Agenda item

CHILD PROTECTION PLANS

To receive a report and presentation from the Interim Director of Safeguarding.

Minutes:

The Acting Director of Safeguarding went through the presentation that had been circulated with the agenda. The first slide showed that Trafford had 250 (+/- 4%) Child Protection Plans (CPPs) on average. There had been a sharp increase in CPPs during August which had seen the number rise to 275, they had since returned to standard levels. The Committee were told that 6.5% of CPPs had been running for over 2 years which was higher than the national average and the Council’s statistical neighbours.

 

The Acting Director then described the main aims of the service going forward. There was a focus upon increasing the number of early interventions and helping children to step down into lower level support as quickly as possible. She told the Committee it was also important that the structure of the service enabled quick decision making to ensure at risk children were moved into care with minimal disruption. Finally, whilst the statutory services needed to be accessible to protect children this had to be balanced so they were only used when necessary.

 

The Acting Director of Safeguarding told the Committee of the Council’s move towards a restorative approach to child protection. A number of improvements had already been made as part of the adoption of this approach. These included a change in the environment in which Child Protection Conferences were held which made them less intimidating for families. There had also been changes in the documentation used in child protection cases so that they were easier to understand and made the Council’s expectations clearer.

 

Another change was the way Independent Reviewing Officers (IROs) looked at cases. Previously IROs had reviewed cases in isolation. Within the new approach they looked at the whole history of the child and their family. When there was recurrence the IRO would look at previous solutions and see whether that support had been removed. The team would then use this data to help monitor the efficacy of commissioned services. The team were also looking at Cheshire East Council’s CPP processes as they had a 30% lower re-plan rate than Trafford.

 

A Member of the Committee welcomed the changes that had been made and the adoption of the restorative approach. The Member then asked why this approach had not been adopted earlier. The Acting Director of Safeguarding told the Committee that the Council had used aspects of this approach before but it had required a shift in perspective to enable the approach to be fully implemented. Previously the system had been the driver of the service whereas the restorative approach was more human centred.

 

The service now looked at the whole family and worked with them to build resilience through training and developing the family unit. This was in stark contrast to old system which had been paternalistic with officers trying to do as much as they could for vulnerable people rather than teaching them how to do things themselves. The Acting Corporate Director of Children’s Services added that Trafford had a track record of being very over protective and the new approach was more appropriate given that the Council were only involved with the majority of families for a short period of time.

 

A Member asked how the performance data was collected and whether the Committee could see it. The Acting Director of Safeguarding responded that they could provide the data outside of the meeting or at a later meeting of the Committee. The Acting Corporate Director for Children’s services said that it would be best to provide an update at the meeting in March in order to allow the changes to bed in.

 

RESOLVED:

1)    That the report be noted by the Committee

2)    That the Committee receive a further update March 2019.

 

Supporting documents: