Agenda and draft minutes

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.

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

42.2     Cllr Cherry declared a personal interest as the Leader of Burgess Hill Town Council, in relation to any discussions on the Bedelands Academy School, under agenda item no 7.

42.3     Cllr Cornell declared a personal interest as governor at Manor Green College in Crawley, under agenda item no 7, on special needs issues.

42.4     Cllr Dabell declared a personal interest as his daughter is the headteacher of Baldwins Hill Primary School in East Grinstead, under agenda item no 7, in relation to school placements.

42.5     Cllr Smith declared a personal interest as the parent of a child with an EHCP, under agenda item no 7.

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.

43.1     No urgent matters were raised.

The Committee is asked to agree the minutes of the meeting held on 17 January 2024 (cream paper).

44.1     Resolved – That the minutes of the meeting held on 17 January 2024 be approved as a correct record and that they be signed by the Chairman.

The Committee is asked to note the responses to recommendations made at recent meetings.

45.1     Resolved – That the Committee notes the responses to the recommendations provided from recent meetings.

45.2     Additionally the Chairman read out the following statement:

“In November, we discussed the SEND Recovery Plan, during which we focused heavily on the processes around EHC Needs Assessments, Plans and delivery of provision.

The discussion rightly focused on the challenges currently facing those children and young people who are impacted, and also on the pressures facing the Service.

For County Council staff listening in to the discussion, I recognise that this may have been extremely demotivating for you, as you work very hard for our children and families in West Sussex.  The challenges you face in your roles are often down to pressures outside of your control, but for which the teams are held ‘responsible’ by those who have their own anxieties awaiting support for their children and young people.

Scrutiny plays an important role as a critical friend to the Cabinet Member, and the service, in order to achieve the best outcomes.  Keeping pace with an evolving and growing number of children and young people being identified with needs necessitating Needs Assessments, is a huge challenge. Something the SEND Recovery Plan aims to address.

We need to work together, without blame, to come up with solutions, policies and procedures so that we can provide the very best services to our residents.

The committee recognise and THANK all our staff for your hard work, and we will continue to support you in the roles that you do in supporting our residents each and every day.”

Report by Director of Children, Young People and Learning.

The Committee is asked to consider the proposals for the relocation of Jessie Younghusband School, the expansion of St Anthony’s School and the amendments to the catchments areas following public consultation.

46.1     The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Learning and Skills, Cllr Russell, introduced the report highlighting the proposals to relocate Jessie Young Husband School (JYHS) to a new school site allowing the County Council to increase and maintain special provision at St Anthony’s Special School (SASS) to give children with special educational needs and disabilities more choice and an opportunity to attend a school in their locality which could meet their needs, whilst reducing the need to travel long distances to schools in other parts of the county, or out of county. 

46.2     The proposal also linked closely to the need to consider all children by protecting the viability of all maintained primary schools across the county where numbers on roll continued to fall due to the decrease in birth rates.  The development of the new primary school in Chichester, which was already under way, would be subject to the academy presumption process in the absence of any relocation of any existing school, which if followed though could threaten the viability of all existing schools in the Chichester area including JYHS. 

46.3     Discussions on the potential relocation of JYHS had been underway for quite some time and had involved all parties, including the Chairs of Governors at JYHS and SASS, both headteachers, County Council education officers, the Secretary of State for Education, who is also the local MP, previous Cabinet Members and Cllr Russell, who is the current Cabinet Member in post.  Following a meeting in October 2023 it was agreed to proceed to informal consultation on the potential to relocate JYHS and consider views on a revised catchment area.  This consultation was extended at the request of the JYHS governing body and ran from mid-December 2023 until the end of January 2024.  The output of the informal consultation is before the Committee and the Cabinet Member welcomed any views and recommendations to assist the team in making decisions on the next steps.

46.4     Cllr Joy, local member for Chichester West, and Cllr Hunt, local member for Chichester North, gave statements on the reactions to the proposals in their constituencies.

46.5     Cllr Joy told the Committee that his constituency covered the Minerva Heights development and not the JYHS area but that he had received many letters in opposition to the relocation.  The concerns raised included the adequacy of the consultation, the adverse impact on the community, the reduction in school places, an increase in school commute time, exacerbation of traffic issues and the need for infrastructure investment.

46.6     Cllr Joy felt there needed to be wider and more meaningful input from parents and residents, safe access to the school, an understanding of broader community impacts of infrastructure, reassurance on the sustainability of long-term provision, parental reassurance and understanding of the importance of each child’s pathway so that both schools could benefit. 

46.7     Cllr Hunt told the Committee that the proposals seemed to make sense on paper, to allow two exceptional schools to expand, however he felt it did  ...  view the full minutes text for item 46.

Report by Director of Children, Young People and Learning.

The Committee are asked to consider the draft Early Years and Childcare Strategy 2024-2027.

47.1     The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Learning and Skills, Cllr Russell, introduced the report highlighting that the first few years of child’s life lays the foundation for a child’s physical, emotional, social, educational and economic future and investment at this stage of their lives will result in long-term positive change.  The strategy links to the Council Plan and the Children and Young People’s Plan. 

