Agenda, decisions and minutes

that the minutes of the meeting held on 2 February be agreed as an accurate record.

1.1      It was agreed that the minutes of the meeting held on 2 February be agreed as an accurate record.

1.2      Resolved: that the minutes of the meeting held on 2 February be agreed as an accurate record.

2.1    Cllr Paschoud declared an interest as husband of a trustee (Councillor Jaqu Paschoud) of Ravensbourne project, which is in receipt from funding from Children’s Social Care.

There are none.

3.1    There were none.

that the report would be noted. It was also agreed that the Executive Director for Children and Young People would come back to the Committee in the new municipal year – and that a note would be circulated from the Executive Director for Corporate Resources detailing the budget and expenditure of the Children and Young People Directorate.

4.1    Cllr Chris Barnham (Cabinet Member for Children and Young People) was invited to address the Committee – the following key points were noted:

·         Children’s services have been rated by OFSTED as ‘requiring improvement’ for too long, with aspects of the service judged as declining in quality between 2015 and 2019.

·         There had been a comprehensive improvement plan developed by new leaders and managers in the service. This was being consistently delivered (and this was supported by OFSTED)

·         This was budget which is difficult to keep under control.

·         We had an expectation that the forecasting and management was as good as it could be.

·         The past decade had seen a reduction in broader support services and interventions for families – which had resulted in more children being brought into care.

·         The proportions of children in care may be higher in Lewisham (in terms of numbers) due to overall differences in population.

·         In only one year since 2016 had the budget been set as high as the previous year outturn. It was not clear where the additional £10m mentioned by finance officers at the meeting had appeared in the directorate budget.

4.2    Lucie Heyes (Director of Children’s Social Care) and Nick Penny (Head of Service Finance) introduced the report – the following key points were noted:

·         The budget for children’s social care was overspending. The budget was comprised of three principal areas: (workforce, section 17 (children at home with child protection plans and children in need); and placements (children looked after, 18–25-year-olds who had left care and children in connected care or in kinship networks such as those under special guardianship orders).

·         The children’s social care system was working with around 2800 children and young people at any one time

·         There had been increases in demand since the pandemic and those cases were increasing in complexity.

·         Lots of work had taken place to manage the numbers of children being brought into social care through a range of interventions.

·         There were a number of reasons that costs in the social care were increasing (despite the Council managing demand – and the number of children in placements remaining stable)

·         The private provider market for care costs had not kept up with demand and Lewisham had a difficult legacy of children who had been in care – and were now leaving care.

·         The level of complexity – and the costs of complex placements was also increasing and the numbers of children and young people requiring those placements was increasing. Three percent of the placements cost approximately 30 percent of the entire placements budget due to their high weekly cost.

·         Work would be required over a number of years to improve the systems used in social care – and to counter the effects of the legacy of poor practice.

·         One of the key challenges in reporting on the budget was the quality of data. Different reporting mechanisms had been in place for different parts of the financial year – which resulted in some distortion in  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

that the annual update from the Audit Panel (circulated in advance of the meeting by email – and considered by the Panel on 14 March) be noted. It was also agreed that the Committee’s work programme suggestions be put forward to the membership of the new Committee following the AGM.

5.1    The Committee discussed the work programme report – noting that the meeting was the last before the Council’s annual general meeting (AGM). Members put forward the following suggestions for the Committee’s 2023-24 work programme:

·         Children’s services finance – including scrutiny of the discrepancy in the figures between the Directorate and the finance team.

·         An update on adult social care.

·         Income generation and commercialisation.

·         A briefing on Council insurances

5.2    Resolved: that the annual update from the Audit Panel (circulated in advance of the meeting by email – and considered by the Panel on 14 March) be noted. It was also agreed that the Committee’s work programme suggestions be put forward to the membership of the new Committee following the AGM.