Corporate Parenting Strategy 2020 to 2023

Our commitment to Corporate Parenting is underpinned by our belief that:

• the family (birth or extended) is usually the best place for bringing up children and young people and early help is better for children and young people
• services we offer must be safe and effective and focus on outcomes
• our young people need and deserve support from trusted adults
• the role of the Corporate Parent is to act as the best possible parent for each child in care and care leaver to advocate on their behalf to secure positive outcomes
• we need to provide strong professional development and support to our children’s workforce, including foster carers and partners to enable them to be effective
• all our children and young people deserve respect and the promotion of equality of opportunity

The responsibility of local authorities to improve outcomes and actively promote the life chances of their children in care and care leavers is referred to as ‘Corporate Parenting’. This is because it must be shared by the whole authority in partnership with relevant agencies and parents. The role of the ‘Corporate Parent’ is to act as the best possible parent for each child, to speak out on her/his behalf, arrange for appropriate services to meet their needs, stand up for them and represent them as needed to ensure they grow up to achieve the best possible outcomes.

Children can be in care in a range of different settings, with the authority acting as corporate parent to all of them. This includes foster care, children’s homes, secure children’s homes, young offender institutions, secure training centres and kinship care. Every councillor and officer within a council has a responsibility to act for those children and young people as a parent would for their own child.

Elected members and senior managers will provide the political and professional leadership of our corporate parenting commitment set out in our pledges and for setting the culture of the Council as a conscious and dedicated Corporate Parent.

Effective corporate parenting requires that all elected members:

• are aware of the role and its implications for discharging the local authority’s legal responsibilities for looked after children and care leavers
• develop knowledge and awareness of the services available for looked after children and care leavers, both across the council and from relevant partner agencies
• are advocates for looked after children and care leavers – ensuring their voices are heard, their needs are met and their achievements celebrated
• prioritise the needs of looked after children and young people in council decision making and budget setting discussions
• to consider how new plans and policies might affect children in care, and to ask questions to ensure that those children are getting the best care, support and protection
• ask appropriate questions of officers across the council, not just in Children’s Services, about the quality of services provided to looked after children and young people, and ensure that any issues identified are resolved in a timely manner
• be accessible to professionals, carers and looked after children who may wish to raise issues or concerns
• take an active interest in the issues facing looked after children and care leavers at a regional and national level, and bring any examples of good practice or new ways of

working to the Corporate Director of Children’s Services and the relevant service team

• have a clear understanding and awareness of the issues for our children in care and care leavers including those placed outside the county
• satisfy themselves that the Council as a Corporate Parent is honouring the promises made in its pledges

All council directorates should by means of work experience, provision of employment, apprenticeships, traineeships and the future development of graduate schemes:

• provide opportunities for our young people to become work-ready
• help young people become confident individuals by providing a taste of the world of work
• support development of relevant skills
• enable young people to become economically and socially contributing citizens who can and do fulfil their ambitions, hopes and aspirations
• In addition, all council directorates will ensure they have a shared understanding of the needs of looked-after children and care leavers, and where appropriate, the wide council will consider: •to what extent are the needs and priorities of looked-after children and care leavers reflected in local service provision?
• what more could we do to ensure looked-after children and care leavers feel listened to and their suggestions acted on?
• how can we deliver services to looked-after children and care leavers in a way that mirrors as far as possible the way a good parent would support their child?
• how can we deliver services in a way that recognises the unique circumstances of looked-after children and care leavers?

Children's Services staff are likely to have the most important direct contact with children in care and care leavers and corporate parenting principles and expectations will be reflected in staff induction and training programmes.

All children will have an allocated worker to ensure that there is a continued focus on improving their individual outcomes.

The quality of relationships that young people have with their families, carers and the professionals closest to them is crucial to their success whilst in and leaving care. Young people who are looked after consistently report their need to feel cared about as well as cared for.

Our virtual school for children in care and care leavers is responsible for providing leadership, strategic direction and foster partnership-working with schools to secure successful educational outcomes. It maintains an overview of our children and young people to ensure they can sustain a school place and that there is support in place designed to meet their individual needs.

We must challenge any assumption that being looked after leads to poor outcomes. Educational targets for children in care and care leavers are often set too low, are insufficiently challenging, or the support required for a child who is not attaining educationally is not provided. Accelerated progress targets must reflect our ambition for looked after children, accompanied by appropriate and targeted support utilising the pupil premium for every child and young person in our care.

Schools, colleges and other education establishments have a range of responsibilities including ensuring every child in care has a Personal Education Plan (PEP) and is supported to achieve success.

Making sure that children in care and care leavers are in school and working hard to avoid exclusions is an important part of achieving such educational success. All schools should have a ‘designated teacher’ with special responsibility for children in care.

School governors have statutory responsibilities, which include monitoring the progress of looked after children. Schools must engage with the Virtual School and respect the role of the Corporate Parent.

Health Service providers have important responsibilities for improving the health, physical, mental and emotional wellbeing, of all looked after children.

Health assessments must be undertaken and specialist nurses for looked after children must ensure that Personal Health Plans (‘Health Passports’) are developed with the child or young person and that they are fully implemented. Transitions to Adult Health Services will be managed sensitively and in full co-operation with young people.

Mental Health services will provide direct intervention for looked after children and eligible care leavers, ensuring prompt assessment of those requiring support.

Housing providers have an essential role to play in working with the Council to provide enough good quality accommodation for care leavers who are ready to live more independently and provide a range of ‘move-on’ accommodation for care leavers wanting to move from more supported accommodation.

There is a wide range of community organisations across the county, providing important services and support for children in care and care leavers, including advice and guidance, mentoring, supported housing, and drug and alcohol services. These services are vital to the task of preventing care leavers from needing the intervention of statutory services.

Lead responsibility for Corporate Parenting sits with the Cabinet Member for Children’s Services who chairs the bi-monthly Panel. The Corporate Parenting Panel works to recently revised terms of reference (see appendix 2) and is responsible for ensuring that agreed strategic objectives are delivered and care pledges are adhered to.

The CPP consists of a cross party group of elected Members supported by officers and partners including the Service Director for Children’s Social Care. Key actions are agreed against the strategic objectives and the required standard of service delivery is achieved. Both quantitative and qualitative data is analysed in order to ensure the objectives are being met.

The corporate director of Children’s Services along with key officers from children’s social care and representatives from partner agencies responsible for aspects of working with children in care and care leavers, also attend meetings including representation from health, education, participation, advocacy services and the independent reviewing service.

There is also representation from various services as and when appropriate. Children in care and care leavers engage in the CPP and the Participation Team presents an annual report on the activity of ‘We Do Care!’.

In addition, 3 sub-groups will focus on key areas for service improvement and will be responsible for providing updates on the progress made to the CPP. The purpose of each sub-group is shown below:

1. To ensure a focused approach to identifying and addressing issues relating to the health, both mental and physical of young people in the care of the local authority.
2. To ensure a focused approach to identifying and addressing issues relating to housing and care leavers.
3. To ensure a focused approach to identifying and addressing issues relating to education, employment and training.