Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland

Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 1 Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland Together For Children Sunderland Sandhill Centre, Grindon Lane, Sunderland SR3 4EN Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this voluntary adoption agency

This voluntary adoption agency is owned by Together for Children Sunderland Limited and provides adoption services on behalf of Sunderland City Council.

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Information about this voluntary adoption agency

Together for Children Adoption – Sunderland is a partner of a regional adoption agency with one other local authority that operate across the north of England. The adoption team undertakes the recruitment, assessment, training and support services for prospective adopters, children adopted, members of the adoptive family, birth families and significant adults.

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Information about this voluntary adoption agency

The agency also provides post-adoption support to adoptive families, operates a letterbox facility, which enables indirect contact arrangements between adopted children and their birth families, and works with adopted adults, including undertaking intermediary work. Support to birth families is commissioned to another voluntary adoption agency.

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Overall experiences and progress of

How well children, young people and adults are helped and protected good

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Overall experiences and progress of

The effectiveness of leaders & managers outstanding

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Overall experiences and progress of

The voluntary adoption agency provides effective services that meet the requirements for good.

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Overall experiences and progress of

Date of previous inspection: 1 November 2022

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Overall experiences and progress of

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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Overall experiences and progress of

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 2

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Adopters feel valued because of the individualised care and support that they receive from the voluntary adoption agency’s social workers pre and post adoption.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

The assessment process for adopters is thorough and undertaken at the applicant’s pace. Social workers facilitate effectively support network meetings during the assessment stage. They bring together family and friends to creatively explore how they can practically and emotionally support the applicant during the initial period of the child moving into their forever home. For one adopter, this included finishing decorating, which enabled him to concentrate on transition planning for the child.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Prospective adopters enjoy the training at the start of their adoption journey, although some reflect that the training was more focused on babies and young children as opposed to older children. Although social workers have delivered bespoke training to adopters, other adopters did not feel as well prepared by the agency for caring for a teenager.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Social workers are experienced and successful family finders. They maintain close working relationships with children’s social workers. This ensures early identification and planning for children pre-birth and during care proceedings. The agency also has effective relationships with regional adoption agencies to explore potential adopters and prevent children from waiting longer than they need to.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Social workers ensure that they include the voice of the child when considering a match to a potential adopter. They considered how one child loves trains, and he can now watch them from his bedroom window. Social workers create support plans for families in advance of matching considerations. Prospective adopters consequently understand the child’s holistic needs and how support will be provided.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Children’s wishes, feelings and needs continue to be well thought out during the transition process. Children receive welcome packs when they move in with their forever families. The packs contain age-appropriate toys and stories that create opportunities to develop early relationships between the child and their prospective adopter.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Children and their forever families benefit from a comprehensive therapeutic offer. A consultant clinical psychologist attached to the agency provides a responsive service. This supports matching and early days considerations effectively. This provides prospective adopters with increased understanding about the impact of trauma on children and themselves. Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 3 Social workers use their therapeutic skills when interacting with adopters and providing support to children pre and post order. There is due diligence to oversee and challenge, where necessary, children receiving therapeutic support through the Adoption Support Fund. This assures the agency that the intervention is meeting the child’s therapeutic needs. When children receive therapeutic input, often at a time of increased stress within the family, children make progress in their relationship-

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Adopters are supported by their social worker to establish arrangements for children to keep in touch with their birth families. Where appropriate, trusting relationships develop, leading to exchanges of update letters, photos and face-to-face contact. This helps children and their birth families to understand their life stories.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Life appreciation days for children enhance their life-story work by celebrating a child’s journey with people who can share memories that may otherwise have been lost.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Life-story work is mainly completed for children in preparation for the granting of the adoption order. Some children, however, experience a delay in receiving their life-story book post order. In addition, some life-story books and later life letters have missing or inaccurate information. This has the potential to confuse children about their journey before moving to their forever home.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Children enjoy family holidays and joining activities in the community, where they make friends. Children participate in the agency’s Crafty Kids group, which provides regular opportunities for children to meet and enjoy fun activities together. Some children attend the more recently established Adopt Shine group. They are starting to contribute to the development of the agency.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Adopters are well supported. They are offered a buddy, who provides invaluable help and support as well as forging long-lasting friendships.

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Overall experiences and progress of service users: good

Adopters are invited to support groups monthly. All groups are held virtually, capturing a wider audience. The support groups focus on specific topics that provide helpful information and advice to adopters. There is less evidence of topics that relate to teenage needs, although these have taken place previously.

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good

Social workers respond appropriately to ensure that children’s safety is the paramount consideration pre and post adoption.

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good

Social workers carry out robust assessments of adopters. They complete appropriate statutory checks and exploration of the applicants’ past relationships to assure themselves of the applicant’s suitability to adopt. If social workers identify vulnerabilities, applicants are treated with respect and provided with useful signposting to improve their potential suitability to progress. Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 4 If a child discloses historic harm, social workers provide appropriate advice and guidance to adopters to ensure the child is safe and feels supported. Adoptive parents seek medical advice when accidents or injuries occur and inform safeguarding professionals. Social workers act in partnership with the children’s social workers to reassure themselves that the child is safe. While the response of social workers follows safeguarding processes, the manager does not always record

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good

her oversight to provide assurance of enquiries undertaken and outcomes. It is therefore unclear in the adopter’s records how the agency has satisfied itself of children’s and the adopter’s wellbeing or support needed. Leaders acknowledged during the inspection that they can improve their recording with more formal processes differentiating the roles of adoption and children’s social workers.

