Children's Home run by Carlisle Mencap Ltd in Cumbria

Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 1 Registered provider: Carlisle Mencap 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

This home is registered by a charitable organisation to provide care and accommodation under short-break arrangements for six children. The home is registered for children who have learning disabilities and/or physical disabilities.

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Information about this children’s home

The registered manager is a qualified social worker and has worked in the home for many years.

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Information about this children’s home

Inspection dates: 11 to 12 December 2019

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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: 29 January 2019

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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: 1247386 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

29/01/2019 Full Good 01/02/2018 Interim Sustained effectiveness 18/07/2017 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 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 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. In particular, the standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to— ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child; use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b)(2)(c)(h)) 11/02/2020

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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; and have their performance and fitness to perform their roles appraised at least once every year. (Regulation 33 (4)(b)(c)) 11/02/2020

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Requirement Due date

Schedule 4 sets out the other information that the registered person must keep in relation to a children’s home. The registered person must maintain in the home the records in Schedule 4 and ensure that the records are kept up to date. (Regulation 37 (1)(2)(a)(b)) In particular, ensure that a copy of the staff duty roster of persons working at the home includes the manager and a record of the actual rotas worked. 11/02/2020

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Requirement Due date

After consultation with the fire and rescue authority, the registered person must— make arrangements for persons working at the home to receive suitable training in fire prevention; 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 fire. (Regulation 25 (1)(c)(d)) 11/02/2020

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must— keep the statement of purpose under review and, where appropriate, revise it; and 11/02/2020 Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 4 notify HMCI of any revisions and send HMCI a copy of the revised statement within 28 days of the revision. (Regulation 16 (3)(a)(b))

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children are welcomed into the home in a well-planned way. Their needs are established through consultation with their parents and social workers. The child and the parents visit the home before children commence their stays. This results in children being well prepared for coming to the home for short breaks.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children enjoy coming to the home because staff make it a warm, welcoming and fun environment. Children are supported to make choices about their meals and activities. Staff know and understand children well and can anticipate their needs. Every effort is made to communicate with children in a way that they can understand and that is commensurate with their needs. More photographs would better evidence the good work that is done by staff in the home.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children are matched to each other in advance of their stays. Staff are aware of friendships within the cohort of children accessing the service and promote these through planning for children to receive short breaks together. This benefits children’s social and emotional development and gives them the best possible experience.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Social workers reported that children make good progress because of the care they receive. One child has made particularly good progress in developing self-care skills, which the social worker attributed to the persistent support and encouragement by staff.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Joined-up working is central to the ethos of the home. There is ongoing communication with schools, parents, health professionals and social workers to ensure that consistency of care is achieved.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The home has the appropriate facilities to meet children’s complex health and learning needs. Children’s needs and routines are clearly identified in their residential action plans, which ensures that staff know how to care for each child individually. The home would benefit from an interior re-paint due to the paintwork being chipped in several areas.

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

Children using the short-break service are vulnerable due to their disabilities. Their risk assessments clearly identify their risks arising from their disabilities, such as their lack of awareness of danger, choking or wandering off. Staff are vigilant and offer a high level of supervision so that children are kept safe. Risk assessments clearly identify what staff Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 5 need to do to maintain safety. Identified risk management strategies are relevant and clear. For example, children may need to have an adult with them in the car on journeys so that they do not unfasten their seat belt.

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

Safeguarding incidents are very rare. There are no missing from home episodes, no incidents of child sexual or criminal exploitation and no concerns in relation to internet safety.

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

Staff understand and know how to intervene and de-escalate children if they are becoming agitated. This means that incidents of difficult behaviour are rare. There have been no physical interventions since the home’s last full inspection in January 2019.

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

Positive behaviour support plans are written in the first person and provide a good description of what behaviours children may display when they are happy, angry or upset. This helps staff to understand, interpret and respond to their behavioural cues, which is particularly important for children who have little or no verbal communication.

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

The home has appropriate firefighting equipment. Children are inducted in fire procedures when they first arrive at the home. Children have individual personal emergency evacuation plans that clearly identify actions staff need to take in the event of a fire. This includes special door signage for children with additional needs. A great deal of detail goes into the plans for those children who have limited mobility or sensory needs arising from conditions such as being deaf. Staff have been trained by their colleagues in fire safety, but the content of this training is unclear, and they would benefit from more formalised fire training. Additionally, fire drills should happen more frequently.

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

The manager is experienced in his role and genuinely cares about the children. He ensures that young people’s experiences and memories in the home are good ones. The manager’s approach to childcare is reflected in the practice of the team and overall has a positive impact on children’s time at the home.

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

Although staff reported feeling supported, they are not all provided with regular supervision, including during staff induction periods. The manager has not completed appraisals for staff this year. This has an impact on staff learning and development in their roles. Additionally, the staff duty roster of persons working in the home does not include the actual hours worked by staff. A code system is in place, making it unclear what staff are present in the home at a given time.

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

Independent person visits take place monthly. However, some recommendations made by the visitor are not addressed immediately by the manager and are often recommended again the following month. Monitoring by the manager is factual but could be further developed by reviewing and evaluating the quality of care provided for children. Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 6 The statement of purpose is robust and has an accompanying visual aid for children and young people. The statement of purpose has recently been updated to reflect staff changes but had not been sent to the regulator at the time of this inspection.

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

The manager works proactively and positively with other professionals to promote the well-being of children. The local police community support officer has carried out training with the children about internet safety. The north-west youth advocacy service (NYAS) visits the home regularly so the children have someone independent to talk or communicate with, and the fire brigade has visited them to teach them about fire safety.

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

Social workers and parents spoke very highly of the service and feel that families benefit from their child accessing short breaks there. The manager and staff are regularly complimented on the service they provide, and children’s feedback indicates that they enjoy their time at the home.

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

Although a number of requirements have been made at this inspection relating to the management of the home, this does not detract from the positive impact the home has on family life for children accessing the service nor from the positive experience children have during their short breaks.

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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: 1247386 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Carlisle Mencap Ltd

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Carlisle Mencap Ltd, Unit J3, Duchess Avenue, Kingmoor Park North, Carlisle CA6 4SN

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Inspectors

Charlie Bamber, social care inspector Cheryl Field, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: 1247386 8 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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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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