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

47.3     It was acknowledged that the high-level draft did not clearly lay out the importance of support in the home environment on the development of children.  However, this was embedded in the priorities and the wording would be amended to better reflect this.

47.4     Children with SEND will be identified and providers will be encouraged to be ambitious for all children, recognising needs and supporting all children to ensure they have the best start to their education journey.  Training will also be provided to recognise that disadvantaged children will need extra support but may not have a particular SEND need.

47.5     There are challenges nationally on the recruitment of staff, but the process is under way to recruit to unfilled posts and will continue to be regularly monitored.  The service is in a good position to implement the strategy from April 2024.

47.6     It was recognised that Good Level of Development (GLD) for last year for all children in West Sussex was in line with national figures, however the performance by disadvantaged pupils, 42.3%, was lower than nationally, 51.6%.  The delivery plans will specifically target work to improve outcomes at the Reception year through priorities 1, 3 and 6.

47.7     It was acknowledged that getting disadvantaged children into an early years setting that helps them would be beneficial.  The Strategy and increased funding will give opportunities to more children.  Early Years care advisers can support families to get children into appropriate provision.

47.8     Members asked if there would be an analysis by geographic area, showing areas of the strength or weakness of provision, to aid levelling up.  Officers reported that this would be possible and could be reported on as part of the roll out of the Strategy.  A lead officer for wrap-around childcare would be undertaking exploration and analysis as the offer rolls out to children who are 2-years-old to check provision is in the right place and support providers who need to be better.  It was recognised that not all child minders take up the funded entitlement and the service does not have to support those providers. However the service is looking to recruit more advisers so that more work can be put into building links with non-funded child minders in order to help them improve the quality of the service they offer.  This will be covered by workstream 6. 

47.9     Members were assured that Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) would be developed that linked to the 8 priorities of the Strategy. 

47.10  The governance arrangements  ...  view the full minutes text for item 47.

Report by Director of Finance and Support Services, setting out the finance and performance position as at the end of December 2023.

The Committee is asked to examine the County Council’s corporate performance, finance, savings, delivery and business performance for the services within the remit of this Committee for the period October-December 2023.

48.1     The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Learning and Skills, Cllr Russell, introduced the report highlighting that the quarter three projected overspend of £24 million was due to an increase in demand and complexity of placements, alongside a growth in the number of pupils needing home to school transport. The Dedicated School Grant deficit is predicted to increase to just under £74m by the end of the financial year.

48.2     Cllr Russell highlighted that the Department for Education had undertaken a review of improvement activity in October 2023, focussing on family safeguarding, care leavers and effective partnership arrangements, and had concluded that the authority continued to improve practice in all three areas and acknowledged that the service is committed to the ongoing pace of improvement. 

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

48.4     A member asked that the KPI results include further information such as numbers of cases, rather than just percentages, to give greater context and view of ongoing performance.

48.5     Members asked that under KPI 25 and 26 where only West Sussex maintained schools were covered, it be changed to all schools so that residents could see the figures for all schools and students.  Officers agreed to investigate this.

48.6     KPI 30 – Members asked why there had been an increase in NEETS from 6% to 9.5% and officers reported that a lot of work had taken place and the number of unknowns was now down to around 1,000.

48.7     KPI 56 – Percentage of EHCPs completed in 20 weeks – Officers confirmed that the September figure was skewed because of the school holiday period but acknowledged that performance was not acceptable and that a recovery plan was in place to get performance to 100% over the next 12-18 months.  This would not happen until the backlog of applications had been cleared.  The data was also reported to the SEND and Alternative Provision Improvement Board who had close oversight of this work.  Funding had been made available to recruit further staff and the budget for 2024-25 had been reset to double the size of the team. Data broken down by month and backlog versus new applications would be included in the EHCP Recovery Plan. Members asked that the data included case numbers as well as percentages. 

48.8     KPI 57 – Children and young people with EHCPs accessing mainstream education – Members queried why this was rated as green.  Officers highlighted that work was being progressed to revise the target for the next financial year. 

48.9     Timeliness of Contacts in 3 days – A member asked why the timeliness had decreased by 10% and was informed by officers that the number of contacts at the end 2023 had been affected by staff sickness but that the January 2024 figure was increasing again.  The rolling annual figure is in the mid-90%.  Members welcomed the work being undertaken but expressed their concern at the drop in performance. 

Finance Summary

48.10  ...  view the full minutes text for item 48.

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.

49.1     The Committee agreed the revised Work programme.

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.

50.1     There have been no requests for call-in to the Scrutiny Committee within its constitutional remit since the date of the last meeting.

The next meeting of the Committee will be held on 12 June at 10.30 am at County Hall, Chichester.  Probable agenda items include:

·       Election of Chairman and Vice Chairman

·       Business Planning Group membership

·       SEND Improvement Plan – EHCP Timeliness

·       Performance and Resources Report 2023-24 – Quarter 4

·       Family Safeguarding Model

Any member wishing to place an item on the agenda for the meeting must notify the Director of Law and Assurance by Friday 31 May 2024.

51.1     The next meeting would be held on 12 June 2024 at 10.30am.