Agenda and minutes

Venue: County Hall, Chichester, PO19 1RQ

Contact: Ann Little on 033 022 22654  Email:  ann.little@westsussex.gov.uk

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Items
No. Item

16.

Declarations of Interests

Members and officers must declare any pecuniary or personalinterest in any business on the agenda. They should also make declarations at any stage such an interest becomes apparent during the meeting. Consideration should be given to leaving the meeting if the nature of the interest warrants it.  If in doubt please contact Democratic Services before the meeting.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

16.1     In accordance with the County Council’s code of conduct the following declarations were made:

 

16.2     Cllr Mercer declared a personal interest as the Chair of the Orchard Hill College Academy Trust which has one academy in West Sussex.

 

16.3     Cllr Linehan declared a personal interest as the parent of a child with an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP).

 

16.4     Cllr Smith declared a personal interest as the parent of a child with an EHCP, who is on the SEND register and uses school special educational needs transport.

 

16.5     Cllr Cherry declared a personal interest as the chair of governors at the Burgess Hill Academy.

17.

Urgent Matters

Items not on the agenda which the Chairman of the meeting is of the opinion should be considered as a matter of urgency by reason of special circumstances, including cases where the Committee needs to be informed of budgetary or performance issues affecting matters within its terms of reference, which have emerged since the publication of the agenda.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

17.1     The Chairman invited the Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Cllr Russell, to provide a brief statement on the outcome of the Ofsted inspection report published on 27 September 2022, in relation to a Children’s Residential Home.

 

17.2     Cllr Russell informed the Committee that following an Ofsted inspection of Teasel Close children’s home in Crawley on 2 and 3 August 2022, Ofsted had published their report giving the home the rating of ‘inadequate’.  Cllr Russell highlighted that the home had been rated ‘outstanding’ twelve times previously by Ofsted and that the recent judgement was disappointing.  

 

17.3     Cllr Russell reported that actions had been taken immediately, and an action plan had been put in place and shared with Ofsted to ensure it complied with the high standard needed.  At their return visit in mid-September, Ofsted had reported they were happy that the work in the action plan was going well and no more issues were raised.  The learning from this had been taken on board and a member session would be arranged for members to understand the complex fragility around this sector.  They would also be looking for opportunities for the local member to visit the home in due course.

 

17.4     The Director of Children, Young People and Learning, Mrs Butler, added that the outcome had been of extreme concern and disappointment for the service.  Mrs Butler highlighted that it was important to understand the context, the wider issues in the care market and the difficulty in getting placements for children with complex needs.  She reported that increasing numbers of authorities were having home ratings downgraded due to these issues and this was being raised with the Department for Education and Ofsted.  It was expected that Ofsted would revisit the home in November/December 2022.

 

17.5     Members of the Committee were informed that the change in rating had been a sharp shock, but with the wider problems around compatibility issues with children with complex needs, from a wider perspective perhaps not a surprise.  The issue had related to one specific individual and had been addressed.  All other County Council children’s homes had been reviewed as part of the learning and there were no such issues at any other home.

 

17.6     The Chairman thanked the Cabinet Member and Director and reported that members would look forward to exploring the matter in more detail at the member session and at County Council in October.

18.

Minutes of the last meetings of the Committee pdf icon PDF 87 KB

The Committee is asked to agree the minutes of the meetings held on 8 June and 12 July 2022.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

18.1     Resolved – That the minutes of the meeting held on 8 June 2022 be approved as a correct record, subject to the removal of the word Vice- in paragraph 1.4.

 

18.2     Resolved – That the minutes of the meeting held on 12 July 2022 be approved as a correct record, subject to the text in 13.12 line 2 being changed from sixth form colleges within schools to sixth forms within schools.

 

18.3     Under item 13.14 of the minutes of 12 July 2022, members asked that they be updated on when all schools would have mental health specialists working with them.  It was agreed that this information should be provided to the Business Planning Group (BPG).

19.

Responses to Recommendations pdf icon PDF 57 KB

The Committee is asked to note the responses to recommendations made at the 8 June and 12 July meetings.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

19.1     The Committee noted the responses to the recommendations made at the meetings on 8 June and 12 July 2022.

 

19.2     Under the Electively Home Educated item the Chairman agreed to write to the Cabinet Member for Learning and Skills to seek clarification on what responsibility the County Council had.

 

19.3     Under the item stating there would be clear alignment between the Education and Learning Strategy and the proposed Adult Skills Strategy the Chairman agreed to seek further clarification.

20.

SEND and Inclusion Strategy 2019-2024 - Delivery and Performance pdf icon PDF 181 KB

Report by Assistant Director of Education and Skills.

 

The Committee is asked to consider the performance and progress of the SEND and Inclusion Strategy to date against its objectives, including current performance on Education, Health and Care Plans.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

20.1     The Cabinet Member for Learning and Skills, Cllr N Jupp, introduced the report and highlighted that it was timely to review the Special Educational Need and Disability (SEND) and Inclusion Strategy as it had been adopted in late 2019, but the recent Government Green Paper meant that proposals and actions needed kept under constant review.

 

20.2     Assistant Director (Education and Skills), Mr Wagstaff, reminded the Committee that the SEND and Inclusion Strategy had been prepared in response to the rising demand for additional support for children with special educational needs, and to particularly look at work in mainstream schools to ensure they were inclusive.  The strategy addressed several key issues around data to plan for placements, the broader issue of inclusive practice in schools, whether the needs of children who had been identified with special needs were being met, the need for more specialist placements and market analysis of where to look for additional specialist facilities when required. 

 

20.3     The SEND and Inclusion Strategy Board contained representatives from the sector, including parent carers, schools and health, who scrutinised detail of progress against initial objectives and actions.  The strategic board had increased its remit to cover SEND commissioning and had a very clear focus on workstreams including provision and alternative transition.

