Agenda

To elect the Chair of the Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee for the 2023/24 Municipal Year

To elect the Vice Chair of the Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee for the 2023/24 Municipal Year.

To receive any apologies for absence from Councillors.

To receive information on any changes in the membership of the Committee.

Note – When a member of a Committee is unable to attend a meeting of a Committee or Sub-Committee, the relevant Political Group Leader (or their nominated representative) may, by notice to the Monitoring Officer (or their nominated representative) prior to the meeting, appoint a substitute member from within the same Political Group. The contact details on the front of this agenda should be used for notifications.

Councillors are requested to declare any interests on items included in this agenda. Please refer to the workflow on the preceding page for guidance.

Declarations received will be reported at the meeting.

To confirm and sign as a correct record the minutes of the Meeting held on 7 February 2023.

To receive any public questions, statements or petitions submitted in accordance with the Constitution, which is available to view at the following link:

https://democracy.bcpcouncil.gov.uk/ieListMeetings.aspx?CommitteeID=151&Info=1&bcr=1

The deadline for the submission of a public question is 4 clear working days before the meeting.

The deadline for the submission of a public statement is midday the working day before the meeting.

The deadline for the submission of a petition is 10 working days before the meeting.

To present the Youth Justice Plan for 2023/24. There is a statutory requirement to publish an annual Youth Justice Plan which must provide specified information about the local provision of youth justice services. This report summarises the Youth Justice Plan for 2023/24, with a copy of the Plan appended. The Youth Justice Plan needs to be approved by the full Council.

To receive a brief verbal introduction from the Corporate Director, Children’s Services

BCP Childrens Services was inspected, under the Inspection of Local Authority Children’s Services (ILACs) framework in December 2021. The outcome was an overall inadequate judgement.

As a result the Secretary of State of Education issued a Statutory Direction and appointed a DfE Improvement Adviser to support the Council in their improvement of Childrens Social Care Services.

The Childrens Services Improvement Plan is in place to ensure progress is made at pace in Childrens Social Care in line with the recommendations of the December Inspection and in accordance with the statutory direction notice received by the Council in March 2022.

Overview and Scrutiny require regular updates on themes regarding improvement. In March 2023 Childrens Services had their third Monitoring Visit, the letter published by Ofsted is presented for scrutiny alongside, the attached presentation and the DfE Advisers second report. The DfE Adviser in their role is required to review the pace and progress of improvement at regular intervals to ensure it is sufficient and report on this to the Secretary of State

The purpose of this paper is to update members on the implementation of the changes of the mainstream SEND banding descriptors and banding values.

This paper reminds Members of the process that was taken to arrive at the options and outlines the implementation process and gives an outline of the spend so far.

This report provides a performance update for the period January to March 2023 (Quarter 4 2022-23) for the key performance indicators relating to Children’s Services as detailed in the Corporate Performance Scorecard. 

Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) is a statutory function of all councils operating an executive model of decision making.  In BCP Council, O&S activity is carried out by four O&S committees formed of councillors and co-opted members.  There is a requirement to report on the work of O&S to Council, to ensure good visibility of the function and Council ownership of any improvements required.

The annual report contains a summary of O&S activity undertaken over 2019-23, reflections on working practices and an action plan identifying strategic improvements to the O&S function.

All O&S Committees will receive the annual report for consideration, providing opportunity for comment prior to the supply of the final report to Council.

To receive a verbal update from the Portfolio Holder for Children and Young People.

The Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny (O&S) Committee is asked to consider and identify work priorities for its next meeting pending a wider review of its Forward Plan in dedicated workshop.

To note the 2023/24 Municipal Year dates for the Committee as follows:

·       19 September 2023

·       21 November 2023

·       23 January 2024

·       19 March 2024

All with a 6pm start, venues to be confirmed.