Agenda and minutes

www.swansea.gov.uk/disclosuresofinterests

No disclosures of interest were made.

To receive the notes of the previous meeting and agree as an accurate record.

The Panel agreed the notes as an accurate record of the meeting.

Questions must relate to matters on the Agenda and will be dealt with in a 10 minute period.

No members of the public were present at the meeting.

Val Jones, Regional Adoption Manager, Western Bay Adoption Service

Val Jones, Regional Adoption Manager, attended to brief the Panel on the 2 recent inspections of the Western Bay Regional Adoption Service including a summary of the findings and the subsequent regional action plan.  The Panel also received an update on progress and performance of the Regional Adoption Service during 2017/18. 

Discussion points:

·       There is an attempt being made to standardise the adoption service across local authorities.

·       All adopters are on a national register but each region/third sector organisation has its own process and adoption panels for approving adopters.

·       Western Bay Adoption Service makes contact with other regions to try and identify adopters if it cannot find an appropriate adopter locally, for example, for sibling groups and children with special needs.

·       Page 37 – it states that 38% of adoption applications made in the region were contested in 2017/18.  However none of the contested applications were successfully achieved.  The important thing is for the child to have permanence.

·       Page 51 – Panel queried why Swansea had such a high dropout figure for referrals during the year.  They were informed that a piece of work needs to be undertaken to try and identify the reason for this. It could be because Western Bay has an early referral system.

·       Page 57 – it was felt that the focus should be on ‘placement order’ for monitoring of performance of the adoption service.

·       It was confirmed that Bridgend will continue to be part of the Western Bay Adoption Service when it is no longer part of Abertawe Bro Morgannnwg University Health Board.

·       The Panel congratulated the Adoption Service on the outcome of its recent inspections and the action plan which it has put in place as a result.

Julie Thomas, Head of Child and Family Services updated the Panel on the implementation of the national approach to Statutory Advocacy, including some of the issues concerning the implementation and issues for the service going forward.

Discussion points:

·       Dave Howes, Director of Social Services now chairs the national board

·       There is still an issue over costs and future funding and the Panel is concerned about this

·       The Panel has offered to help, if they can, to progress the issue.

Julie Thomas provided the Panel with an overview of the survey and the responses and updated the Panel on the next steps which includes an integrated action plan and answered the Panel’s questions.

Discussion points:

·       Child and Family Services in Swansea was asked to be involved in the research which 6 authorities took part in. 

·       The survey was undertaken with Looked After Children (LAC) who were asked to give their views on a range of different issues.

·       The children who completed the survey cannot be identified but some of the issues that were raised can be discussed in LAC review meetings.

·       Social workers need to be looking more broadly at children’s wellbeing and to realise how essential it is to form relationships with children and parents. Training for social workers is going to be introduced to try and improve this.

·       The Service is talking to Education about some of the results and what they can do to help, for example, increasing friendship groups.

·       There is a lot of learning for the Service from the survey.

·       Swansea will be taking part in the survey again next year.

·       The survey highlighted some bright spots for Swansea and where improvements need to be made.  This will be included in the Corporate Parenting Board Plan

·       The Panel was pleased that Swansea has taken part in the survey and that issues are being addressed.

The Panel considered  the work programme.

a) Response from Cabinet Member (20 April 2018 meeting)

b) Convener’s letter to Cabinet Member (25 June 2018 meeting)

Letters received and considered by the Panel.