(i)         The report of Councillor Okunade, Cabinet Member for Children's Social Care, is enclosed.

Councillor Okunade, Cabinet Member for Children’s Social Care, introduced the report and, in doing so, highlighted some of the key successes and update of the service, which included the following: 

·         Family Support and the Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH)

·         Child Protection Plans

·         Looked After Children and Care Leavers

·         The work of the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board (LSCB)

The Cabinet Member welcomed Andrew Carter, who had recently been appointed to the position of Head of Care and Targeted Outcomes and thanked Nicky Pace for her work with the service in the interim.

The Cabinet also paid tribute to the fantastic work of Thurrock’s loyal foster carers and the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board, and stated that she was proud to be Portfolio Holder for the service.

Members questioned the Portfolio Holder and received responses on the following matters:

·         Councillor Halden observed that the Council had given incorrect advice to parents regarding permission for home schooling their children. He called for the Portfolio Holder to undertake a review and to ensure that Council officers received adequate training to allow them to advise parents on the correct procedure in accordance with the law. He also questioned how many parents had been disadvantaged by receiving the incorrect information issued.

The Cabinet Member advised that general education did not fall under her portfolio but assured Members that it was both Members and officers responsibility to ensure that the correct information was disseminated to parents and stated that officers would review this.

·         Councillor Roast stated that in 2013 Members approved an increase in the child care budget of £3 million to meet the budget short fall, however it was not expected that this would become a permanent feature of the department’s budget setting process. He questioned what the Portfolio Holder was doing to ensure that the poor budget setting did not happen again.

The Cabinet Member explained that the priority was to safeguard children and that increased demand on the service had increased the placements budget cost. She emphasised that this was difficult to control the placement budget as the Council’s priority was to support children who needed help, regardless of the impact of cost. However, she further added that the Council was not complacent and that every placement was reviewed to ensure that money was being spent effectively and that this was regularly reported back and reviewed by the Corporate Parenting Committee.

(At 7.33pm Councillor Ojetola entered the Chamber)

·         Councillor Johnson thanked the Portfolio Holder for including the budget outturn information in the report. He observed that the legal costs budget for 2014/15 had increased from £700,000 to over £1.2 million and that in the past year the Council had seen at least one case where a child had been returned to its parents following a court case. He questioned whether the increase in budget was a result of greater scrutiny and challenge of social care decisions rather than errors and mistakes. 

The Cabinet Member advised that the legal cost increase was not a result of careless mistakes and that when a child was identified at risk the Council always adopted a cautious approach and without court agreement a child would not be taken into care. She further explained that new guidance had resulted in a reduction of external independent experts and that the creation of a threshold panel reduced the need for a number of Legal Planning meetings and therefore some legal costs.

·         Councillor Hebb questioned how the service was working differently with their budgets, in light of the additional £3 million budget short fall that was required in 2013/14.

The Cabinet Member assured Members that a number of measures were in place to reduce the reliance on more expensive external placements and drive forward recruitment for in house foster carers. She noted the progress that had been made so far but reiterated that the priority for the Council was to ensure that every child who needed support received it. 

·         Councillor Sue Little advised Members that, through her work on the Adoption and Fostering Panel, she had become aware of a number of problems with Social Workers IT systems which had made it more difficult and time consuming to complete tasks. She called for better IT systems that were fit for purpose for Social Workers needs.

The Cabinet Member agreed that IT systems should be in place to support officers in their work and provided assurances that every system to help social workers work more effective should be achieved.

·         Councillor Barbara Rice congratulated the Portfolio Holder for her work on implementing the Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH), which had been a fantastic success story. She asked whether Members would be attending the local pantomime again this year with Looked After Children with their Corporate Parenting hat on.

·         The Cabinet Member thanked Councillor Barbara Rice for her kind words and agreed that it would be good for all Members to support Looked After Children again this year. She paid particular thanks to Councillor Brian Little for his work in helping to make last year’s event a success and hoped that he would continue to provide support this year.

The Cabinet Member briefly summed up the report and thanked all front line staff and partners for their support.