Children's home run by Priory Education Services Limited

Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 1 Registered provider: Priory Education 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 one of a group of five homes run by a private organisation for young people from the local authority area. The home’s statement of purpose says that staff aim to make a difference to the lives of young people by protecting them, improving their engagement in learning, and reducing health inequalities. Staff aim to establish stability in the lives of young people and identify further support and resources to meet their needs.

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Information about this children’s home

The registered manager has a level 4 NVQ in leadership for residential childcare and has been registered to manage the home since November 2017.

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Information about this children’s home

At the time of this inspection, there were five young people living at 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 and widespread failures that mean young people are not protected or their 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: requires improvement to be good Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 2 Enforcement action since last inspection: none

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

02/05/2018 Full Requires improvement to be good 23/11/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 16/05/2017 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 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 quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who understand the children’s home’s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children; 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 ensure that staff help each child to understand and manage the impact of any experience of abuse or neglect and help each child to develop resilience and skills that prepare the child to return home, to live in a new placement or to live independently as an adult. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b)(2)(b)(v)(vi)) 02/08/2019

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Requirement Due date

The quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who—understand the children’s home’s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children; 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—ensure that the premises used for the purposes of the home are designed and furnished so as to— meet the needs of each child; and enable each child to participate in the daily life of the home. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b)(2)(c)(i)(ii)) 02/08/2019

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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. In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure—that staff—meet each child’s behavioural and emotional needs, as set out in the child’s relevant plans; help each child to develop socially aware behaviour; encourage each child to take responsibility for the child’s behaviour, in accordance with the child’s age and understanding; help each child to develop and practise skills to 02/08/2019 Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 4 resolve conflicts positively and without harm to anyone; 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

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Requirement Due date

understanding; help each child to understand, in a way that is appropriate according to the child’s age and understanding, personal, sexual and social relationships, and how those relationships can be supportive or harmful; help each child to develop the understanding and skills to recognise or withdraw from a damaging, exploitative or harmful relationship; strive to gain each child’s respect and trust; 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; 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; de-escalate confrontations with or between children, or potentially violent behaviour by children; understand and communicate to children

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Requirement Due date

that bullying is unacceptable; and have the skills to recognise incidents or indications of bullying and how to deal with them. (Regulation 11 (1)(a)(b)(c)(2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(vi)(vii)(viii)(ix)(x)(xi)(xii)(xiii)) 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—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 any harm to the child; help each child to understand how to keep safe; have the skills to identify and act upon signs that a child is at risk of harm; manage relationships between children to prevent them from harming each other; understand the roles and responsibilities in relation to protecting children that are assigned to them by the registered person; take effective action whenever there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare; and are familiar with, and act in accordance with, the home’s child protection policies. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(vi)(vii)) 02/08/2019

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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 the home’s day-to-day care is arranged and delivered so as to keep each child safe and to 02/08/2019 Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 5 protect each child effectively from harm. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(b)) The leadership and management standard is that the registered person enables, inspires and leads a culture in relation to the children’s home that—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 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; ensure that staff work as a team where appropriate; ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child; ensure that the home has sufficient staff to provide care for each child; ensure that the home’s workforce provides continuity of care to each child. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b)(2)(a)(b)(c)(d)) 02/08/2019

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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—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—understand the impact that the quality of care provided in the home is having on the progress and experiences of each child and use this understanding to inform the development of the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b)(2)(f)) 02/08/2019

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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—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—use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b)(2)(h))* 02/08/2019

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Requirement Due date

Restraint in relation to a child is only permitted for the purpose of preventing—injury to any person (including the child); serious damage to the property of any person (including the child); or a child who is accommodated in a secure children’s home from absconding from the home. Restraint in relation to a child must be necessary and proportionate. (Regulation 20 (1)(a)(b)(c)(2)) 02/08/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that— the privacy of children is appropriately protected; children can access all appropriate areas of the children’s 02/08/2019 Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 6 home’s premises; and any limitation placed on a child’s privacy or access to any area of the home’s premises— is intended to safeguard each child accommodated in the home; is necessary and proportionate; is kept under review and, if necessary, revised; and allows children as much freedom as is possible when balanced against the need to protect them and keep them safe. (Regulation 21 (a)(b)(c)(i)(ii)(iv)) The registered person must ensure that all employees— undertake appropriate continuing professional development; receive practice-related supervision by a person with appropriate experience; and have their performance and fitness to perform their roles appraised at least once every year. (Regulation 33 (4)(a)(b)(c))

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must notify HMCI and each other relevant person without delay if—a child is involved in or subject to, or is suspected of being involved in or subject to, sexual exploitation; an incident requiring police involvement occurs in relation to a child which the registered person considers to be serious; there is an allegation of abuse against the home or a person working there; a child protection enquiry involving a child —is instigated; or concludes (in which case, the notification must include the outcome of the child protection enquiry); or there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious. (Regulation 40 (4)(a)(b)(c)(d)(i)(ii)(e)) 02/08/2019

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Requirement Due date

* These requirements are subject to a compliance notice.

