Agenda item

The item was introduced by Becky Hale (Assistant Director, Strategy and Commissioning). She told members that of the 22 key business measures of relevance to the remit of the Committee, 16 were on track or had been completed. There were a number of positives, with the key business measures relating to the number of children subject to a child protection plan and applications for school places being highlighted as particularly good areas of performance.

There were two service areas where performance was static and four where it was declining. One of the performance areas that was not on track to be met related to the under 18 conception rate. Becky Hale said the most recent data was from December 2021 and a lot of targeted work had been taking place since then to improve the figures and understand the root cause of the current ones. One of the static performance areas related to the number of under 18s being admitted to hospital due to alcohol. Becky Hale said there had been a slight improvement but admission rates in Warwickshire were notably higher than the national average. Targeted work was taking place in the Nuneaton and Bedworth and Warwick districts due to these being particular outliers. A new liaison officer was in the process of being recruited to work with the Council’s commissioning provider, Compass. This was a priority as part of the Strategic Drug and Alcohol Partnership. Instances of self harm was another area of concern where targeted action was taking place as the key business measure was not on track to be met.

John Coleman said the percentage of care leavers in education, employment or training had decreased overall during the last year. However there was an interesting trend that had emerged when the data was analysed in more detail; the percentage of 17-18 year olds in care in education, employment or training had decreased but the figure for 19-20 year olds had increased. The reasons for this trend were being investigated. The number of careers advisors in the children in care team had been increased. John Coleman said around 45 per cent of children in care were unaccompanied asylum seekers, and although they had been engaging in education courses they were not able to work. There were further concerns however as they would generally take shorter courses; additionally there was limited availability for English as a Second Language courses. John Coleman said addressing this issue was an area of priority.

Shade Agboola (Director of Public Health) said a programme had been implemented to address declining rates of children who were receiving checks from health visitors at 6-8 weeks old. Following discussions at the Health and Wellbeing Board an action plan had been devised, whereby families who had high needs or were classified as vulnerable would be prioritised. All families would receive a health check by the age of 13 weeks. Shade Agboola said recruitment of health visitors remained a national challenge. However of the cohort of students set to graduate soon, indications showed they were likely to want to remain in Warwickshire and potentially support the workforce. Shade Agboola said parents who had been identified as being vulnerable would be entitled to receive a virtual offer of support.

Matt Biggs (Strategy and Commissioning Manager, Education and Early Years) said the Council had recently been subject of an LGA Early Years Peer Review. The results and recommendations of this were being reviewed. Matt Biggs said some of the recommendations would be easy to implement but others would need a more strategic approach. Matt Biggs drew members’ attention to the uptake of nursery places for eligible two-year-olds, as this had been a particularly successful piece of work and would provide greater longer-term benefits for those children, as they would be from disadvantaged backgrounds. Work on this would continue through the revised Education Strategy, which was in the development phase. Members were told a new service lead had come into post with a view to picking up on improvements in early years.

Becky Hale drew members’ attention to the summary of the Integrated Delivery Plan contained within the report. This outlined there were action plans in place to address areas that were not meeting performance targets. Becky Hale said there had been a three per cent overspend at the end of the financial year and 20 per cent underachievement in terms of savings. Additionally there were forecast delays in relation to the capital programme.

Councillor Jerry Roodhouse said he had some concerns about a number of areas. He said he was worried there would be a build-up of issues regarding health visitors if the ideas were not implemented swiftly enough. He also said issues relating to self harm and conception rates had been long standing and needed addressing. Councillor Roodhouse asked if there was more the Council could do, and if the Corporate Delivery Plan needed to be re-examined or if there needed to be more direction given by Cabinet.

In relation to conception rates and hospital admissions, Councillor Jill Simpson-Vince asked what information was being given out by schools and if there was sufficient joining up between their programmes and the Council’s. She also asked if this was also partly due to the fallout from Covid and children being in isolation. John Coleman said prevention strategies relating to hospital admissions due to alcohol took longer to embed and see the impact of. The Council had been investing in youth workers to help schools and the police to spread the message of the dangers of alcohol misuse and engage them with other activities. John Coleman said the Council had commissioned the educational theatre company Loudmouth to engage with young people and explain about the dangers associated with social media and keeping safe in relationships. Members were told there had been a significant increase in the number of young people who had been accessing early help support. The subject of raising awareness of exploitation was being raised in primary schools.

Councillor Clare Golby said social media use was harmful to young children, and said it had been used to circulate footage of crime taking place in Nuneaton and Bedworth district. She stated her belief that benchmarking programmes, and the feedback from them, had not been good enough. She stated her belief different things needed to be tried, particularly in relation to distraction techniques. John Coleman said distraction activities were used and work was taking place with the police and youth justice teams to try and change behaviours. He said some of the children and young people the Council were working with were being exploited and did not have comfortable home environments. The focus was moving them away from those scenarios and potential criminal behaviour. John Coleman said there had been an increase in weapons-related crime, although he reiterated that Warwickshire was a comparatively safe place to live. Responding to points raised by Councillor Clare Golby, John Coleman said the inspection report of the youth justice service had been positive and the Youth Justice Board had been pleased with its performance and level of service. There were a number of positive but challenging relationships with partner organisations.

Responding to a question from Councillor Justin Kerridge, John Coleman said there was a difference in educational attainment rates between children in care and those not in care. This was reflected nationally, although Warwickshire children in care were performing relatively well at GCSE level. Raising attainment rates amongst children in care was an area of focus.

Shade Agboola said there was a lag in the most recently available data, but said Warwickshire was performing better than its statistical neighbours. She said a working group set up to focus on self harm in 2018 had demonstrated there had been engagement with schools. A self harm guidance policy had been developed, advising how school staff could have conversations with children and young people with issues pertaining to self harm. Regarding health visitors, Shade Agboola said the Council was doing as much as it could, and emphasised that this was a national challenge and no vulnerable families were being missed. Contracts were not necessarily reflective of the current workforce. In response, Councillor Jerry Roodhouse said it was his recollection the officer coordinating the working group had left the Council and the focus of the group had thereafter moved towards suicide prevention rather than self harm.

Councillor Kam Kaur said work was being carried out and there was a commitment to tackling the issues that members had raised, but there was a possibility work was taking place in silos. She suggested members be given a briefing note to outline the work that was going on. Becky Hale indicated she was happy to provide this.

During their discussions, members had mentioned an app called Me Too and asked what had happened with its development. Becky Hale said the trials had not been successful, and during the Covid lockdown period a new app called Kooth had superseded it and this was now being used.

Members noted the contents of the report.