Children's home run by Keys QTC Limited

Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 1 SC009653 Registered provider: Quality Time Care 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 home is registered to provide care for seven children who have emotional and/or behavioural difficulties. However, there are only three children currently accommodated at the home.

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Information about this children’s home

On 1 April 2019, the home changed its statement of purpose from a seven-bed mobile crisis service to a residential home for girls who may have experienced child sexual exploitation.

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Information about this children’s home

The home forms part of a large social care company. The home has had a permanent and qualified registered manager since 19 May 2015.

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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 children and young people are not protected or their welfare is not promoted or safeguarded.

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inadequate

Date of last inspection: 14 November 2018

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: n/a Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

14/11/2018 Full Good 12/12/2017 Full Good 02/02/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness 21/09/2016 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 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 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.

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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, 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.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 11(a)(b)(c)(2)(a)(vi)) 09/08/2019

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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 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 any harm to the child;

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Requirement Due date

manage relationships between children to prevent them harming each other;

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Requirement Due date

take effective action whenever there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 12(2)(a)(i)(iv)(vi)) 09/08/2019 * Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 4 13: The leadership and management standard

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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 promotes their welfare. 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 which is consistent with the approach and ethos, and delivers the outcomes, set out in the home’s statement of purpose;

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Requirement Due date

ensure that the staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of 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.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 13(1)(b)(2)(c)(h)) 09/08/2019 *

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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 have a positive experience of arriving at or moving on from the 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 children are admitted to the home only if their needs are within the range of needs of children for whom it is intended that the home is to provide care and accommodation, as set out in the home’s statement of purpose.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 14 (1)(a)(b)(2)(a)) 09/08/2019

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must keep the statement of purpose under review and, where appropriate, revise it; and notify HMCI of any revision and send HMCI a copy of the revised statement within 28 days.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must make arrangements for the handling, recording, safekeeping, safe administration and disposal of medicines received into the children’s home. 09/08/2019 Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 5 In particular, the registered person must ensure that— medicine which is prescribed for a child is administered as prescribed to the child.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that all employees receive practice-related supervision by a person with appropriate experience.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must complete a review of the quality of care provided for children (‘a quality of care review’) at least every 6 months. The registered person must supply to HMCI a copy of the quality of care review report within 28 days of the date on which the quality of care review was completed.

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Requirement Due date

* These requirements are subject to a compliance notice.

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Recommendations

 The registered person must ensure that the behaviour management strategy is understood and applied at all times by staff, and must be kept under review and revised where appropriate. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 46, paragraph 9.34)  Ensure that staff are familiar with the home’s policies on record keeping and understand the importance of careful, objective and clear recording. Information about the child must always be recorded in a way that will be helpful to the child. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 62, paragraph 14.4)  The registered person should ensure that staff can access appropriate facilities and resources to support their training needs and that the training available meets the needs of the children in their care. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 53, paragraph 10.11)

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Recommendations

 Evaluation of missing incidents should be undertaken to identify any gaps in training, skills or knowledge for staff or to record or retain evidence of what worked well. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 46, paragraph 9.31)  Children must be consulted regularly on their views about the home’s care, to inform and support continued improvement in the quality of care provided. Due consideration should be given to the child’s cognitive ability in the development and implementation Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 6 of any consultation processes. Children should be able to see the results of their views being listened to and acted upon. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 22, paragraph 4.11)

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The care and experiences of young people are poor. There has been a significant change to how the home operates in the last seven months. Previously, the home was a crisis centre, where young people stayed for a 12-week period and enjoyed a range of outdoor activities throughout the region. On 1 April 2019, the service became a residential home for up to seven girls, with a range of emotional needs including young people that have been or who are at risk of sexual exploitation.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The preparation for this change by the organisation was poor. Limited training was provided for staff, including a five-hour course on child sexual exploitation. Some staff members were made redundant, whereas others felt the home was not the right environment for them and left the organisation. A total of 20 staff have left the organisation since the last inspection in November 2018. This resulted in only a small core group of care staff with little or no experience in managing a complex service for girls.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Care staff were concerned that they were unprepared and inexperienced in working in this type of residential home and raised their concerns to the residential manager and the responsible individual, both verbally and in writing. In particular, staff stated that a higher ratio of staff was required to care for one of the young people at the home, who was a particularly vulnerable girl. They were concerned about the negative influence that she was having on other, younger girls at the home. In one staff supervision at the beginning of June 2019, a member of staff raised their concerns about the welfare of the children they were caring for, but management failed to take action about the concerns being raised.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Due to identified risks, a decision had been made not to allow the girls out on an activity all together. However, this decision was overridden, and the girls went out shopping together, accompanied by staff. During this period, the girls ran away, and staff could not locate them. The police were not called for two hours and 20 minutes after the young people were last seen. This was not in line with their risk assessment, which indicated that the police should be called immediately.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Although one girl returned to the home, the remaining young people did not return to the home until after midnight in a taxi cab, which had been pre-paid. Staff commented that the girls were highly intoxicated and stated that they had been raped by two males in a hotel in the town centre. Although one young person told staff that she had been raped and staff followed the correct safeguarding procedures, another young person who had previously said that she had not been raped changed her mind, but staff did follow the correct safeguarding procedures. Staff failed in their roles as residential childcare workers. Poor management oversight and a total failure to keep young people Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 7 safe have left a life-changing impact on the girl’s lives.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The periods of unsettlement at the home increased as further admissions were made to the home. There have been incidents where young people have assaulted staff, harmed each other and caused damage to the home. The day-to-day experiences of young people living in the home have therefore been poor. The staff told the inspector that ‘We are on our knees and are desperate for support. The girls are very challenging, and we want to do our best for them, they deserve it, but we are struggling to keep them safe.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