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Recommendations

 Children should be provided with appropriate furniture, such as a lockable cabinet or drawers to securely store personal items, including any personal information. Children should have separate bedrooms and should not share a bedroom with an adult. It may be appropriate for siblings of the same sex to share. Children should be given a choice about how their personal space is decorated in accordance with regulation 7(2)(a)(i). (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 16, paragraph 3.19)  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 information provided by such interviews when assessing risks and putting arrangements in place to protect each child. (‘Guide to the children’s homes

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Recommendations

regulations including the quality standards’, page 45, paragraph 9.30)  Any sanctions used to address poor behaviour should be restorative in nature, to help children recognise the impact of their behaviour on themselves, other children, the staff caring for them and the wider community. In some cases it will be important for Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 7 children to make reparation in some form to anyone hurt by their behaviour and the staff in the home should be skilled to support the child to understand this and carry it out. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 46, paragraph 9.38)

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Staff do not ensure that young people are cared for in a nurturing and homely environment. One young person is sleeping on a duvet inside a pop-up tent in his bedroom. The young person does not have a bed, furniture, curtains or blinds, and there is damage to the wall and sink in his bedroom. Staff routinely allow another young person to sleep on a mattress on his bedroom floor. There is a broken light fitting in the corridor and in one glass panel door the glass is shattered.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The physical environment has an institutional appearance, with internal doors fitted with locks, cubical toilets and high fencing to the garden. There are unnecessary restrictions in place. Staff routinely lock away games and computer consoles in the office. Young people have to ask staff to open doors to certain areas of the home, such as the kitchen, the games room and education room. These restrictions do not create a homely environment for young people to feel proud to live in.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Staff are far too quick to refuse young people’s requests. One young person told the inspector that ‘staff removed the fuse from my TV plug to prevent me from watching TV.’ This young person was later told that they needed to be good to get the television back.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Young people are not always listened to or respected. When the inspector shared with the manager concerns raised by a young person, the manager stated, ‘he is lying’ and was quick to dismiss the young person’s feedback.

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

The management of young people’s behaviour by staff is ineffective and of very poor quality. Staff allow incidents to escalate and do not intervene quickly enough to de-escalate conflict, reduce risk and minimise potential harm to young people.

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

In October 2018, one young person was asleep in bed, when a member of staff allowed another young person to enter the young person’s bedroom without the first young person’s consent and spend the night in his bedroom. Staff allowed this to happen to avoid having to address the second young person’s challenging behaviour and failed to take reasonable action to safeguard the first young person’s privacy and safety.

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

In August 2018, there was a serious incident in the home. Staff allowed one young person to enter another young person’s bedroom and then watched as a third young person held the bedroom door closed. Afterwards, one young person told a member of staff that they Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 8 had been abused by another young person while trapped in the bedroom. There were only two members of staff on shift, who stated they were unable to gain access to the bedroom due to levels of aggression.

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

Between June 2018 and June 2019, young people have gone missing from the home on 63 occasions. At times, young people are at significant risk. On two occasions, young people told staff that they had been sexually assaulted when they were missing from the home. Staff reaction to manage the risk of young people going missing from the home is to routinely prevent young people from leaving the house by locking doors and physically restraining the young person. When young people do manage to leave, the staff again resort to using physical restraint to make the young person compliant with their request to return to the house. Staff take this action without the legal authority to do so. This inappropriate intervention understandably results in an escalation of young people’s challenging behaviour.

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

When young people return from periods of being missing from the home, staff do not ensure that return home interviews by an independent person take place. This creates a missed opportunity to fully understand the risks that young people may have faced during the time they have been missing and to ensure that the right action is taken to safeguard the young person.

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

Managers have failed to inform Ofsted as the regulator of all notifiable events. Managers do not routinely let Ofsted know when they call the police to the home to respond to aggressive behaviours. There have been at least four occasions when staff have called the police to manage young people’s challenging behaviour when they were unable to do so. This is not appropriate, is poor practice and places young people at risk of being unnecessarily criminalised.

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

Managers have failed to respond and report safeguarding incidents to the right professionals and agencies. In September 2018, a young person reported being subject to an inappropriate physical intervention by staff. This was not investigated fully. In January 2019, a young person made an allegation of sexual assault against a member of staff. Again, managers failed to ensure that safeguarding protocols were implemented. In April 2019, another young person reported that a member of staff had grabbed him and sat on his lap. No formal investigation was carried out. None of these allegations were correctly referred to the local authority or investigated by use of locally agreed multi-agency safeguarding procedures. This is very poor practice and does not ensure that young people are provided with the protection of a multi-agency consideration of their circumstances.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There are serious and widespread concerns about poor standards of care and practice in this home that include inappropriate behaviour management, poor attention to child protection procedures and a culture of institutionalised practice. As a direct result of the significant failures found at the home, Ofsted made the decision to suspend the home’s registration from 14 June 2019 to 15 September 2019. Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 9 The leadership and management of the home is extremely poor. The manager has not addressed shortfalls identified at the last inspection in May 2018. The monitoring and management oversight of incidents is ineffective and fails to drive improvement in practice.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Managers have failed to ensure that staff receive and stay up to date with basic and necessary training. For example, 14 members of staff have not received first aid training and training related to physical intervention has not been updated within the required timescales. Thirteen members of staff have not received refresher training related to food safety. Eleven members of staff have not received up-to-date training related the care of medicines.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Managers do not ensure that staff receive the training they need to meet young people’s complex needs. For example, staff have not received training to develop their understanding of risks relating to involvement in county lines, the dangers of substance misuse, child sexual exploitation and autism spectrum disorder. Ofsted has issued a compliance notice to address this shortfall in staff training.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Staff do not receive regular supervision. This prevents them from having their performance and practice regularly appraised and is a missed opportunity to discuss the care of young people and how best to meet their needs. Managers do not maintain comprehensive records of staff supervision meetings.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The very poor quality and absence of management oversight means that managers do not have a full and accurate record of incidents that occur in the home. Documentary records are incomplete, unavailable or missing.

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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: 1245981 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Priory Education Services Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Fifth Floor, 80 Hammersmith Road, London W14 8UD

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Inspector

Debbie Holder, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: 1245981 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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