Children's home run by Wessex College Limited in Dorset

Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 1 SC043245 Registered provider: Wessex College Limited Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The home is owned by a private provider and offers care and accommodation for up to four children. The provider states in its statement of purpose that care is provided for children with social, emotional or behavioural difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

The registered manager has been in post since August 2020.

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Information about this children’s home

Due to COVID-19 (coronavirus), at the request of the Secretary of State, we suspended all routine inspections of social care providers on 17 March 2020.

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Information about this children’s home

We last visited this setting on 2 September 2020 to carry out an assurance visit. The report is published on the Ofsted website.

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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 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: 21 November 2019

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: requires improvement to be good

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

21/11/2019 Full Requires improvement to be good 17/07/2018 Full Good 19/07/2017 Full Good 02/02/2017 Interim Sustained effectiveness Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 3

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inadequate

Leaders and managers do not ensure that all the children are provided with good routines and a healthy lifestyle. For example, one child is not regularly eating nutritious meals and is snacking on ‘junk’ food in their bedroom. The children do not always eat together with the staff in the dining room and instead eat alone in their bedrooms.

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inadequate

The staff fail to implement routines and boundaries effectively. One child is regularly refusing to get out of bed until the afternoon on a school day. This means that they are not able to engage in meaningful educational activities and have only attended school on a few occasions since they moved to the home seven months ago. This leads to poor educational outcomes. Prior to moving to the home, this child was attending school regularly and was making progress with their education. Another child does not regularly attend education as they are often missing from the home.

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inadequate

The children report that they have good relationships with most of the staff and can name a member of staff they would speak with if they were worried or unhappy. However, too often, the staff are allowing the children to have too much control in the home and are not implementing consistent boundaries and routines that will help to ensure that the children make progress and feel safe. The children decide when they get up, when they eat and what time they go to bed.

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inadequate

Placement plans do not contain comprehensive and creative strategies that staff need to enable them to support the children effectively. For example, an extensive therapeutic assessment was commissioned for one child by their placing authority. However, the strategies arising from this assessment are not documented in the child’s plan for the staff to follow. In addition, a referral for a specialist assessment was made for this child but has not been followed up.

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inadequate

The home is spacious and is generally comfortable and homely. Any damage to the home is promptly repaired. However, the children are not always being supported to learn to keep their bedrooms clean and tidy. One child’s bedroom was found to be very untidy and have an unpleasant odour. The manager is aware that parts of the home need to be refreshed. Plans are in place to achieve this, so that the children feel valued by living in a well-decorated environment.

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inadequate

Relationships between the young people and their families are promoted by the staff. The children are supported to visit their families, who are also welcome to visit the home. As a result, the children are re-establishing positive relationships with their families. Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 4

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

Two children are regularly going missing from care, often together, and incidents are not decreasing. There is evidence from the records that one of these children is vulnerable to sexual exploitation. Managers acknowledge that they are unable to keep two of the children safe in the home and have asked the children’s placing authorities to find alternative homes that can meet the children’s complex care needs. However, this action has not been taken in a timely manner.

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

The staff are not always able to safely manage the children’s behaviour and de- escalate incidents. The mix of the children is not positive. Serious incidents are occurring regularly between the children, which results in them accusing each other of physical and sexual assault.

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

There have been too many incidents where the children have been out of staff’s control. For example, a child is regularly climbing on the roof of the home. Recently, three children barricaded themselves in the lounge and caused damage to the home. Children are locking themselves in the bathroom and bedrooms together and have self-harmed.

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

Behaviour management is not consistent, and the approach to behaviour management is confusing. The staff give the children rewards and sanctions for positive and negative behaviour, but these are not being monitored for effectiveness and lack consistency. Boundaries and routines in the home are unclear. Behaviour management strategies are not comprehensively documented to offer the largely inexperienced staff team guidance and direction.

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

A member of staff was unable to de-escalate an incident, which resulted in a child being physically restrained using a hold that is not taught. Due to being restrained, the child was very distressed, self-harmed and damaged the home.

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

Safeguarding incidents are appropriately referred to safeguarding professionals. When the children go missing from care, staff use professional curiosity and follow the home’s missing-from-home procedures. They ensure that all children receive an interview on their return. The manager uses information from these interviews to gain intelligence about where the children are going and what they are doing when they are missing.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The registered manager has made assumptions that the staff are completing tasks when this is not the case. For example, staff regularly fail to inform a school when a child is not attending and give a reason for the non-attendance.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Feedback from professionals is mixed. Education professionals and a placing social worker are concerned about a lack of routine in the home, lack of attendance of one child at school and the failure of staff to impose consistent boundaries and sanctions. They comment negatively about the lack of information-sharing. Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 5 Professionals are concerned about the lack of attendance from a representative of the home at meetings that have been held to discuss children’s education plans.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Leaders and managers have not taken effective and prompt action when the home is unable to keep children safe and the children are having a negative impact on each other. Managers have failed to take account of the inexperience of the staff team when admitting a fourth child who has complex care needs to the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There is a lack of management oversight in the home. The close monitoring of safeguarding trends and patterns and the behaviour of the children in the home is not undertaken by the manager to assess the quality of care and inform staff practice and care planning.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There is a full staff team, and the use of agency staff is minimal. Despite the recent turbulent time in the home, the staff report that there is good morale and say that they feel well supervised and trained. Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 6

