Agenda item

The Mayor and Lead Member for Children’s Social Care, Adult Social Care and Public Health and the Executive Director of Children’s Services submitted a report for the Executive’s consideration.

The purpose of the report was to request agreement to commission ‘Audit to Excellence’, at a cost of £216k, to ensure that the programme could continue until March 2022 (the end of the current financial year). The submitted report did not request for additional finances, as the programme could be funded from current budgets, namely the Improvement or Change funds.

The ‘Audit to Excellence’ programme had now been rolled out across the whole service with team plans/performance clinics and non-negotiables in place with strong endorsement of the approach across the service.

Ofsted had commented:

“The ‘Audit to Excellence’ framework successfully builds in learning from audit, with clear links to individual team planning, wider service improvements and performance clinics. Social workers and early help practitioners provided inspectors with examples of how they had made positive changes to their practice as a result of their learning from audit.” (Focussed visit in May and published in July 2021.)

OPTIONS

The submitted report set out the reasons why ‘Audit for Excellence’ could not be delivered in-house.

Securing different auditors was not an option because it would have taken a significant period for them to become familiar with the ‘Audit to Excellence’ approach and it was important to maintain the pace of the improvement programme.

ORDERED

That the content of the report be approved and the required commissioning takes place at a cost of £216k.

REASON

The finances allocated for auditing purposes ceased in March 2021 and the agency auditors had formed their own business called ‘Audit to Excellence’ with the aim of working with other authorities to develop similar bespoke approaches. However, there was still a significant amount of work to be carried out in Middlesbrough to fully embed the ‘Audit to Excellence’ approach and in particular equipping the workforce with the skills to carry out internal audits to a good standard. Therefore, it would be detrimental to Middlesbrough’s improvement programme if the Council could not retain the auditors’ skills and experience. Sufficient funds had been identified to commission them for nine months until March 2022 at a cost of £216K, which compared well with the auditors previous daily rate as agency workers. A commissioning arrangement would give Middlesbrough more security as agency workers could leave an authority in two weeks, which would again be detrimental to the improvement programme.

The Overview and Scrutiny Board had not examined the report or a Scrutiny Panel as there was an urgent requirement to secure the necessary resources needed to consistently improve outcomes for Middlesbrough’s vulnerable children. However, the fundamental aspects had been discussed and agreed by Mayor Preston in his role as Lead Member for Children’s Social Care.

It was important to note that the ‘Audit for Excellence’ programme was for the whole of Children’s Services i.e. for children’s social care and education and partnerships not just the former. Education services played a significant role in improving outcomes for vulnerable children, indeed all children in Middlesbrough.