 

20.4     The Chairman introduced Ms Westwood, the acting Chief Executive of the West Sussex Parent Carer Forum (WSPCF), an independent, pan-disability charity working to represent the views of parent carers in West Sussex of children and young people aged 0-25 years with special educational needs and/or disability. 

 

20.5     Ms Westwood made the following points:

 

20.6     The WSPCF had been very much involved in the co-production and updating of the Strategy and their views had been heard and taken on board where possible.  There was clearly a strong commitment and desire to improve SEND services for children in West Sussex, but the process was more service focussed than on the child or young person.  Many families felt that what they said about the young person was not always heard, and this caused them frustration. 

 

20.7     The West Sussex Children and Young People’s Plan listed SEND as a priority.  The SEND and Inclusion strategy had to deal with inconsistency of good practice across a large county. The strategy needed to also focus on the majority of SEND young people who do not have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP). 

 

20.8     The strategy could do more to acknowledge the SEND family journey and focus on telling families how they can access services. 

 

20.9     The WSPCF acknowledged that delays in the delivery timescales for EHCPs and action plans were often due to services outside the ownership of the strategy.

 

20.10  Better communication with families, children and young people could help address some of the challenges, frustrations, empower families and help manage expectations and reduce a culture of blame if people knew where the problem laid.

 

20.11  WSPCF recognise that the County Council is being asked to deliver more support with no additional  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20.

21.

Performance and Resources Report 2022-23 - Quarter 1 - April-June 2022 pdf icon PDF 67 KB

Report by Director of Finance and Support Services.

 

The Committee is asked to examine the Council’s corporate performance, finance, savings delivery and business performance for the services within the remit of this Committee for the period April to June 2022.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

21.1     The Committee looked at the Performance and Resources Report – quarter 1 – which covered the period April-June 2022.

 

Learning and Skills

 

21.2     The Cabinet Member for Learning and Skills, Cllr N Jupp, introduced the item highlighting the continued issues relating to SEND and school transport.  He reported a number of issues continued to be addressed, but that some were outside or the Council’s control. 

 

21.3     Members of the Committee asked questions and a summary of those questions and answers follows.

 

21.4     Officers agreed to provide details of the ratio of staff resources in comparison to the number of pupils with an EHCP and also across the SENAT caseloads to give a greater comparison to the 2015 figures and enable Committee members to seek assurance that this is sufficient.

 

21.5     Officers agreed to share the current rate of parental mileage rate for home to school transport and reported there had been a small increase in take up and work was ongoing to encourage parents.

 

21.6     Work had taken place to introduce an internal fleet to reduce the cost of external taxis (Significant Financial Issue 2) focusing on expensive accessible vehicle routes.  This was going well, and officers were looking to see if this could be extended. 

 

21.7     The underspend due to difficulties recruiting into the Educational Psychology Service and School Crossing Patrol Services teams would be used to support early years specialists.

 

21.8     Performance Measure 30 – Number of 16-17 year olds Not in Education, Employment or Training – The Committee highlighted that the figures that the gap, although continuing to close, remained higher than the national average.  Mr Wagstaff confirmed there was more recent data than the quarter 1 information provided and agreed to share that with the Committee.  He highlighted that the data was only collected in February each year.  He also confirmed that the Council’s responsibility was to track children not in education, employment or training and guide them towards pathways.  It is a choice for young people who may be young parents, unwell children, or who drop out of education, etc, but the gap was narrowing.

 

21.9     The projected Dedicated Schools Grant deficit was a matter of concern.  Many other councils were also in difficult positions.  The lobbying of Government continued, and the County Council were not in the front line of worst performing authorities.  Work was underway with the Department for Education (DFE) and Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) to provide data so the Council could bid for extra money.  Every effort is being made to reduce the number of costly out of county specialist placements as well as provide more school places within the county.

 

Children and Young People

 

21.10  The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Cllr Russell, introduced the report highlighting that the Ofsted inspection referred to had taken place in September 2022 and results would be published at the end of October 2022.  Cllr Russell reported that recruitment was still a challenge, despite initiatives such as  ...  view the full minutes text for item 21.

22.

Work Programme Planning and Possible Items for Future Scrutiny pdf icon PDF 107 KB

The Committee is asked to agree its draft work programme (Appendix A) in accordance with the scrutiny checklist attached (Appendix B) and highlight any further possible items for future scrutiny.

 

The Committee is also asked to review the Forward Plan entries relevant to its remit (Appendix C) and consider whether it wishes to enquire about any of the forthcoming decisions within its portfolio.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

22.1     The Committee discussed the work programme and Forward Plan of decisions, and the following suggestions were made.

 

22.2     It was agreed that the following items should be considered by the Business Planning Group for future scrutiny:

 

·       Care Leavers

·       Lessons learnt from recent inquests (to consider once inquests are completed).

 

22.3     An update be provided on the Orchard House project for the Chairman.

23.

Requests for Call-In

There have been no requests for call-in to the Scrutiny Committee within its constitutional remit since the date of the last meeting.  The Director of Law and Assurance will report any requests since the publication of the agenda papers.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

23.1     There had been no request for call-in to the Scrutiny Committee within its constitutional remit since the date of the last meeting.

24.

Date of Next Meeting

The next meeting of the Committee will be held on 16 November 2022 at 10.30 am at County Hall, Chichester.  Probable agenda items include:

 

·       Performance and Resources Report 2022-23 – Quarter 2 – covering July-September 2022

 

Any member wishing to place an item on the agenda for the meeting must notify the Director of Law and Assurance by 4 November 2022.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

24.1     The next meeting would be held on 16 November 2022 at 10.30am.