The concerns raised by staff were not acted on by the organisation until after the serious safeguarding incident in June 2019.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Arrangements for the administration of prescribed medicines are not consistently safe. Staff do not always administer medication to young people in line with their prescription. Young people’s comfort and well-being could be affected if they are not given their medication as prescribed.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Placement plans and key-worker sessions do not adequately reflect young people’s individual needs. Direct work with children as identified in risk assessments, such as keeping safe and building healthy relationships, is not consistently carried out. This demonstrates that although the staff listen to the young people, they do not always take the agreed action to address young people’s views, wishes and feelings.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Young people say that they have positive relationships with the manager and staff, spoke positively about their placement and expressed their wish to stay.

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

Safeguarding practice in the home is poor and does not promote the welfare and safety of young people. When a young person made a disclosure of serious sexual assault, the registered manager and staff failed to follow child protection procedures. Shortfalls in the reporting and recording of serious safeguarding incidents weaken safeguarding practice and have resulted in some matters not being investigated. Consequently, young people are not adequately safeguarded and are placed at continued risk.

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

Staff do not manage relationships in the home effectively to prevent or minimise the risk of young people harming each other. For example, an older young person has encouraged a younger girl to go missing and this has led to significant incidents of harm and exploitation. This has impacted on the welfare and safety of all young people living at the home.

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

When young people go missing from the home, staff report them to the police and local authorities and they consistently look for young people or follow them. This has been sometimes to the detriment of staff when young people have involved other youths in the community to act against the staff. For example, one staff member had a lighter thrown at her and others gave chase when the girls stated that the staff were paedophiles. Return home interviews are not carried out by an independent person and managers do not consistently challenge the placing authorities when return home Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 8 interviews are not completed. Furthermore, managers do not evaluate episodes of going missing, or other significant events as a whole team, which limits the opportunity to monitor staff practice and patterns of behaviour. There is a lack of consistency from staff in how they manage behaviour; this was reported by staff throughout the inspection.

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

Individual risk assessments for young people at risk of self-harm or sexually harmful behaviour lack sufficient detail about the specific actions that staff should take to reduce the risk of harm. Risk assessments were only amended during the inspection, and not after significant events, with no clarity as to why risks had increased. For example, one girl’s risk of exploitation increased significantly, without any changes to the actions to be taken by staff. This means that there is no clear guidance for staff to follow. Furthermore, young people do not receive a consistent approach from staff in trying to reduce this risk and keep them safe.

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

Staff have demonstrated that they understand and are able to make use of the whistle- blowing procedure.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager is qualified and experienced. The deputy manager is currently on maternity leave. Of the three seniors, one remains in post. Twenty staff have left since the last inspection, either through redundancy or deciding the role was not for them. Five staff have been employed with no prior experience in residential childcare. Five staff are qualified to Diploma level 3 with another four on the course.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There has been a high staff turnover since the last inspection and this has impacted on the consistency of care to young people. Not all staff receive a sufficient induction when they start working in the home. Staff told the inspector that their induction was poor. This does not ensure that new staff are adequately supported to develop the skills they need for the role.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Some staff lack the experience and training required to ensure that they can meet the needs of the young people who they are caring for. Staff have not had sufficient training in self-harm or child sexual exploitation, which hinders their ability to understand and manage these risks. Consequently, staff do not have the relevant training to ensure that they are able to safely meet the needs of the young people.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The staff spoken to during the inspection say that they do not feel supported. Team meetings are held on a regular basis and staff are up to date with mandatory training. However, they do not receive regular supervision in line with the company’s own policy and timescales. This is a particular shortfall for the new member of staff who has no experience of working with children or young people. She has not had a supervision session since she started working at the home in June. The registered manager does not enable staff to learn from significant incidents, nor has she challenged staff practice when it has been unsafe or when there have been concerns. As such, staff practice does not change or improve and young people continue not to be heard when they raise concerns. Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 9 The manager has failed to adequately address all the requirements and recommendations made at the last inspection. Therefore, shortfalls in the protection of

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

children standards and training to help staff to meet the needs of the children in their care continue. Consequently, young people are not safeguarded, nor are they making good progress. The lack of effective action to address the requirements and recommendations made at the last inspection demonstrates poor management and ineffective management systems at the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The monitoring and review systems at the home are weak and have failed to identify some of the shortfalls identified during this inspection. The monthly reports from the independent person, in relation to whether young people are safeguarded effectively and how the home promotes the well-being of young people, are not routinely sent to Ofsted in line with regulation. Furthermore, the registered manager’s quality review and the updated statement of purpose were not sent to HMCI in line with regulations. Therefore, the regulatory body is not always aware of any shortfalls, themes or trends occurring at the home and how the home intends to make improvements to address these.

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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: SC009653 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Quality Time Care Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Maybrook House, Queensway, Halesowen, Worcestershire B63 4AH

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Melanie Kavanagh

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Inspector

Elaine Clare, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC009653 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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