward. Introductions had started without a clear plan of arrangements for the young person’s care, including education.

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

Leadership and management arrangements have not promoted and safeguarded young people’s welfare. Guidance for staff on what they needed to do to keep the young person safe when she went missing was not thorough and not always followed. For example, on a recent occasion the young person went missing from the home close to midnight. The police should have been called immediately, but this was not done for one and a half hours, potentially leaving the young person in more danger.

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

A very serious incident occurred, but managers did not realise that the social worker had not been informed until a week later. Medication procedures and management instructions were not followed during this incident. Consequently, the young person was placed at risk, emotionally and physically, as staff were unable to safely manage her Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 8 behaviour. A more recent incident was better managed. Although written guidance for staff on how physical intervention should be used was not clear, the incident resulted in staff using appropriate physical intervention as a last resort to keep the young person safe.

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

Not all safe recruitment checks are completed when staff are appointed. For example, checks to verify references for one member of staff were not completed.

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

When allegations are made, or incidents have needed to be investigated, the manager has reported these to the designated officer appropriately. The registered individuals within the organisation have carried out investigations, which have resulted in clear conclusions.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Since December 2018, this home has had two different managers, neither of whom have been registered with Ofsted. For most of this time, strong management of the home was lacking, and the uncertainty has had a negative impact on the running of the home. The current manager, who has been in post since 18 March 2019, is due to move when a permanent manager is appointed, which will create further instability.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Management and organisational oversight and monitoring have been insufficient. Adequate systems are not in place to ensure that important information is documented accurately and that all necessary tasks are completed and reviewed. Not all complaints and concerns are recorded in one place, which would enable the manager to understand emerging themes that may need attention. Staff supervision arrangements are not organised well enough, and supervision does not happen regularly enough for some people. These gaps mean that staff do not get the guidance, reflection and support that they need to carry out their jobs effectively.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

In the last two months, a team from another home has joined the home. Staff have not had the benefit of regular, recorded team meetings and team development sessions to deal with these changes, and so team relationships are strained. Decisions have not yet been made as to which staff members will make up the core staff team, ready for when a new young person moves in.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The responsible individual wishes to change the statement of purpose to reflect a move towards a more nurturing and therapeutic approach towards young people. It currently depicts a sanction-based behaviourist model, which senior managers do not support.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The current temporary manager has facilitated some improvements in the home, but there is still a significant amount of work to be done so that the team can unite to provide a nurturing environment and safe, clear boundaries for young people. Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 9

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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: SC368137 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Phoenix Child Care Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Phoenix Learning and Care Ltd, First Floor, Rolle Quay House, Rolle Quay, Barnstaple, Devon EX31 1JE

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Inspector

Sarah Canto, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC368137 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 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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