Children's home run by Heath Solo Limited

Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 1 Registered provider: Heath Solo 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

This home is operated by a private company. It is registered to provide care and accommodation for one child, irrespective of gender. The home specialises in caring for children who have been, or who are, experiencing emotional and behavioural difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

The registered manager has been in post since the home’s registration in May 2019. She manages two children’s homes.

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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 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

Date of last inspection: this is the home’s first inspection since registration

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: not applicable

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

This is the first inspection since registration Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 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

The standard in paragraph (1) requires the registered person to ensure that staff—

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Requirement Due date

meet each child’s behavioural and emotional needs, as set out in the child’s relevant plans;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to develop socially aware behaviour;

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Requirement Due date

encourage each child to take responsibility for the child’s behaviour, in accordance with the child’s age and understanding;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to develop and practise skills to resolve conflicts positively and without harm to anyone;

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Requirement Due date

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 understanding;

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Requirement Due date

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

help each child to develop the understanding and skills to recognise or withdraw from a damaging, exploitative or harmful relationship;

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Requirement Due date

strive to gain each child’s respect and trust; 24/02/2020 Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 4 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;

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Requirement Due date

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;

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Requirement Due date

de-escalate confrontations with or between children, or potentially violent behaviour by children.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 11(1)(a)(b)(c)(2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(vi)(vii)(viii)(ix)(x)(xi) The protection of children standard is that children are protected from harm and enabled to keep themselves safe. 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

understand the roles and responsibilities in relation to protecting children that are assigned to them by the registered person;

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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

that the effectiveness of the home’s child protection policies is monitored regularly.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 12(1)(2)(a)(i)(v)(vi)(e)) 24/02/2020

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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 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—

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Requirement Due date

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;

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Requirement Due date

ensure that staff work as a team where appropriate; 24/02/2020 Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 5 ensure that staff have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child, and ensure that the home’s workforce provides continuity of care to each child.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 13(1)(2)(a)(c)(e)) The care planning standard is that children receive effectively planned care in or through the children’s home; that arrangements are in place to manage and review the placement of each child in the home; and that each child’s relevant plans are followed.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 14 (1)(a)(b)(ii)(c)) 24/02/2020

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must ensure that all employees receive practice-related supervision. (Regulation 33(4)(b)) 24/02/2020

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must prepare and implement a policy (‘the behaviour management policy’) which sets out—

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Requirement Due date

how appropriate behaviour is to be promoted in the children’s home; and

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Requirement Due date

the measures of control, discipline and restraint which may be used in relation to children in the home.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must keep the behaviour management policy under review and, where appropriate, revise it.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain records (‘case records’) for each child which include the information and documents listed in Schedule 3 in relation to each child; are kept up to date; and are signed and dated by the author of each entry.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must notify HMCI and each other relevant person without delay if—

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Requirement Due date

a child is involved in or subject to, or is suspected of being involved in or subject to, sexual exploitation;

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Requirement Due date

an incident requiring police involvement occurs in relation to a child which the registered person considers to be serious;

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Requirement Due date

there is an allegation of abuse against the home or a person working there; 24/02/2020 Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 6 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);

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Requirement Due date

or there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious.

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 40(4)(a)(b)(c)(d)(i)(ii)(e)) The registered person must complete a review of the quality of care provided for children (‘a quality of care review’) at least once every 6 months.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

This home was registered on 1 May 2019. This is the home’s first inspection. The overall experiences and progress of children are judged as inadequate. This is primarily because there are weaknesses in safeguarding procedures, risk and behaviour management systems and management oversight, which have the potential to result in harm to children.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Contrary to the home’s admissions policy and procedures, children have not benefited from a detailed compatibility risk assessment or a thorough appraisal of their needs. The registered manager offered a placement to a child without clearly identifying, assessing or addressing their full range of needs and the required skills and experience of staff to meet those needs. For example, the impact risk assessment for the child was completed nearly three months after the child came to live at the home. The delay has essentially made this assessment redundant and has contributed to managers’ and staff’s inability to manage the child’s behaviour.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

Records do not provide a full insight into children’s lives. For example, the few records that are on children’s files detail informal discussions, rather than a more comprehensive record of planned sessions that address the individual needs of children. This is particularly evident in the lack of recorded key-working sessions after incidents of children displaying violent and aggressive behaviour. Therefore, there is limited information to measure children’s progress or to identify the effectiveness of the support provided. Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 7 Information in children’s records is confusing and contradictory. For example, a child is documented as being on 2.1 staffing at all times in his placement plan; however, this has not been implemented.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: inadequate

On a positive note, education is supported well in the home and this has resulted in a child who was previously not attending school now having 75% attendance at his education provision.

