Setting

Beate Wagner Director of Children’s Services Council House Solihull West Midlands B91 3QB

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Monitoring visit to Solihull children’s services

This letter summarises the findings of the monitoring visit to Solihull children’s services on 15 and 16 October 2024. This was the fifth monitoring visit since the local authority was judged inadequate in November 2022. His Majesty’s Inspectors for this visit were Rebecca Quested and Steve Bailey.

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Areas covered by the visit

Inspectors reviewed the progress made in the following areas of concern identified at the last inspection in relation to care experienced young people aged 18 to 25 years:

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Areas covered by the visit

◼ The quality and suitability of accommodation.

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Areas covered by the visit

◼ Care experienced young people at risk of specific types of harm, such as criminal and sexual exploitation.

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Areas covered by the visit

This visit was carried out in line with the inspection of local authority children’s services (ILACS) framework.

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Headline findings

Senior leaders have made tangible improvements in services for care experienced young people in Solihull. The revised strategy and improved local offer show ambition and aspiration for care experienced young people. Personal advisers (PAs) develop trusting relationships with most care experienced young people to prepare them for adulthood. The majority of care experienced young people now live in suitable accommodation, and the innovation of a community parenting board is providing new opportunities to prepare them for employment and supporting them Ofsted

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Headline findings

Store Street Manchester M1 2WD T 0300 123 1231 Textphone 0161 618 8524 enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk www.gov.uk/ofsted to secure jobs. Senior leaders are proud of the positive impact this is having on care experienced young people’s progress. Most PAs workloads are too high. Senior leaders have identified the need to recruit more PAs to reduce workloads and to improve consistency of practice. Recruitment is underway to address this, with new PAs due to join the team by the end of October and strengthened management now in place.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Most young people benefit from having appropriate transition plans in place when they leave care at 18. As a result, most young people have clear arrangements about where they will live and how they will be supported to study or work, which meets their needs. PAs now work alongside social workers prior to young people leaving care. Some PAs do have an opportunity to develop relationships with young people over this time. However, for other PAs their high workloads can have a negative impact on their capacity to do this.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Once young people are aged 18 years old, PAs work with them at their pace and build relationships which are based on the care experienced young person’s priorities and needs. PAs recognise that transitions are challenging and that they need to earn the trust of the care experienced young person that they are supporting.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

PAs know their care experienced young people well and treat them with respect. They understand their histories and take their lived experience into account. This supports care experienced young people to engage with their PAs to navigate their way through early adulthood. PAs provide the level of support which is commensurate to young people’s needs, including when young people are over 21 years old. PAs care about their care experienced young people and make sure they know this by taking an interest in their lives. For example, one PA travelled to support his young person, who was running the London marathon and another went to see their young person at work.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Most care experienced young people are in good health, or are being supported to access the services they need to improve their well-being. PAs encourage young people to attend health appointments so that their physical and emotional health needs can be met. They are persistent and keep returning to issues until the young person feels ready to address them.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

PAs, and the care experienced young people that inspectors spoke with, are positive about the newly revised local offer. Care experienced young people’s rights and entitlements now provide comprehensive financial and practical support to help them fulfil their aspirations. The local offer is available online in an accessible format, which includes translation into many languages as well as a read aloud option. Care experienced young people have their health records provided when they are 18, but many do not have other key documents they need in order to have control in their lives. Former unaccompanied asylum-seeking care leavers receive well-coordinated holistic support that means their needs are well met, including their education, health, accommodation, and family tracing. Their cultural, linguistic and religious needs are recognised and supported, although this is not regularly recorded within their plans.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

PAs are aware of potential indicators of exploitation. Most work closely with those in the care experienced young person’s support network to identify when risks are increasing so as to tailor their approach to risk reduction. For those children who have been referred to the Multi-Agency Adult Child Exploitation (MAACE) meeting before their 18th birthday, support and disruption activities are well embedded. However, care experienced young people are not always referred into the MAACE meeting in a timely way, because some PAs are unsure of the referral process and some PAs lack guidance on how to take forward safeguarding concerns. Senior leaders have plans in place to address this.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

PAs support care experienced young people to live in homes where their needs are met. This represents considerable progress since the last inspection. Many are supported to remain ‘Staying Put’ with their former foster carers and others to continue living with their families, when that is safe and in their best interests. PAs support care experienced young people to move to supported or independent accommodation at a time that is right for them. The local authority has training flats and offers guidance and practical advice to prepare them to take on their own tenancy. PAs help care experienced young people to navigate the benefits system and think about how they can develop their independence skills.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Very few care experienced young people are living in unsuitable accommodation. When this does occur, PAs are tenacious in their efforts to keep in touch with them to help them find somewhere suitable to live.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

