Children's home run by Vcare - 24 Limited

Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 1 Registered provider: Vcare - 24 Limited Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The children’s home is owned and managed by a private company. The home provides care for three children who may experience social and emotional difficulties.

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Information about this children’s home

At the time of the inspection, one child was living in the home. Two children have left the home since the last inspection.

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Information about this children’s home

The registered manager post has been vacant since May 2023. Currently the home has an acting manager.

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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 requires improvement to be 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: 21 September 2022

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

21/09/2022 Full Good 08/12/2021 Full Good Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 3

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff have built positive relationships with the child currently living in the home. This has helped the child to settle quickly. The child’s family talked about the positive progress the child has made and said, ‘Staff really care about [name of child].’ The child likes living in the home and said, ‘It’s the best care home I have lived in.’

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff support the child to have their health needs met and attend specialist appointments. Staff have a good understanding of the child’s individual needs. However, one staff member was unclear regarding the child’s additional health needs. This could impact on the quality of care provided to the child.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children are supported with their emotional health, and staff make appropriate referrals to services. Staff help the child understand the importance of keeping healthy and encourage them to make healthy choices.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff help the child to develop their independence with the support of incentives. The child carries out household chores and cleans their room.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The child has experienced some changes with their education provisions. Staff try hard to support and encourage the child to attend education. The staff are proactive in advocating for the child to have an appropriate education plan and have assisted the child in creating a CV.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff encourage the children to share their wishes and any concerns during individual discussions. The child feels able to share their wishes and their views, and these are embedded in their daily care.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff support and encourage the child to access activities such as going ice skating and out on day trips. This offers the child opportunities to build their confidence. Staff assist the child to explore their own identity and talk about their individuality.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff work hard with the child to support them to have a positive night-time routine. The child experiences some challenges going to sleep at a reasonable hour, which leaves them without a stable routine. Staff work with the child to assist them in attending essential appointments, but this proves difficult at times.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff strive to make children feel welcome in the home. On occasions when moves have been on an emergency basis, staff have assisted children to talk about their worries.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Two children have moved on from the home since the last inspection. Staff supported the children to have an independent advocate to help them share their views. The managers have made attempts to work with the children’s placing authority to support children’s moves into and out of the home. At times, it has not Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 4 been possible to support timely moves due to concerns around children’s safety and welfare.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Staff understand the importance of family time and help the child to have good quality time with family. The child and their family enjoyed celebrating the child’s birthday together at the home. Staff have also encouraged the child to talk to the independent advocate to ensure that their views are known about seeing other significant people in their life.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

The interior decoration of the home needs attention. In the bathroom, some items need replacing, such as the toilet seat and tap, and maintenance is needed to improve the appearance. The sofa in the lounge is damaged, and curtains in the lounge and child’s bedroom need securing. These repairs will help the child to feel more relaxed in their home.

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

Staff help to keep the child as safe as possible. The child can identify trusted adults they can talk to and understands how to make a complaint. The child’s family said, ‘[Name of child] feels safe and really trusts staff.’

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

The staff understand the importance of their safeguarding roles and responsibilities. Staff feel confident in reporting any safeguarding concerns. This has resulted in investigations into the staff’s practice and appropriate action being taken to safeguard all children in the home.

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

Staff search for the children when they leave the home without permission, and they are aware of the procedures for notifying and reporting missing-from-home incidents. One child had frequently left the home and disengaged from staff support. This resulted in the managers taking the decision to end the child’s placement. The current child’s local authority said, ‘There has been a significant reduction of missing episodes for the child since living at this home.’

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

The use of holds has not been necessary for the current child, and staff focus on building good relationships with them. Staff struggled to support one child, and an incident escalated, resulting in police assistance. Gaps in the recordings of this incident mean it is not clear whether staff used appropriate de-escalation techniques.

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

Staff use rewards to help acknowledge the child’s positive behaviours. This helps the child to be proud of their achievements. The child’s family said ‘[Name of child] has made positive progress around understanding their behaviours.’ This is helping the child manage their behaviours and feelings safely.

