Children's home run by Wigan Council in Wigan

Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 1 SC040266 Registered provider: Wigan Council Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This is a local authority children’s home. The provider states in its statement of purpose that the home provides care for children aged between 11 and 17 years old.

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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 15 September 2020 to carry out an assurance visit. The report is published on our 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 failures that mean children and young people 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

Overall judgement at last inspection: sustained effectiveness

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

12/03/2020 Interim Sustained effectiveness 11/06/2019 Full Requires improvement to be good 14/02/2019 Interim Improved effectiveness 10/04/2018 Full Requires improvement to be good Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 3

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inadequate

There are four children living at this home. Since the previous visit, three children have moved out of the home and two children have moved into the home. Children’s overall progress and experiences are compromised by poor safeguarding practice. The manager and staff do not have sufficient skills to create a safe environment.

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inadequate

This means that children’s care, progress and safety have been compromised. The manager could not demonstrate the support that staff provide for all children to ensure that their overall needs are met and that they make progress from their individual starting points. Ultimately, children make limited progress and one child has not made any progress.

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inadequate

Specialist help is made available for the children, for example in respect of external support to help children stop misusing cannabis. However, children do not engage, therefore it is difficult to measure progress because children continue to misuse cannabis. However, staff say that children’s cannabis misuse has decreased, although this is based on their observations of children when they return home from time out in the community.

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inadequate

One child told the inspector that the manager and staff are nice. She said that they made her feel welcome when she moved into the home. This is positive and the inspector observed warm relationships between the child and the staff team.

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inadequate

Staff understand the importance of children keeping in touch with their friends and families and they support them to do this. This means that children maintain relationships with their friends and families.

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

Risk management is reactive rather than proactive. This means that staff do not implement effective prevention strategies to reduce the risk of harm to children. Consequently, for some children, the risk of harm increased throughout their time living at the home.

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

Children’s risk assessments do not address all known vulnerabilities effectively and set out what action staff should take to reduce risk. For example, this is in relation to the risks associated with cannabis misuse and when a child spends time with her family.

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

Some strategies in risk assessments are not effective to manage and reduce risks to children. For example, there is a risk of fire-starting in respect of one child; however, the child has a lighter. The manager’s response to this is not sufficient because she told the inspector that the child would not give staff her lighter. This Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 4 does not demonstrate that the manager and staff take effective action to keep the child and staff safe.

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

The manager and staff do not have the skills to manage children’s needs safely and effectively. There have been missed opportunities from managers and staff to take a proactive approach and support and engage children to reduce the risk of harm. On numerous occasions when a child has been missing from home, there has been no professional curiosity from staff about what the child was doing and who he was with. This was despite triggers from the child when he told staff that he used alcohol and cannabis. This failure to respond to incidents has placed the child at risk of harm.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There is a registered manager in post. She registered with Ofsted in 2018. Her approach is child-centred and has positive relationships with the staff and children.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

The manager is not leading the home in a manner that is consistent with the home’s statement of purpose. The manager fails to demonstrate that she leads and inspires a culture that helps children aspire to fulfil their potential and that the care being delivered meets the needs of children and promotes their safety and welfare.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Staff spoken to said that the manager is supportive. Staff said that they have frequent supervision that helps them in their roles. Staff described a difficult time at the home, although they said that it is improving.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Risk management and behaviour management in the home are not robust. Risk assessments fail to provide the staff team with appropriate strategies to manage children’s behaviour or minimise risk. Despite the registered manager and staff attending training in safeguarding, the shortfalls identified during this visit have proved the training to be ineffective. Furthermore, this demonstrates that managers and staff do not clearly understand their roles and responsibilities in keeping children safe.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

There are gaps in the home’s monitoring and review systems. This reduces the true analysis and evaluation of the care provided for children and the impact on children’s outcomes. This has been a requirement in three previous inspections and is repeated. Therefore, this fails to demonstrate that leaders and managers have taken effective action to address these gaps to understand the impact that the quality of care is having on the progress and experiences of each child.

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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 Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 5 ‘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 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

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

help each child understand how to keep safe;

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Requirement Due date

have the skills to identify and act upon signs that a child is at risk of harm;

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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 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;

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Requirement Due date

(Regulation 12 (1) (2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(v)(vi)(b))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the manager should ensure that all risks in respect of children are assessed and that risk assessments include strategies to reduce risk.

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Requirement Due date

Furthermore, the manager should ensure that strategies to manage risk are closely monitored and reviewed. 1 August 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 1 August 2021 Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 6 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

understand the impact that the quality of care 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 provided in the home;

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Requirement Due date

use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the home.

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the manager should ensure that she implements effective monitoring and review systems to review children’s care. This is in relation to all children’s plans and records and specifically children’s risk assessments.

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Requirement Due date

* These requirements are subject to a compliance notice. Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 7

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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: SC040266 8

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Town Hall, Library Street, Wigan WN1 1YN

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Shirley Parkinson

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Inspector

Catherine Fargin, Social Care Inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC040266 9 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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