Agenda item

The Southwark Safeguarding Board’s annual report is attached, alongside a cover report.

Independent Chair, Michael O’Connor, will present.

5.1  The chair invited officers to introduce themselves and present the Safeguarding report. Strategic Director , David Quirke-Thornton and Rory Patterson, Director of Children’s Service introduced themselves and gave apologies for the Independent Safeguarding Chair , Michael O’ Connor, who was unable to attend because of a funeral.

5.2  The Strategic Director explained he was new into post and offered some key observations. He said there was a strong partnership. The key model being used: ‘social work matters’ is a systemic group process with clinical support. Social workers go out in difficult and unknown situations - so a process that holds our social workers is vital. This model has been developed from both social work and the safeguarding partnership.

5.3  MASH is a hub that enables good decisions making and also enables people to be offered support even if they do not meet a threshold. This partnership approach enables others partners to participate, rather than just leaving interventions to social workers.

5.4  The report under sells the involvement of young people in the work of the Safeguarding Board . The Strategic Director observed he went to a meeting and they were active posing questions. Other parts are more objective.

5.5  The Children’s Service is glad this report comes to this committee. In future  Children’s Services would like to increase the role and voices of children and families in the report so it gives more of local flavor.

5.6  This report is for the previous year. A current focus is Children on Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) and at last meeting the Board looked at social media.

5.7  The Strategic Director commented that best practice to publish board minutes and papers and publish the presentations of the conference. In future this report could be read in conjunction with the minutes.

5.8  The chair asked if the boards work influences Children’s Services policy and the Director said it did, for example domestic abuse. 70 % of safeguarding is related to domestic abuse and the impact on children - witnessing incidents is harmful. The strategy on Domestic Abuse is held is elsewhere in the council but conversations at the Board influence this policy. The board is also engaged in family matters, CSE and also neglect. We receive a Key Performance Indicators (KPI) report from partners. The Board has a key role in holding to account with reductions in budgets.

5.9  The chair asked why the minutes of the board meetings were not made available to the committee or published, particularly given the current emphasis on transparency. The Strategic Director apologized and said the emerging good practice is to publish. He assured the chair that Children’s Services will find a way to reconcile the minutes from last year and share with the committee. A member asked what the problem had been and the Strategic Director explained that the Independent Chair, as a matter of courtesy, had wanted to check that the partners were happy to share.

5.10  A member asked about attendance and engagement and the Strategic Director said he had been impressed by the culture the chair has encouraged: the Probation Service has commissioned a rehabilitation company and officers from both parts of the service are there.  The best part is when the children set tasks and ask question, which is at every meeting and keeps it real.

5.11  Officers were asked if schools & academies are playing their part in Safeguarding and officers explained that there is an education representative on the Board and officers also meet with the Headteacher's Executive. Children’s Service  also have area teams that work with schools , however the Director cautioned that he wouldn't want to say that covers everything . Members observed that there is a blind spot with Harris Academies and that they do not participate in Headteacher’s Executive. Officers explained that they highlight the benefits and risks of not attending, and added that Children’s Services also reaches out to schools. Members ask for clarification and if there is a representative of the Headteacher’s Executive on the board and officers confirmed that there was, a primary school teacher. 

5.12  A member noted there is only a small mention of work to tackle FGM . The Director said that Southwak is setting up a joint project with Lewisham.  Children Services had a briefing with the Chief Social worker and has received extra funding for 18 months to start an initiative based on a scheme in Belgium, which is very approachable for potential clients. A member asked if this was part of the 5 borough service and the Director explained this was something different, however the Chief Social Worker does chair this.  The chair mentioned the scrutiny in a day on this topic and the Director offered to bring people along working on this proposal.

5.13  Officers were asked about links with the voluntary and faith groups and the committee was informed that there is a sub group chaired by CAS. The Strategic Director said it is it is early days but the Board is working on this.

5.14  A member commented that it is really good to see the involvement of young people as that was not clear from report. Officers mention a recent DVD that has been commissioned to work with Children on Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE).

5.15  It was noted that the report contain a single page setting out priorities - but it was then hard to see how these were delivered in the report.  The Director said we are changing the report so it will be easier to see this. He said that the capacity of Safeguarding relates to the strengths and weakness on front line practice and traditional tools do not bring that out richly - the Annual Safeguarding conference is one way we look at issues in more detail. The theme for this years conference is ‘The Younger’s - the focus is teenagers on how to very young people may be coming of age, engaging in relationships, might be both a victim and perpetrator.

5.16  Members asked how achievements are measured. The Director said there were audits and measurement of partner KPI; however the conference was about getting to heart of issues. The Director said that when he sees things working well it is about core issues - such as consistency and multi agency working together which, when at its best, can really shift issues in a family. The Strategic Director referred to Section 11 audits, which are often not particularly welcomed, but are really important. He said the service is reviewing the format to make them more engaging and also encouraging partners to contribute.

5.1  The chair asked about Serous Case Review and sharing the lessons learnt. The Director responded that there are checks and balances on why one would not be carried out.  The service circulates the lessons learnt.

RESOLVED

The minutes of the previous years Children’s Safeguarding Board will be provided.

The Independent Safeguarding Board chair will be invited to attend the next meeting. 

A copy of the DVD on Child Exploitation will be provided.