Children's Home run by Lodge Group Care UK Limited in Redbridge

Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 1 SC064182 Registered provider: Lodge Group Care UK Limited Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This privately run children’s home provides care and accommodation for up to six children and young people. The statement of purpose states that the home cares for children and young people who have learning disabilities. The service provides one place for a short break and five long-term placements. The manager was registered with Ofsted in 2013.

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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 requires improvement to be 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: 15 October 2018

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

15/10/2018 Full Good 08/05/2017 Full Good 23/11/2016 Interim Sustained effectiveness 05/07/2016 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 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 care planning standard is that children—

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Requirement Due date

receive effectively planned care in or through the children’s home; and

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Requirement Due date

have a positive experience of arriving at or moving on from the home. (Regulation 14 (1)(a)(b)) In particular, that placement planning meetings are held and that staff obtain the children’s and young people’s local authority care plans. 01/01/2020

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Requirement Due date

The care planning standard is that children—

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Requirement Due date

receive effectively planned care in or through the children’s home; and

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Requirement Due date

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

ensure the effective induction of each child into the home; and

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Requirement Due date

manage and review the placement of each child in the home. (Regulation 14 (2)(a)(b)(i)(ii)) 01/01/2020

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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— 01/01/2020 Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 4 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)) In particular, that managers monitor and review the quality of records. This relates to records of key-work sessions, support plans, children’s ‘About Me’ documents and body maps. The registered person must ensure that all employees—

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Requirement Due date

undertake appropriate continuing professional development;

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Requirement Due date

receive practice-related supervision by a person with appropriate experience; and

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Requirement Due date

have their performance and fitness to perform their roles appraised at least once every year. (Regulation 33 (4)(a)(b)) 01/01/2020

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff can access appropriate facilities and resources to support their training needs, and should understand the key role they play in the training and development of staff in the home. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 53, paragraph 10.11) In particular, that staff training is less reliant on online training, and that more face-to-face training is provided.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people receive care that meet their individual needs. They make steady progress from their starting points. Leaders, managers and staff ensure that children or young people new to the home are well matched with existing residents. Therefore, children and young people settle in well following their arrival, as admissions are planned.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Many of the children and young people do not communicate through speech. Staff are skilled in communicating with children and young people who are non-verbal. Staff are familiar and make good use of children’s preferred method of communication. Routinely, staff use pictorial cue cards and interpret body language and facial expressions of children and young people to understand their wishes.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff use creative methods to offer children a range of choices, such as meals and Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 5 leisure activities. Weekly residents’ meetings are another way of obtaining children and young people’s views.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Managers have amended information about making complaints. This is to improve children and young people’s understanding about how they can make complaints. Since the last inspection, the home has received no complaints.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people enjoy very good relationships with the staff team. The inspector observed children and young people happily playing with staff and having fun. One young person told the inspector that he liked the staff team ‘very much’. Parents are appreciative of the attention staff pay to their children. A parent said, ‘The staff are amazing. They have provided my son with a safe and secure family environment.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people lead healthy lifestyles. Staff ensure that they receive all primary and specialist healthcare services that they need. Their communication with healthcare professionals such as speech and language specialists and occupational therapists is good. Staff’s management of children’s medication is safe.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people attend school regularly and have set targets that they are working towards. As a result, their learning outcomes are good. Typically, these goals focus on being with others, communication development and managing their own personal care tasks.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Individual bedrooms have children and young people’s artwork and achievement certificates on display. Children and young people enjoy fun and new experiences. For example, this summer they enjoyed a holiday together with staff in Hampshire.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children and young people develop practical living skills, with the support and supervision of staff. For example, they learn to make snacks, use cutlery appropriately and learn about road safety. This helps them to live their lives more independently.

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

Children are safe at the home and appeared relaxed in the company of staff. Staff protect them from harm, abuse and bullying. There have been no allegations made against staff, no child protection referrals and children and young people do not go missing.

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

Staff’s vigilance and supervision of children and young people are effective. They benefit from staff’s knowledge of child protection procedures and their participation in safeguarding training.

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

Staff have a very good understanding of the impact that children and young people’s disabilities have on their behaviour. All staff receive training in de-escalation techniques, and the staff team generally manages children and young people’s challenging behaviour well. Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 6 There have been several incidents which have included the use of restraint. In these instances, staff have taken appropriate action to protect children, young people and others.

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

Children benefit from positive handling plans that are clear and provide staff with guidance that helps to curb unacceptable behaviour. Staff use verbal praise and a rewards system with children and young people to encourage positive behaviour.

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

A social worker said, ‘In the year that my child has been living there, there have been no reported incidents of behavioural issues with staff or other children in the home. They (staff) appear to be able to keep him safe and others, unlike when he was living at home.’

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

Risk assessments identify known and anticipated risks and include strategies that help to reduce children and young people’s risks. Staff keep these documents up to date. Behaviour management plans provide staff with good guidance that highlight the triggers for children and young people’s behaviours and suggest techniques that help to reduce challenging or risky behaviour.

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

Managers ensure that the recruitment of staff is safe. This confirms that staff are suitable to work with vulnerable children and young people.

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

Since the last inspection, the home has undergone a significant programme of refurbishment. The home’s previous quiet room no longer exists, and this space has been used to extend one of the lounge areas. This provides greater space for children and young people to safely explore their home environment.

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

The home’s sensory room has been redesigned with creative, new sensory equipment. Staff complete very regular premises checks, and fire prevention practices are sound. There are no health and safety concerns.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

The care planning process does not always include the details of placement planning meetings. This is important to ensure that all parties have a clear understanding of placement goals from the outset. In addition, managers do not ensure that placement reviews take place after children and young people have been living at the home for some time. This is to ensure that the placement continues to meet identified needs well, and to review placement progress and issues.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

Partnership working with professionals is generally effective. However, managers do not consistently obtain important local authority information. This was found to be the case for one child, where the placing authority had failed to provide the home with a care plan or to attend meetings to meet with managers.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

Some case records are poor. In one case file seen, some records of one-to-one discussions and observations were very brief or missing. The child’s ‘About Me’ Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 7 document was available in words only despite the child not being able to read. Furthermore, a number of support plans are vague and are not explicit in outlining placement objectives or targets and staff do not consistently complete body maps that highlight children’s injuries.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

There are significant gaps in the frequency that staff receive supervision, and not all staff appraisals happen every 12 months. Staff training opportunities are adequate. However, this training remains largely in the form of online training. This was highlighted as an area of concern at the previous inspection. The quality of training is not sufficiently wide-ranging, given the complex issues that children and young people present with. This does not help staff to develop relevant knowledge and skills.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

The staff team is led by a suitably experienced and qualified registered manager. Feedback from other professionals about the home’s management team is positive. A social worker told the inspector, ‘The manager is effective. She leads the staff team well, cares about the children and is always available to speak with me. The service is well run, I think.’ A member of staff said of the registered manager, ‘She’s amazing. She listens, is peaceful and takes on board my suggestions. Because of her, the team is more united, cohesive.’

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

Staffing levels are appropriate to meet the needs of children. Senior staff are enrolled on level 5 management courses. This is to enhance their managerial skills, so that they can further support the work of the registered manager.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: requires improvement to be good

Staff work well with other professionals. This helps them to coordinate and conduct their work thoroughly. A social worker said, ‘I’m impressed by the staff team and I know my young person enjoys working with the team. I have no issues with the service at all.’

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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: SC064182 8

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Lodge Group Care UK Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 87 High Street, Heathfield, East Sussex TN21 8JA

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Inspector

Sandra Jacobs-Walls: social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC064182 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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