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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 education standard is that children make measurable progress towards achieving their educational potential and are helped to do so.

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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

understand the barriers to learning that each child may face and take appropriate action to help the child overcome such barriers;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to understand the importance and value of education, learning, training and employment;

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Requirement Due date

maintain regular contact with each child’s education and training provider, including engaging with the provider and the placing authority to support the child’s education and training and to maximise the child’s achievement;

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Requirement Due date

help a child who is excluded from school, or who is of compulsory school age but not attending school, to access educational and training support throughout the period of exclusion or non-attendance and to return to school as soon as possible;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to attend education or training in accordance with the expectations in the child’s relevant plans; and

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Requirement Due date

that each child has access to appropriate equipment, facilities and resources to support the child’s learning. (Regulation 8 (1) (2)(a)(iii)(iv)(v)(vi)(vii)(viii)(ix)(x)(b))

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Requirement Due date

This relates to ensuring that children access education as stated in their plan. If the child is refusing to attend school, ensure that creative strategies are put in place through working in partnership with the other relevant agencies. 25 June 2021 Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 7 The positive relationships standard is that children are helped to develop, and benefit from, relationships based on ─

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Requirement Due date

an understanding about acceptable behaviour; and

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Requirement Due date

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 ─

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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

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

de-escalate confrontations with or between children, or potentially violent behaviour by children. (Regulation 11 (1)(a)(b)(c) (2)(a)(i)(iii)(v)(xi))

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Requirement Due date

This particularly relates to ensuring that the mix of children living in the home is positive and that they are supported to develop positive relationships with each other. 25 June 2021

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Requirement Due date

The health and well-being standard is that ─

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Requirement Due date

the health and well-being needs of children are met;

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Requirement Due date

children receive advice, services and support in relation to their health and well-being; and

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Requirement Due date

children are helped to lead healthy lifestyles.

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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

understand the child’s health and well-being needs and the options that are available in relation to the child’s health and 25 June 2021 Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 8 well-being, in a way that is appropriate to the child’s age and understanding;

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Requirement Due date

ensure that each child has access to such psychiatric and psychological advice, treatment and other services as the child may require. (Regulation 10 (1)(a)(b)(c) (2)(a)(ii)(c))

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Requirement Due date

This particularly relates to ensuring that all children are eating regular, nutritious meals and that these meals are eaten in the dining room with the adults and that children are not eating alone in their bedrooms. Also, that children are supported effectively to access any relevant specialist assessments or therapeutic intervention and that outcomes arising from these interventions are documented in a child’s care plan.

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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 ─

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Requirement Due date

manage relationships between children to prevent them from harming each other;

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Requirement Due date

take effective action whenever there is a serious concern about a child’s welfare. (Regulation 12 (1) (2)(a)(iv)(vi)) 25 June 2021

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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 ─

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Requirement Due date

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 in the home;

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Requirement Due date

use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care in the home. 25 June 2021 Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 9 (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b) (2)(f)(h))

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Requirement Due date

In meeting the quality standards, the registered person must, and must ensure that staff ─

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Requirement Due date

seek to develop and maintain effective professional relationships with such persons, bodies or organisations as the registered person considers appropriate having regard to the range of needs of children for whom it is intended that the children’s home is to provide care and accommodation. (Regulation 5 (d)) 25 June 2021

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Requirement Due date

*The quality and purpose of care standard is that children receive care from staff who ─

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Requirement Due date

understand the children’s home’s overall aims and the outcomes it seeks to achieve for children;

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Requirement Due date

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 ─

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Requirement Due date

understand and apply the home’s statement of purpose;

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Requirement Due date

protect and promote each child’s welfare;

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Requirement Due date

help each child to understand and manage the impact of any experience of abuse or neglect. (Regulation 6 (1)(a)(b) (2)(i)(ii)(iii)(v)) 25 June 2021

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Requirement Due date

* These requirements are subject to a compliance notice.

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people, 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: SC043245 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Wessex College Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Atria, Spa Road, Bolton BL1 4AG

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Samantha Choules

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Inspector

Tina Maddison, Social Care Inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC043245 11 to 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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