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

Safeguarding practice in this home is not sufficiently robust and the arrangements for safeguarding children are inadequate. Furthermore, the poor leadership and management, coupled with a fluctuating and inexperienced staff team, mean that children continue to engage in risk-taking behaviour, which compromises their safety and well-being.

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

Effective action is not always taken when there is a concern about a child’s welfare, and, as a result, children have not been protected from harm. For example, a child disclosed to a member of staff that he had been assaulted by a previous staff member. Staff and managers failed to follow child protection procedures and did not report the incident to relevant professionals or record and pass on the safeguarding concern.

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

Staff fail to follow, or consistently update, risk management plans for children. For example, plans in the home state that due to the child’s known history of fire-starting, daily room checks should take place to remove any items of risk. However, since May 2019, when the child moved into the home, only one daily room check has been carried out. This is despite managers’ and staff’s knowledge that the child is consistently smoking in his bedroom and has access to lighters and matches. This fails to demonstrate that managers and staff understand or follow risk management strategies to keep the child and themselves safe.

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

There are not clear and consistent boundaries or effective behaviour management strategies to support children in improving their behaviour. This means that children continue to display violent, aggressive behaviour, which places themselves and others at risk of harm. A child commented, ‘I like it here. It’s not like the other homes. There’s no rules here and I can do what I want.’

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

The manager and staff team should ensure that the day-to-day care in the home is delivered in such a way that it fosters mutual respect and trust between the staff and the child. It is not appropriate to elaborate on this in this report, however the manager and the responsible individual are aware of the issues identified at the inspection. Subsequently, the registered manager failed to ensure that the recommendations from an internal inquiry were carried out, therefore compromising the safety of the children.

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

Recording in the home is poor. Records of incidents are unclear and fail to provide an accurate account of what has occurred. Some records are inconsistent or include Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 8 information that should alert managers to the fact that further enquiry is necessary. However, on several occasions, this information has not been identified. It is unclear what action was taken because of incidents, and whether all professionals were notified. This fails to safeguard all involved.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The provider has failed to demonstrate that it inspires and leads a culture in the home to promote children’s welfare and to enable children to fulfil their potential. The manager is not leading and managing the home in a manner that is consistent with the aims outlined in the home’s statement of purpose. She has failed to demonstrate that the care being provided meets the individual needs of children and promotes their safety and welfare.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There is a lack of robust systems in place to monitor and quality-assure the standard of care provided at the home. The provider’s oversight of care planning and risk management is poor. The inspector found that risk assessments and behaviour management plans are not up to date, and that the manager has failed to evaluate all known risks to children.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Staff do not have the experience and knowledge to understand the risks that children can face, or the skills needed to support children. Furthermore, the registered manager does not sufficiently influence the decision-making when serious incidents occur. It is concerning that during the inspection the manager was unable to give guidance to staff during an ongoing incident, whereby a child who had a history of fire-setting had a lighter in his room and had barricaded himself in. The manager had failed to recognise the severity of risk or the need to minimise the risk, thus placing the child and others at risk of harm.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Staff report that they feel supported by the manager. However, the manager has failed to provide staff with regular supervision. The absence of effective supervision means that staff do not have the opportunity to reflect on their practice and identify any further training they may need. It also does not provide an opportunity to ensure that they are promoting better outcomes for all children in their care. This could be detrimental to children as there is potential for the quality of practice to decline without effective performance monitoring and management.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Significant events involving children living at the home have not been reported to Ofsted or the child’s local authority. A failure to share information with all relevant people compromises the safety and welfare of children. Furthermore, the regulator is unable to carry out its monitoring function to ensure that appropriate action is taken by the provider to safeguard children.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The manager has failed to ensure that she uses the monitoring and review systems, such as the regulation 45 reports, to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided at the home. Consequently, areas for improvement have not been Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 9 addressed and decisive action has not been taken to resolve issues. The lack of rigour by the registered manager has not helped the home to sufficiently protect children and maintain good enough standards of care.

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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: 2511607 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Suite 1.3 My Buro, 20 Market Street, Altrincham, Cheshire WA14 1PF

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Ann-Cheri Callow

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Inspector

Elaine Allison, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: 2511607 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 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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