Children's Home run by Hillcrest Children’s Services Ltd in Oxfordshire

Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 1 SC482296 Registered provider: Hillcrest Children’s Services Limited Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This is a privately owned children’s home that provides care for up to eight children who have social and/or emotional difficulties due to early childhood trauma. The organisation’s school is located on the same site.

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Information about this children’s home

The manager was registered with Ofsted in August 2021.

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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 19 August 2021, to carry out a monitoring 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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good

How well children and young people are helped and protected good

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good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers 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: 10 September 2019

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: outstanding

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

10/09/2019 Full Outstanding 03/10/2018 Full Outstanding 22/08/2017 Full Outstanding 08/11/2016 Full Outstanding Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 3

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children benefit from supportive relationships with adults who are attentive and sensitive to their needs. Staff use a wide range of methods to ascertain the children’s views. Children share good-quality relationships with staff. One child nominated a staff member for a local authority award. The child talked about why they had done this, and said: ‘[Staff member] helps me to explore my feelings.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children’s views are respected. Children spoke confidently about their wishes and needs. Children know how to complain. Daily community meetings allow opportunities for children to speak about their day. The meetings also encourage positive relationships. As a result, children feel valued.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff support children who live far from home. Time with family members is promoted. Through this, good relationships are maintained. This encourages positive experiences for children in maintaining links with their family.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Education is a priority for children. All children are enrolled in full-time education. Staff maintain good relationships with the school by having at least daily contact. This ensures continuity of care for the children. Consequently, the children have continued to make progress with their education.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Despite the challenges of the COVID-19 lockdowns, the adults have created opportunities for the children to continue to have enriching experiences. Children have enjoyed cinema nights and theme days safely within the grounds of the home. Since the restrictions began to lift, children have taken part in activities such as horse riding, swimming and martial arts. Children are enjoying reintegrating into society.

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

Safeguarding practice is good. Staff have a good understanding of the risks faced by the children in their care. All professionals and family members reported that children are safeguarded.

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

As a result of an emphasis on developing safe practice, the staff have made vast improvements in how they respond to children’s behaviours. There is now clear and consistent communication between children and staff. In relation to any use of restraints or incidents, management oversight is reflective and is now recorded within the relevant timescales. This avoids any undue delay in senior staff oversight and means that the previous recommendation has been met.

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

There have been no missing-from-home episodes during this inspection period. Children are therefore kept safe by staff who have built good relationships with them. Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 4 All staff are recruited in line with safe recruitment practice, and there are always sufficient staff on duty to provide good levels of supervision and support. One social worker commented on the consistency of staffing, and said, ‘The one week on, one week off [rota] benefits kids so much – what they do makes a huge difference to children.’

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

Some critical incidents have taken place, and have resulted in some children making allegations against staff. Serious events are notified to safeguarding partners and Ofsted appropriately. The designated officer in the local authority raised no concerns regarding safeguarding practice. The collaborative approach within the professional network keeps children safe.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The registered manager provides supportive and reflective leadership for his team. He is supported by two experienced and knowledgeable team managers. While the staff team has experienced challenges over the past year, this has settled, and practice has improved.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Leaders and managers are aspirational. Their enthusiasm and passion are shared by those who work at the home. Staff reported feeling well supported by visible and approachable leaders and managers. This leads to a positive feeling in the home.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The previous requirement to ensure that the home is led and managed in a way that is consistent with the approach and ethos set out in the statement of purpose has been met. Since the previous inspection, the manager has improved his practice. This has been achieved through improvements in oversight of safeguarding incidents and continued professional development.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

The statement of purpose was published containing some personal details of children. This puts children at potential risk of harm, as this personal data is accessible to the public.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Timely supervision and annual appraisals provide the staff with opportunities for reflection and development. However, not all supervision and appraisal documents are dated and signed. There could be a conflict in practice if the content of these documents is not formally agreed by both supervisor and supervisee, which could in turn have an impact on children’s care.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Training is readily available to staff, with a wide choice of courses on offer. All staff have completed mandatory training. However, some staff have not completed the required refresher training for some courses. This means that some staff have not received up-to-date training in some key areas of practice, which could potentially have a negative impact on the care of children. Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 5

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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 privacy and access standard is that the registered person must ensure that—

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Requirement Due date

the privacy of children is appropriately protected. (Regulation 21 (a)) 12 November

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff can access appropriate facilities and resources to support their training needs, and should understand the key role they play in the training and development of staff in the home. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 53, paragraph 10.11)  The registered person should ensure that a note of the content and/or outcomes of supervision sessions is kept, and should ensure that both the person giving the supervision and the staff member have a signed and dated copy of the record. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 61, paragraph 13.4)

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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: SC482296 6

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Hillcrest Children’s Services 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: Sadie Dangerfield

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Inspector

Skye Frain, Social Care Inspector Inspection report children’s home: SC482296 7 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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