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Dudley Council children's services still needs to improve

Council bosses say they are confident children in Dudley are safe despite services for vulnerable young people still needing further improvement in the borough.

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Ofsted recently inspected Dudley Council's children's social care services and rated its overall effectiveness as 'requires improvement to be good' in a report published today.

The council was given a 'good' rating in the impact of leaders of social work practice with children and families, and the experiences and progress of children in care and care leavers.

It had been previously been heavily criticised by inspectors, who rated it as 'inadequate' overall in early 2016. This followed regular monitoring visits from the education watchdog.

Council bosses said their latest inspection rating was only the start of their journey and that improvements still needed to be made in the coming months.

They added that their ambition was to be rated 'outstanding' overall in the next full inspection in three years time.

'Significant progress'

The report said that "significant progress" had been made in many areas, and added: "Effective work by senior management and staff, together with the commitment and investment by political leaders, has led to improved responses to the needs of children and families.

"As a result, outcomes for many children and their families are better.

"If their needs escalate, children receive a considered and timely response from social care. Risk to children is recognised and effective action is taken to minimise that risk.

"Areas identified as inadequate in the last inspection have been turned around and now deliver better quality and more focused and child-centred practice.

"Some challenges remain and there are areas of service that require further improvement. A high turnover of staff has had a detrimental impact on the quality of practice, particularly in assessment teams.

"Plans for children in need or at risk do not always clearly state what actions need to be taken and within what time-frame.

"Some young people have remained in care for longer than they should. Social workers are not always benefitting from supportive supervision and the opportunity to reflect on complex work."

'A milestone not a destination'

Martin Samuels, the council's strategic director for people, said: "The distance that has been travelled and the scale of the improvement really should not be underestimated. This is only a milestone on the journey – this is not the destination.

"Ofsted has said we still require further improvement to be good, our ambition is that Dudley should be outstanding for its children's services.

"This key element that Ofsted found when they looked at many hundreds of cases, their conclusion was that children in Dudley are safe.

"That is such an improvement compared to where we were when they came at the beginning of 2016.

"Three years ago Dudley was deeply inadequate. As a result we were unable to show that they were safe.

"Ofsted went through between 400 to 500 cases this time round and found not a single case was found to be unsafe.

"We still have further to go to ensure that are getting the best outcomes.We can and we will do better. We are confident that children are not unsafe in Dudley."

Plan

Sue Butcher, chief officer for children, said: "There are still things we need to do and focus on really quite quickly.

"Part of the reason we were inadequate was that when children came into care, it was not efficient or effective enough to move them to forever families – they remained in care for too long. We are much better at achieving permanency for children now."

Councillor Sue Ridney, Dudley Council's cabinet member for children's services, added: "This represents an important first step on our journey towards becoming a 'good' authority and beyond in relation to our children's services.

"We have taken one step up the ladder and came within a whisker of taking two, which is practically unheard of. We recognise there is still a way to go, but we are determined to get there."

Mr Samuels said a three-year improvement plan would be developed and presented to the cabinet in the new year.