Children's Home run by The Place Young People’s Company in Leicestershire

Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 1 Registered provider: The Place Young People’s Company Limited Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The home is run by a private provider. It is registered to provide care for up to four children or young people who present with emotional, mental health and/or behavioural issues. There is an acting manager in post who has submitted their application for registration with Ofsted.

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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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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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requires improvement to be good

How well children and young people are helped and protected requires improvement to be good

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requires improvement to be good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers requires improvement to be good

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requires improvement to be good

The children’s home is not yet delivering good help and care for children and young people. However, there are no serious or widespread failures that result in their welfare not being safeguarded or promoted.

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requires improvement to be good

Date of last inspection: 21 January 2020

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requires improvement to be good

Overall judgement at last inspection: Good

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requires improvement to be good

Enforcement action since last inspection: None Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

21/01/2020 Full Good 23/01/2019 Full Good 20/02/2018 Interim Declined in effectiveness 28/06/2017 Full Good Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 3

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improvement to be good

The home has been through an unsettled period, largely due to changes in staffing and in the management of the home. This led to a period where no children were living at the home. New senior leaders, along with the acting manager, have taken steps to build a secure and stable staff team. The home is now fully staffed.

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improvement to be good

Children develop positive relationships with staff. One child, who has only been living at the home for a short period, has been supported to feel very well settled in the home. Staff are able to gain a good understanding of the complexity of the children’s needs.

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improvement to be good

Despite these positive relationships, the progress children make is variable. One child was moved on from the placement partly due to poor placement matching decisions. When considering whether the home was suitable for this child, known risks were not assessed well. Risk assessments did not sufficiently take children’s existing patterns of behaviour into account or how these behaviours were likely to impact on the new child.

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improvement to be good

For most children, their progress in relation to education has been poor. Staff have tried different approaches, but children continue to refuse to attend education. In addition, children have not engaged with other specialist services. There has, however, been progress in relation to one child’s emotional health and well-being, resulting in a reduction in self-harm incidents.

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improvement to be good

Staff place the well-being of children at the centre of their practice, irrespective of the challenges the children’s behaviours may present. Children’s day-to-day needs are generally well met through the provision of a warm and welcoming environment, good routines and nurturing care. Despite these positive aspects, one child has continued to be at significant risk when missing from care.

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improvement to be good

Children are sensitively supported to maintain contact with people who matter to them. Relationships with parents and carers have improved over time and, for one child, contact is supported at the home. Staff understand the importance of family contact, where possible.

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improvement to be good

Key-work sessions are carried out regularly with children. Some of these sessions are planned and others take place spontaneously. Despite some children’s reluctance to engage in formal sessions, staff use informal opportunities to gather information and develop positive relationships with children. Children’s individual likes and dislikes are considered, and they engage in activities that are of interest to them.

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improvement to be good

Children know how to complain; however, there have been minimal complaints at the home in recent months. Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 4

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improvement to be good

There have been incidents where a child’s welfare has not been promoted; however, this has not been related to staff’s failings. The child remains at high risk when missing from care and staff are unable to keep her safe without further intervention. Despite their efforts, staff have not always been able to ensure the safety of the child. Appropriate follow-up action has taken place to respond to incidents with a view to reducing risks in the future. There has been robust management of safeguarding processes and sharing of information with key agencies.

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improvement to be good

There have been occasions where a child has had opportunities to go missing from care while staff have been distracted; this has led to the child going missing from care and subsequently being at risk of harm. The manager has reflected on this with staff and lessons have been learned. It is clear from the safeguarding processes in the home that staff have been motivated to support the child and to reduce risks.

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improvement to be good

There has been good communication with other agencies in reporting and managing missing-from-care incidents. A police sergeant provided positive feedback about the staff and the quality of communication. An independent reviewing officer commented on how well staff had engaged in safeguarding processes, but noted their continued concern about the child.

