Agenda, decisions and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from County Borough Councillors C Leyshon and P Evans.

To receive disclosures of personal interest from Members in accordance with the Code of Conduct

Note:

1.     Members are requested to identify the item number and subject matter that their interest relates to and signify the nature of the personal interest: and

2.     Where Members withdraw from a meeting as a consequence of the disclosure of a prejudicial interest they must notify the Chairman when they leave.

In accordance with the Council’s Code of Conduct, the following personal declarations were provided:

County Borough Councillor S Rees – “I am a VVC Panel Member”.

To approve, as an accurate record, the minutes of the last meeting of the Corporate Parenting Board held on 7^th May 2024.

To approve as an accurate record, the minutes of the meeting of the Corporate Parenting Board held on the 7^th May 2024.

To receive the report of the Service Director of Democratic Services & Communication, providing Members with details of the Corporate Parenting Board Work Programme for the 2024/25 Municipal Year.

The Senior Democratic and Scrutiny Officer provided the Corporate Parenting Board with a summary of the draft work programme for the 2024-2025 Municipal Year. Alongside the regular annual updates, many of the topics for consideration within the Programme had been identified by Members at previous meetings.

The officer explained that the Work Programme was a fluid document that could be amended to reflect any changes to business needs throughout the year.

The Chair asked that in addition to the proposed Work Programme, regular reports on the not-for-profit models of care for children looked after, should be provided, along with timely reports from the South Wales Police in respect of the Youth Justice Service.

A Member also welcomed the suggestion of a report on the not-for-profit models of care for children looked after and provided Members with an update on the issue with regards to planning and private children’s homes.

A Member also acknowledged that the Community Services scrutiny committee had an item on this on their 2024/25 Work Programme.

The Corporate Parenting Board RESOLVED:

1.    To provide comment as appropriate on the draft Work Programme; and

2.    To approve the draft work programme as a basis, which can be amended to reflect any changing priorities throughout the year, in addition to the two items above.

To receive the report of the Service Director of Democratic Services & Communication, providing Members with the Corporate Parenting Board Annual Report for the 2023/24 Municipal Year.

The Senior Democratic and Scrutiny Officer provided the Corporate Parenting Board with the Corporate Parenting Board Annual Report for the 202-2024 Municipal Year. The report covered the breadth of work considered by the Board during the year; and put forward the items identified for future consideration. The officer reminded Members that if approved, the report would be presented to Scrutiny and Cabinet.

There were no questions from Members.

The Corporate Parenting Board RESOLVED:

1. To provide comment as appropriate on the draft Annual Report before its presentation to Scrutiny and Cabinet.

To seek Corporate Parenting Board’s involvement and feedback for the draft implementation plan that links to the Corporate Parenting Board Pledge for RCT.

The Graduate Participation Officer (Children's Services) provided the Corporate Parenting Board (CPB) with an update on the CPB Implementation plan for RCT, advising that the purpose of the report was to seek Corporate Parenting Board’s involvement and feedback for the draft implementation plan that linked to the CPB Pledge for RCT, at appendix 1. The draft implementation plan also put forward a proposal for Members input  and feedback into the 7 key priority areas. The Graduate Participation Officer (Children's Services), then continued through sections 2, and 3 of report, before highlighting the next steps for the pledge’s implementation plan, at section 4 before concluding with the next steps, at section 12, which was to promote the visibility of the CPB to children, young people, carers and staff noted in the implementation plan as part of the development of the children and young people’s website. This included a social media strategy to raise awareness for children and young people.

The Graduate Participation Officer (Children's Services) then took Members through the CPB draft implementation plan, which provided CPB Members with the key areas and key milestones.

The Chair thanked the Officer for the comprehensive report, noting that it was important to pledge to look after all care leavers, care experienced young children, and young people, and then referred Members to pages 62 and 63 of the report, which showed the Shared Principles for Corporate Parents, highlighting a number of these.

A Member concurred with the Chairs remarks, it that this was an extremely important report, and asked for the timelines back to CPB, with regards to monitoring the actions and the progress.

The Graduate Participation Officer (Children's Services) advised that in terms of progress, this would be passed on to the Transform Team, who would be able comment on that. The Children and Young People website was being worked on, with those website pages live by August.

A Member also asked how the success of the pledge, could be evaluated, and also as a CPB Board, evaluate CPB engagement with it.

The Service Director, Children's Services, began by commending the work of the Graduate Participation Officer, and wished her well with in her new appointment. In terms of evaluating the implementation, the Service Director, Children's Services, explained she was happy to bring back some suggestions, with the proof of that being in the surveys from young people, noting the annual survey to care experienced young people, and suggested that the next time this went out it could be looked at, building into the baseline, some questions to hold CPB to account. The Service Director, Children's Services continued that there was a lot of legwork to do before getting there, but was keen to move on with that, acknowledging the vacancy.

The Chair acknowledged that it was important to give young people a voice, and the CPB would allow that, suggesting that in the future young people could be invited to come along and speak to CPB, to give their views, particularly  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

To update Corporate Parenting Board members on the work of the Therapeutic Support Panel over the course of 2023/24 and the implementation of a therapeutic model for Children’s Services.