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good

Social workers provide high levels of therapeutic support, which enables most families to work through difficult times to remain together. The consultant clinical psychologist has analysed a small number of children who have experienced family breakdowns ten years post adoption. She has taken themes from the experiences of families to develop further training for adopters. This is delivered through the assessment stage, adoption support groups and lunchtime learning for social workers. This reflection informs the agency’s practice to reduce the likelihood of recurrence for families.

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good

Social workers demonstrate person-centred practice for adopted adults accessing their records. They use their professional judgement, particularly in preparing individuals for distressing information or where risks are identified. Social workers are committed to providing the best possible outcomes in a safe and supportive way.

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good

The agency has appropriate processes to ensure that staff and panel members are safely recruited. This includes the verification of references and comprehensive enquiries to assure themselves that applicants have the appropriate skills and integrity for the role.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The responsible individual and registered manager are dedicated and ambitious leaders. Their commitment to improving outcomes for children and adopters is valued by social workers and adopters.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Leaders recognise the strengths of the agency and areas for further development. Leaders address obstacles such as delays for adult medicals undertaken by GPs with the commissioning of private adoption medicals. This avoids drift for prospective adopters and children.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Leaders participate in national and regional forums, therefore contributing to the designing of practice and services in line with adoption reform. Their representation at Local Family Justice Board promotes the importance of planning for early permanence as well as maintaining relationships after adoption. Learning is brought back into the agency with leaders working proactively with the practice development Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 5 team to provide social workers with tools to improve outcomes for children and their families in line with national policy and reform. A newly implemented ‘keeping in touch’ assessment tool provides helpful guidance to social workers. Children with adoption plans are now benefiting from more creative ways of maintaining relationships with their birth families.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Leaders aspire to improve the quality of practice with robust governance and monitoring systems. Performance data influences the direction of practice, for example the theme of adopter’s file audits. Audits are collaborative, with the inclusion of feedback from adopters, resulting in improved practice and learning for social workers.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Management oversight is seen across the prospective adopter’s journey, which ensures accountability and assurance that their assessment is on track. Quality assurance of the prospective adopter’s report is undertaken by the manager prior to adoption panel, and robust systems ensure that panel members have the information they need to make recommendations about children and prospective adopters’ suitability for adoption. The adoption panel chair reports improvements in the quality of assessments and support plans for adoptive families completed by social workers.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The responsible individual invests in the continuing improvement of the agency with new services, including a virtual memory box, about to be launched. Leaders consider learning from children’s and adopters’ feedback. Adopters are aware of their right to complain. However, numbers are low, indicating high levels of satisfaction. The agency has appropriate systems in place, including independent investigating officers, for complaints to be responded to. Leaders consider learning from complaints, including discussion of findings with the team and adoption panel members.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Leaders recognise the impact of trauma on children and encourage the professional development of social workers, who are trained in several research-informed therapeutic models. The consultant clinical psychologist praises the social workers, who are experienced at navigating a range of relationships while remaining calm and containing. Both adopters and children’s social workers describe social workers in the agency as skilled at building trusting relationships with children and adopters. Adopters feel safe talking to their social worker, which promotes a proactive response to supporting children and their families.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Social workers receive regular reflective supervision sessions, which include development of social work practice and how this is cascaded across the team and wider service. The manager’s recording of supervision provides a detailed account of the discussions and decisions made.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The consultant clinical psychologist describes the responsible individual as a creative thinker who brings about change in the agency. Social workers describe leaders as being visible, approachable and responsive. The team is stable, with social workers having champion roles linking into other service areas such as the pre-birth and Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 6 locality teams. This promotes learning and improved identification of the needs of children seeking permanence through adoption.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The commitment social workers have for their job is tangible. One social worker wrote, ‘Being able to see a case through from the very beginning to the conclusion is also incredibly rewarding and provides continuity for our families.’ Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 7

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that the completed life-story book is presented within 10 working days of the adoption ceremony. This particularly refers to ensuring that the quality assurance process is in place to track the completion of and accuracy of information within a life-story book and later life letter. (Adoption: national minimum standards 2014, 2.7)  The registered person should ensure that adopter training skills them to help children understand how to keep themselves safe including when outside of the household. This particularly refers to targeted training post adoption to support parents to anticipate potential risks for children and to respond effectively. (Adoption: national minimum standards 2014, 10.9)  The registered person should ensure that the manager regularly monitors all records kept by the agency to ensure compliance with the agency’s policies, to identify any concerns about specific incidents and to identify patterns and trends.

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Recommendations

Immediate action is taken to address any issues raised by this monitoring. This particularly refers to ensuring that management decision-making and oversight is clearly recorded in the adopters’ records. (Adoption: national minimum standards 2014, 25.2)

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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 Voluntary Adoption Agencies and the Adoption Agencies (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2003, the Adoption Agencies Regulations 2005, any other relevant legislation, and the national minimum standards. Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 8

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Voluntary adoption agency details

Registered provider: Together For Children Sunderland

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Voluntary adoption agency details

Registered provider address: City Hall, Plater Way, Sunderland SR1 3AA

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Voluntary adoption agency details

Email address: adoption@togetherforchildren.org.uk

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Inspectors

Jo Warburton, Social Care Inspector (Lead) Joanne Wallis, Social Care Inspector Cat Makel, Social Care Inspector Inspection report for voluntary adoption agency - Together For Children Adoption - Sunderland 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 looked after children, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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