Children's home run by Beaufort Care Group Ltd

Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 1 Registered provider: Beaufort Care Group Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This home provides care for up to three children. There are currently two children living in the home.

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Information about this children’s home

The manager registered with Ofsted in May 2020.

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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 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

Date of last inspection: 1 February 2022

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inadequate

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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inadequate

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

01/02/2022 Full Good Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 3

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inadequate

Leaders and managers have not consistently taken action to keep children safe. At times, they have failed to identify and respond effectively to safeguarding concerns and have also failed to take timely action to address bullying between the children.

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inadequate

Children share their views about living in the home through regular home meetings. However, the manager sometimes fails to act when children raise concerns during these meetings. Over several months, two children have raised significant concerns about their negative experiences of living in the home. These two children experienced threatening and harmful behaviour from a peer. Leaders and managers did not respond quickly or robustly to the children’s worries. This led to the children becoming withdrawn and isolating themselves in their bedrooms thereby missing out on social interaction.

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inadequate

Two children have moved out of the home since the last inspection. One of these children failed to make good progress. The child remained out of education, isolated from peers and was unwilling to take steps towards appropriate independence. While leaders and managers identified the lack of progress, they failed to take timely action to meet the child’s needs.

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inadequate

Children receive support from a stable team of staff. One child is settled in the home and enjoys positive relationships with staff, including a close and trusting relationship with their key worker. Staff support this child to do their best at school and maintain a part-time job. However, one child is newer and spends significant lengths of time out of the home. Staff allow this, thereby limiting the opportunity to establish a relationship with the child.

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inadequate

Staff successfully promote children’s relationships with their family and the people who are important to them. Staff have built links with one child’s friendship network to understand who they spend time with. They are supporting this child well to develop the skills they need to travel independently to visit people who are important to them. However, for the other child, there is a lack of curiosity to understand who the child is spending time with. Therefore, potential risks are not identified or considered.

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inadequate

Staff maintain a clean and comfortable home for children. They offer children support to keep their rooms tidy and help them to personalise their space.

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

Managers and staff have failed to take action to safeguard a child. They are not professionally curious about identifying and understanding risks to the child from outside of the home. Staff do not fully understand the risk faced by this child due to Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 4 an underdeveloped knowledge of exploitation. Because staff do not understand the risks, safety measures are not put in place and this means that this child has been in situations in which risk could, and should, have been mitigated. Records in the home do not show the action that leaders and managers believed staff were taking to check on the child’s welfare. As a consequence, on this inspection, they have recognised this and are now taking action aimed at improving the situation.

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

Staff do not consistently or always sufficiently effectively identify safeguarding concerns. This is because they lack sufficient specialist knowledge and have not been supported well enough to develop this knowledge. As a result, action is not always taken to safeguard children. Poor identification and recording of concerns mean that leaders and managers do not have an accurate picture of the level of risk in the home. Action was taken during the inspection to correct the records and start a chronology to capture concerns.

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

Children have experienced bullying and intimidation from a peer inside the home. The excessive focus on one child’s specific needs at the expense of the other children’s needs resulted in the acceptance and normalisation of their behaviour in the home.. The behaviour was not always correctly recognised and labelled as bullying. Leaders and managers failed to identify the extent of the concerns or develop a clear plan of action to safeguard children. The manager responded to incidents by managing physical safety. They failed to identify or consider the emotional abuse experienced by children. This group of children has now changed and the current children are not being bullied.

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

Permanent staff are recruited following safer recruitment guidelines. Since the last inspection, the manager now ensures that they see the necessary information for temporary workers.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Monitoring and oversight by leaders and managers are of poor quality and consequently ineffective. Detailed information and learning about children gained by staff is not analysed by leaders and managers to understand how to improve the quality of care. The manager does not identify learning from incidents to improve practice in the home and the experiences of children. This is in significant part due to a failure to recognise the seriousness of some of the concerns.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Staff enjoy working in the home and say that they feel supported by the manager. More-experienced staff mentor and support the development of new staff. However, staff lack direction and challenge from the manager. Supervision takes place regularly; however, it fails to offer staff the opportunity to critically reflect on their practice. Because the manager does not accurately understand the quality of care in the home, staff do not receive clear direction about how to support children. The manager’s own supervision does not demonstrate professional challenge or curiosity to support their management of the home. These shortcomings have an inevitable negative impact on how well children are safeguarded and cared for. Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 5 Professionals speak positively of the working relationship with staff. They say that they value the good communication between them.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Prior to this inspection, leaders and managers identified a lack of challenge from their independent person and have taken action to address this.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: inadequate

Ofsted will monitor this home closely and undertake further inspections. Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 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 children’s views, wishes and feelings standard is that children receive care from staff who—

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Requirement Due date

take their views, wishes and feelings into account in relation to matters affecting the children’s care and welfare and their lives.

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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

ascertain and consider each child’s views, wishes and feelings, and balance these against what they judge to be in the child’s best interests when making decisions about the child’s care and welfare. (Regulation 7 (1)(c) (2)(a)(i))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that when children’s views are sought, there are clear links to how they are understood and used to contribute to the development of the home and improve experiences for children. 3 February 2023

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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—

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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

help each child to develop socially aware behaviour; 13 January 2023 Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 7 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

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

understand and communicate to children that bullying is unacceptable; and

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Requirement Due date

have the skills to recognise incidents or indications of bullying and how to deal with them. (Regulation 11 (1)(b)(c) (2)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(x)(xi)(xii)(xiii))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that staff identify and understand bullying in the home and take action to address the concerns, including consideration of the emotional impact of being bullied. Leaders and managers should also ensure that staff help children to understand and modify their behaviour and escalate concerns when this does not work.

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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; 13 January 2023 Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 8 help each child to 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

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

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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; and

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Requirement Due date

are familiar with, and act in accordance with, the home’s child protection policies;

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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)(a)(i)(ii)(iii)(iv)(v)(vi)(vii)(b))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that staff understand and identify safeguarding concerns and take action to reduce risks to children when they spend time with friends. Leaders and managers should also ensure that staff understand the risks in areas where children spend time so that they are able to make an accurate judgement about how safe they are.

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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

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 have the experience, qualifications and skills to meet the needs of each child; 3 February 2023 Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 9 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 provided in the home;

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Requirement Due date

demonstrate that practice in the home is informed and improved by taking into account feedback on—

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Requirement Due date

feedback on the experiences of children, including complaints received; and

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Requirement Due date

use monitoring and review systems to make continuous improvements in the quality of care provided in the home. (Regulation 13 (1)(a)(b) (2)(a)(c)(f)(g)(ii)(h))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, ensure that regular reviews and monitoring are carried out so that the manager understands the quality of care in the home and the improvements needed to support children to make progress.

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Requirement Due date

A requirement was made under regulation 13 at the previous inspection, although the action to be taken by the registered person has changed.

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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 for children’s home: 2588486 10

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Beaufort Care Group

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Unit 2, Hollygrove Business Park, Verwood Road, Ringwood, Dorset BH24 2DB

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Inspector

Clare Nixson, Social Care Inspector Inspection report for children’s home: 2588486 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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