The Head of Family Support & Accommodation provided the Corporate Parenting Board with the Therapeutic Support report, advising that the purpose of the report was to update Corporate Parenting Board members on the work of the Therapeutic Support Panel over the course of 2023/24 and the implementation of a therapeutic model for Children’s Services. CPB Members would have seen the report attached, for the therapeutic support that was being developed within Children’s Services and the panel that exists now to be looking at and considering the therapeutic needs of children and young people and how to best match those to the services available. She continued that the Panel was created because the MAPPS service was commissioned to look specifically at young people looked after, where there had been a number of placement breakdowns, to try to prevent further breakdown and support young people returning into in-county placements if possible and maintaining some of the placements within fostering and kinship provision.

The Head of Family Support & Accommodation continued that the panel looked at every referral for young people who required any kind of therapeutic intervention and could be allocated to either the MAPSS service or in-house educational psychology service within therapeutic families team or with educational psychology colleagues in education, who sit within the vulnerable learners service, It was hoped to further develop and have more interaction with CAHMS colleagues, from a health perspective.  The Head of Family Support & Accommodation continued to present the report, highlighting before highlighting the two case studies, before concluding with the summary.

The Chair thanked the Officer and acknowledged this was an excellent report and an excellent service and highlighted a number of points.

A Member noted that 11% of referrals came through the VVC service, and asked if services were directed more to the adoptive parents or to the children, and asked if these were older children, and asked if the service considered it had prevented any breakdowns of adoption.

The Head of Family Support & Accommodation advised that in terms of whether or not it was more directed to the carers that the child, the requests that come through for adoption support, were primarily a direct therapeutic service that the child was requesting but there would always be elements of the consultation that might determine that some of the work needs to be directed towards the carers, with some trauma informed consultations, for the carers. The Head of Family Support & Accommodation acknowledged that she did not have the breakdown for adoptive carers but could look at that going forward. The Head of Family Support & Accommodation advised that the age of the child for the adoption referrals, tended to be younger than some of the ones that maybe coming through CLA referrals, so there were some young children coming through in the adoptions referrals and what they were looking to do with utilising this way of working post adoption, was consolidating adoption support.  The Head of Family Support & Accommodation acknowledged that it would be useful to have  ...  view the full minutes text for item 7.

To receive the Tros Gynnal Plant (TGP) Cymru quarterly progress report.

Tros Gynnal Plant provided the Corporate Parenting Board with a progress update for the quarter 4 period, which covered January 2024 – March 2024.

Members were informed that, during the period, 41 young people accessed

Issue Based Advocacy; and 32 were referred for the Active Offer. Of the 41

young people, 18 were care experienced, presenting with 21 issues. Of the 18 care experienced young people, 2 were accessing Issue Based Advocacy for the first time.

During the period, 6 of the care experienced young people became eligible for the Active Offer in the quarter or the previous quarter. Members learned that, during the period, the most popular issues in need of advocacy support related to placement followed by contact.  Self-referral and social services referrals continue to be the most popular route into the IBA service for care experienced you people.

The Officer concluded by providing CPB Members with a case study, which provided an example of advocacy work undertaken during the quarter.

The Chair thanked the Officer and noted, that this proved that Advocacy worked with youngsters, with the case studies revealing.

The Corporate Parenting Board RESOLVED:

1.    To acknowledge the work undertaken by TGP Cymru.

“That the press and public be excluded from the meeting under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act, 1972 (as amended) for the next item of business on the grounds that it involves the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraph 13 of Part 4 of Schedule 12A of the Act.”

It was RESOLVED that the press and public be excluded from the meeting under Section 100A(4) of the Local Government Act (as amended) for the following items of business on the grounds that it involves the likely disclosure of the exempt information as defined in paragraph 13 of Part 4 of the Schedule 12A of the Act.

To receive an overview of the operation and effectiveness of the statutory Social Services complaints procedure.

The Principal Customer Feedback and Complaints Officer provided the Corporate Parenting Board with an overview of the operation of effectiveness of the statutory Social Services complaints procedure between 1^st October 2023 – 31^st March 2024.

The report contained information on the number of complaints received, the nature of the complaints and any lessons learnt, as well as detailing Councillor, A.M and M.P enquiries and the number of complaints received.

The Corporate Parenting Board RESOLVED:

1.  To note the contents of the report and the work undertaken by the Complaints Unit.

To receive an update in relation to the Children Looked After: Residential Care Strategy 2022 – 2027.

The Director of Children’s Services provided the Corporate Parenting Board with information about children in settings known as Operating without Registration (OWR), and Children’s Services plans for supporting those children, and ending those arrangements.

Following consideration of the exempt report, the Corporate Parenting Board RESOLVED:

1.   to acknowledge the information contained within the report; and

to receive subsequent reports until such time as there are no OWR situations for Rhondda Cynon Taf looked after young people.

None.