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

Staff use restorative consequences when the child’s behaviours are unacceptable. However, there is an inconsistency in the records of when children have been spoken to following the use of consequences. Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 5 Staff work with the child to help them to understand risks around internet and fire safety. This helps the child understand how to keep themselves safe. However, there are gaps in staff support for the child’s understanding around healthy relationships.

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

The child’s risk assessments are updated following significant incidents. This helps staff understand the associated risks. However, recordings of some actions are not clear regarding what staff should do to assist the child. This does not offer consistency of care.

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good

The home does not have a registered manager in post. The acting manager was absent during the inspection, and the inspection was led by the responsible individual and group manager.

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good

The manager has monitoring systems in place to review the quality of care provided. However, these systems need further embedding to address gaps in recordings of daily logs and significant events. Gaps in management oversight and recordings in the child’s risk assessment do not support staff to have the right information to meet children’s needs.

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good

Notifications of significant events are not always sent to Ofsted in a timely manner. This results in a delay in securing the independent oversight required to ensure all actions are being undertaken to promote children’s welfare.

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good

Staff are not offered consistent supervision, and there are gaps in recordings of supervision. This means staff are not provided a copy of agreed actions, and it is unclear regarding the support offered. There are gaps in the recording of team meetings, which make it difficult to ensure staff can offer the child consistency of care.

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good

The registered manager was proactive in challenging previous local authorities to ensure that children have the right level of support. The registered manager worked with children to access advocate support and ensured one child’s voice was heard regarding their wish to move to a family placement.

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good

Staff have completed mandatory training, and new staff are supported through an induction period. The leaders and managers are proactive in addressing shortfalls in staff practice and ensure that staff have appropriate support.

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good

Staff say that they feel supported by leaders and managers. The staff support each other and feel they are a strong stable team. Family and professionals said that communication from managers and staff is good. Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 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, The Children’s Homes (England) Regulations 2015 and ‘The Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’. The registered person must comply within the given timescales.

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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

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

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)(f)(h))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the registered person must ensure recordings are clear regarding incidents, consequences, risk assessments and plans and that management oversight provides staff with clear actions to support children. The registered person must also ensure that staff have consistent reflective supervision and team meetings in accordance with the home’s statement of purpose. 26 November

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must notify HMCI and each other relevant person without delay if—

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Requirement Due date

there is an allegation of abuse against the home or a person working there; 26 November Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 7 a child protection enquiry involving a child —

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Requirement Due date

concludes (in which case, the notification must include the outcome of the child protection enquiry); or

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Requirement Due date

there is any other incident relating to a child which the registered person considers to be serious. (Regulation 40 (4)(c)(d)(i)(ii)(e))

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Requirement Due date

The registered provider must appoint a person to manage the children’s home if—

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Requirement Due date

there is no registered manager in respect of the home; and

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Requirement Due date

is not, or does not intend to be, in day-to-day charge of the home.

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Requirement Due date

If the registered provider appoints a person to manage the home, the registered provider must, without delay, give HMCI notice of—

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Requirement Due date

the name of the person so appointed; and

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Requirement Due date

the date on which the appointment takes effect. (Regulation 27 (1)(a)(b)(i)(ii)(iii) (2)(a)(b)) 26 November

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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

provide personalised care that meets each child’s needs, as recorded in the child’s relevant plans, taking account of the child’s background;

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Requirement Due date

provide to children living in the home the physical necessities they need in order to live there comfortably. 26 November Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 8 (Regulation 6 (2)(a)(b)(iv)(vii))

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Requirement Due date

In particular, the registered person must ensure arrangements are in place to support children to have positive care routines, all staff to have a clear understanding of the children’s needs and to offer children individual support around associated risks.

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Requirement Due date

The registered person must maintain records ("case records") for each child which—

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Requirement Due date

include the information and documents listed in Schedule 3 in relation to each child;

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Requirement Due date

are kept up to date. (Regulation 36 (1)(a)(b)) 26 November

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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: 2544219 9

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: Unit 10, Halifax Way, Pocklington Industrial Estate, Pocklington, York YO42 1NP

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Children’s home details

Responsible individual: Victoria Simpson

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Inspector

Gina Lightfoot, Social Care Inspector Inspection report for children’s home: 2544219 10 regulates and inspects 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 looked after children, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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