Preparing for the Safeguarding
and looked after children
inspection
Tony Morrissey
Head of Safeguarding Inspection & Audit
Directorate for Children & Young People
Safeguarding and CLA
Inspection
• One inspection every 3 years
• Maximum notice - 10 days
• Length of inspection – 10 Working days
• At least 3 Ofsted/HMI Inspectors and Care
Quality Commission Inspector
Evaluation schedule
• Section 1: Overall effectiveness
• Capacity to improve
Evaluation Schedule
• Section 2: Meeting the need to safeguard and
promote the welfare, development and life
chances of children and young people and;
meeting the needs of looked after children
and young people
Leadership and management
• Ambition and prioritisation
• Evaluation, including performance management,
quality assurance and workforce development
• User engagement
• Partnerships – LSCB/CT
• Equality and diversity
• Value for money
• Effectiveness in promoting safeguarding
Quality of provision
• Service responsiveness including complaints
• Assessment and direct work with children and
families
• Case planning, reviews and recording
Safeguarding outcomes
• Children and young people are safe: the
effectiveness of services in taking reasonable
steps to ensure that children and young people
are safe
• Children and young people are safe: the
effectiveness of services in taking reasonable
steps to ensure that children and young people
feel safe
Every Child Matters outcomes
for looked after children and
young people
• Being healthy
• Staying safe
• Enjoying and achieving
• Making a positive contribution
• Achieving economic well-being
Surveys
• All CLA aged eight and over (Care4Me survey)
• All children and young people aged eight and
over who have left care during the previous 12
months (AfterCare survey).Care Leavers
• Social Workers
• Safeguarding professionals
• Third Sector
Inspection Activities Documents
• Minutes of the last six LSCB Meetings
• Details of Children’s Trust Board, and minutes of
last six meetings
• CYPP
• Performance management information
• Data relating to CAF
• Summaries of management reviews
Inspection Activities Documents
• Arrangements for missing children
• Organisation charts for council and partner
agencies
• Findings from other Lancashire inspections
• Summary of judgements of SCR evaluations
• Complaints to Ofsted
Inspection Activities
• Case file scrutiny
• Evaluating documentation
• Meetings and hold discussions with users,
managers, health professionals and agencies,
police, other staff and stakeholders.
• Chair and members of the LSCB and Children’s
Trust
Areas of evaluation/grading
• Over 200 areas of evaluation to make
judgements
• 33 separate grades
Limiting Judgments
• overall effectiveness is likely to be inadequate if either of
the two safeguarding outcomes is judged as inadequate
or for CLA any outcome judgement is inadequate
• overall effectiveness is unlikely to be good or better if
either of the two safeguarding outcomes is not judged as
good or for CLA either staying safe or enjoying and
achieving is not judged as good
• enjoying and achieving are unlikely to be good if looked
after children and young people are not making at least
good educational progress overall in relation to their
starting points and capability
• leadership and management are likely to be inadequate
if the grade awarded for equality and diversity is
inadequate.
Full inspection
Experiences so far: 13 Authorities
Safeguarding Inspection
1 (Outstanding)
2 (Good)
3 (Adequate)
4 (Inadequate)
Hounslow
Hillingdon
Swindon
Knowsley
Staffordshire
Devon
Cambridgeshire
N. Yorkshire
Blackpool
Cornwall
Warrington
Leeds
Sandwell
2 (Good)
3 (Adequate)
4 (Inadequate)
Devon
N. Yorkshire
Hounslow
Hillingdon
Blackpool
Swindon
Knowsley
Staffordshire
Cambridgeshire
Warrington
Leeds
Sandwell
Cornwall
LAC Inspection
1 (Outstanding)
Safeguarding and CLA inspection
Experiences so far: Safeguarding element
Strengths
Weaknesses
•
Clear priorities
•
No progress or direction
•
Strong visible leadership
•
Quality & timeliness of assessments
•
Sustained improvement
•
Unclear thresholds
•
Child-centred
•
Statutory guidance not followed
•
Good partnership/joint working
•
•
High staff morale
Poor management support, oversight and
decision making
•
Good staff training
•
Ineffective LSCB and Children’s Trust
•
Active and visible LSCB and
Children’s Trust
Safeguarding and CLA inspection
Experiences so far: Looked After
Children
Weaknesses
Strengths
•
Poor joint working
•
No clear strategy
•
Good partnership/joint working
•
Gaps in service provision
•
Clear priorities
•
Statutory guidance not followed
•
Responsive, child-centred service
•
Inadequacies in care planning
•
Committed workforce
•
Not ambitious performance objectives
•
Strong leadership
•
Slow pace of change
•
Effective corporate parenting board
•
Engagement of looked after children
and young people
Next steps
Logistical
preparations
•Getting pre-inspection
documents together
Safeguarding
and LAC
inspection
Readiness for
inspection
•Processes and practices
•Documentation
•People are aware
action taken
Step 1: Set up Groups to oversee preparations for the inspection.
Step 2: Allocate responsibilities for undertaking preparation tasks
LOGISTICS
• Inspector information pack
• Documentation checklist
• Notification cascade
• Auditing team
READINESS FOR INSPECTION
• Self evaluation
• Documentation audit
• Evidence file
• Staff briefings
• Mock inspection
Preparations so far
Current status
Inspection preparation Groups
Yes in DfCYP and proposal for Partnership
Board
All relevant people briefed
No – How are we going to do this in our
agencies?
Regular case file audits
Underway in DfCYP – What about other
agencies?
Self-evaluations
Underway in DfCYP – What about other
agencies?
Inspector information Pack
Cascade system/action plans
Document collation
Logistical arrangements
Underway
Underway in DfCYP – What about other
agencies?
Underway in DfCYP– What do other
agencies have?
Underway
Useful website addresses
• http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/Ofsted-home/Formsand-guidance/Browse-allby/Other/General/Inspections-of-safeguardingand-looked-after-childrenservices/(language)/eng-GB
• http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/Ofsted-home/Formsand-guidance/Browse-allby/Other/General/Illustrative-grade-descriptorsfor-inspecting-safeguarding-and-looked-afterchildren-services/(language)/eng-GB