Agenda item

Claire Walker,  Specialist Commisisoning Manager will present the Sufficiency action plan to the Board.

The Chair welcomed the Specialist Commissioning & Procurement Senior Manager to the meeting to provide an update of the highlight report of the Sufficiency action plan which was devised out the Corporate Parenting Board Strategy.

The Sufficiency Action Plan would be reviewed and updated as actions were completed or as new work was identified in the event of any changes to our sufficiency needs over the 3-year cycle of our plan. The Board last received an update in March 2022.

As with the Permanency action plan, the Sufficiency action plan was broken up into 6 themed areas, with a key accountable officer who works closely with the Manager.

The themes were as follows:

Theme 1 - Strengthening Commissioning for Children and Young People

Theme 2 – Increasing Placements Close to where Children and Young People live and learn

Theme 3 – Growing Early Intervention & Prevention

Theme 4 – Improving Placements & Support for Care Leavers

Theme 5 – Enhancing Learning Outcomes for Children & Young People

Theme 6 – Building Our Fostering Capacity and Adoption Outcomes

The Manager went through each of the priorities and identified what has been achieved since the action plan had been last updated. Full details of these were outlined in the report which had been circulated to the Board prior to the meeting.

The Manager outlined the impact/ data and performance; these being:

·          Weekly reporting on residential placement activity continues and is providing greater level of data on placement changes and needs.

·         Recruitment continues to be a national issue in a number of areas and work to ensure levels of staffing both internally and externally continues.

·         Agency staff are being utilised and internal recruitment campaigns are on-going.

The Board were made aware that in terms of going forward, a full refresh of the Commissioning Action plan was needed and would be completed by November 2022.

Following the presentation, the Board sought clarification on the number of new providers and it was confirmed that there were three. The third was to provide accommodation for children with complex needs which was pleasing. In terms of Daniel Court, there was a greater need above the capacity and the Chair queried whether another home offering the same facilities should be opened. It was commented that this was being discussed as part of the placement planning meetings.

A note of clarification was also sought in terms of external businesses who come to Middlesbrough to open a home and whether they work closely with the Council to offer places to Middlesbrough children. The Manager advised that a meeting with be established with any new potential suppliers , which would include a member of the commissioning team and future for families and the type of provision they plan to open would be discussed, and if appropriate we would look to put forward a business case with them, of we felt the provision would benefit some of our children’s needs. Two out of the three providers are already having in depth conversations with the local authority. 

The Manager was thanked for her presentation.

AGREED- That the information be noted.