The Assistant Director for Children’s Social Care and Early Help confirmed that the report provided a summary of Children’s Social Care’s performance for quarter 2 which covers July – September this year. She updated the Committee that the number of multi-agency safeguarding hub contacts and referrals are comparable to the same period the previous year. There has been an improvement in the number of assessments completed in timescales from 90% to 94%. At the end of September the number of children on Child Protection Plans was 83 compared to 106 last year.

In terms of Unaccompanied asylum-seeking children up until a few months ago our allocation number was 31 this has now been increased alongside all other Local Authorities to a UASC quota of 45. The Borough currently has 35 UASC children but this week we are on the rota for accepting UASC children and therefore this number is likely to increase.

Between July and September 2022, there were a total of 218 missing episodes represented by 28 individual children. Only 4 of the 28 children were under 16.

All children are offered a Return Home Interview within 72 hours following each missing event, with the aim of understanding the young person’s circumstances and the reasons why they go missing. As at end of September 2022, the percentage of children offered a return to home interview was 100% of which 72% accepted and received an interview compared to 56% in September 2021. This represents 16% increase in interviews being accepted and received.

The Chair applauded the department for the improvements. He queried how the department had been able to improve the number of those taking up the offer of a return home interview.

The Assistant Director of Social Care and Early Help confirmed they meet every Monday morning to look at this issue. They are using social workers and looking at anyone who has a relationship with the child to conduct the return home interview so the children are more willing to tell us where they have been and why.

Councillor Kerin noted there was an 11 % drop in referrals and queried if this was in fact good or bad news.

The Assistant Director of Children’s Social Care and Early Help confirmed that when they get contacts they look at whether a referral is needed. Contacts and referrals often go down in the summer holidays and rise once the children return to school in September. The number of referrals stepping into social care are going down but the numbers of those going into early intervention are going up so hopefully they are dealing with issues at a much earlier stage. If they receive repeat referrals starting to rise it can mean the threshold isn’t quite right. Repeat referrals are currently low and this helps to measure that they are getting it right.

Councillor Kerin raised the issue of missing episodes and queried why these happen.

The Assistant Director for Children’s Social Care and Early Help responded that the majority are 16 years old and over and quite a lot are 17 and 18 in a matter of weeks. If a child is not where we expect them to be then they are reported as missing. They may be staying with a girlfriend or boyfriend or a friend. It therefore might not mean they are unsafe but they are not where they should be.

RESOLVED

1.1     That Members review the areas of improvement in Children’s Social Care and work undertaken to date to manage demand for statutory social care services.