When care experienced young people are in custody, PAs maintain a relationship with them through visiting them regularly. PAs continue to advocate on their behalf and support them to engage with education and training while in custody and on their release.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

The support for care experienced young people to engage with education, employment and training opportunities has developed greatly since the last inspection. More care experienced young people are now attending university and benefit from the practical and financial support to enable them to study. The development of a community parenting board, which draws on local business and community members to provide employment, training and practical support to help young people into work, is providing opportunities for many care experienced young people. These opportunities, such as work experience, internships, interview preparation and jobs, including apprenticeships, are carefully matched to young people’s needs and experiences. Care experienced young people’s progress is reviewed during regular education, employment and training meetings. PAs offer increased levels of support when this is required to ensure young people continue to

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Findings and evaluation of progress

engage in a working life. Progress has been made in ensuring that pathway plans are completed every six months, although the quality is variable. Pathway plans are increasingly written alongside young people, so that their voices inform the support they receive. Most plans include information about young people’s aspirations and their strengths but contain broad or generic goals. As a result, it is not clear how young people will know if they are making progress or how they will be able to hold the local authority to account. Some recent plans are more detailed, specific and timebound. Leaders have plans in place to support PAs to embed this practice and to ensure that plans are updated to reflect changes in young people’s circumstances and are translated into young people’s preferred language.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Care experienced young people we met told us how much they value their relationships with their PAs. One said, ‘[His PA] has cleaned my cuts and bruises and he is in my corner… he has high expectations of me.’ And another said, ‘I tried to push my PA away but she never let me… they don’t give up on us.’ Care experienced young people said they enjoyed the opportunity to meet up at Our Voice, Our Services, Solihull’s children in care and care experienced young people council, where they have made friends and developed confidence, which has supported them to gain employment. They enjoyed the awards ceremony and felt that their PAs should also be recognised for what they do for them.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Improvements in corporate parenting since the last inspection, in November 2022, are making a difference to the experiences and progress of care experienced young people in Solihull. Political and financial commitment by senior leaders has supported these changes. Care experience has been identified by the Solihull council as a protected characteristic and has encouraged health partners to also take this step. This provides additional opportunities for care experienced young people to gain employment. The continued support of the children’s commissioner maintains the focus on improvement. The involvement of the regional improvement partner is effective in terms of providing additional leadership capacity and operational capacity, which is allowing improvements to progress with greater pace.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

The corporate parenting board is becoming a more effective forum for scrutiny and improving partnership working. Partnership working has led to tangible improvements, including a strengthened offer from the integrated care board to care experienced parents during pregnancy and improved joint working with the housing department to prevent care experienced young people being made homeless. The development of the innovative community parenting board has been effective in involving the wider community and businesses in providing opportunities for care experienced young people.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Senior leaders understand the strengths and areas for improvement for care experienced young people well. They have revised strategies, policies and procedures which provide the structure to improve the effectiveness of support and services for care experienced young people. Quality assurance processes are improving. Compliance in the completion of audits is embedding, as is auditors’ understanding of what good practice looks like and the use of audits to improve individual worker’s practice. Auditors make attempts to gain feedback from young people, and when this is obtained, it provides a greater understanding of the impact of practice. The audits of care experienced young people’s case records have identified the areas of focus for practice improvements, and progress is being made to address these. However, the effectiveness of ‘closing the loop’ for individual care experienced young people during audit activity is not yet

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Leaders ensure that PAs are well informed about the management and strategic changes being made. PAs feel the managers within their practice area are accessible and supportive. A new practice model has been launched across children’s social care. This followed consultation with staff and an all-staff conference which included PAs.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

PAs have lots of opportunities to attend training, including training regarding the new practice model. However, workload pressures are having a negative impact on their ability to attend this training. The induction provided when PAs join the service lacks robustness in providing the information they need to do the job, including specific training around housing processes, managing risk and securing former asylum- seeking children’s legal status. As a result, some PAs do not have a comprehensive understanding of the processes and systems designed to promote young people’s welfare.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Supervision is now taking place. PAs benefit from more reflective supervision with their manager which focuses on improving outcomes for young people and in ensuring their records reflect the support they are receiving. Stronger examples of effective supervision are written to the care experienced young person and most are timebound.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

Most PAs workloads are too high. This is having an impact on the quality of practice and case recording. PAs are frustrated that they are not always able to provide the quality of support they know young people need. Leaders know this and have appointed more PAs, who are due to start once safer recruitment processes have been completed.

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Findings and evaluation of progress

I am copying this letter to the Department for Education.

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