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improvement to be good

In situations where managers feel that risks are not being managed well enough, appropriate steps were not taken quickly enough to escalate their concerns. Actions to reduce risk could have been taken sooner. However, staff have been actively involved in promoting the child’s safety and reducing risks.

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improvement to be good

Children’s placement plans and risk assessments are sufficiently detailed. There is a clear chronology of incidents and these plans are regularly reviewed.

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improvement to be good

Staff recruitment is carried out in accordance with safer recruitment protocols. This means that all staff are subject to rigorous vetting processes.

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good

The home has been without a registered manager since August 2020. There has been a degree of instability in the management of the home with three managers being in post since this time. The current manager has been in post for five months and he has now successfully submitted his application to register as the home’s manager. The management instability over the last year has adversely affected the stability of the home.

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good

The manager has started to have a positive effect on the functioning of the home. The manager has a good understanding of the children’s needs. Action has been taken where risks have been identified, despite this action not always being effective. Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 5 Reporting and recording is not always carried out in a manner which is helpful to children. For example, a missing-from-care incident for a child was reported as a child making ‘bad choices’. This does not reflect the nurturing care that children should receive when returning from situations where they may have been subject to exploitation.

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good

Staff are now receiving regular supervision. Staff report feeling confident in the manager’s response to safeguarding matters. Staff also say that communication about key changes to care plans and risk assessments are shared appropriately with staff. Team meetings are taking place where key issues are discussed. In addition, staff have received a suite of mandatory training, and further training is commissioned which is bespoke to the needs of children in the home.

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good

The staff team is relatively new with varied levels of experience. Half of the team members are unqualified. Communication between the staff has improved. However, staff need to be clear and consistent at the start of children’s placements about behaviour management expectations.

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good

The manager demonstrated learning from the management of safeguarding incidents and staff have received debrief sessions and additional training. In addition, the manager has considered environmental changes to reduce risks.

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good

An independent visitor reports on the home and the progress made. These reports are forwarded to Ofsted. There have been recent improvements in the quality of these reports in that the visitor has reflected on how effectively children are safeguarded. The more recent change indicates a more open and transparent safeguarding culture at the home. The manager has also carried out a management evaluation of how well the home is being run and has produced a good-quality, evaluative overview report. Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 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 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

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. (Regulation 14 (1)(a)(b) (2)(a))

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Requirement Due date

This specifically relates to the need for robust matching and the use of impact risk assessments to help in making decisions about children’s care. 26 June 2021

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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

that the home’s day-to-day care is arranged and delivered so as to keep each child safe and to protect each child effectively from harm. (Regulation 12 (1)(2)(b))

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Requirement Due date

This relates to staff managing and responding to individual risk assessments with a view to reducing risks. 26 June 2021

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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 involve each child’s placing authority effectively in the child’s care, in accordance with the child’s relevant plans; 26 June 2021 Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 7 if the registered person considers, or staff consider, a placing authority’s or a relevant person’s performance or response to be inadequate in relation to their role, challenge the placing authority or the relevant person to seek to ensure that each child’s needs are met in accordance with the child’s relevant plans. (Regulation 5 (a)(c))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that when children are at significant risk that escalation processes are effective and achieved in a timely manner. 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 to overcome any 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

promote opportunities for each child to learn informally.

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Requirement Due date

This refers to children being supported effectively to understand barriers to learning and to overcome these barriers and make some progress in engagement with education. 26 June 2021

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff are familiar with the home’s policies on record keeping and understand the importance of careful, objective, and clear recording. Staff should record information on individual children in a non-stigmatising way that distinguishes between fact, opinion and third-party information. 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) Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 8

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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: 1250039 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: The Place Young People’s Company Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Belvoir Farmhouse, Woolsthorpe Road, Redmile, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire NG13 0GN

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Inspector

Bev Allison, Social Care Inspector Inspection report children’s home: 1250039 10 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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