Issue - meetings

Background:

This report provided details of the annual refresh of the statutory Sufficiency Report. This detailed how the Council, through working with all its partner agencies, would meet the placement needs of current and future Children in Care and Care Leavers and improve their outcomes in light of the Council’s understanding of their needs and current provision.

The report explained that over the last year there had been a 10% rise in numbers of new children coming in to care. The majority of this activity was from the 10-15 year old age group. There had also been an increase in the length of stay in care: 26% of children in care had been in care for five years or more, compared to 19% three years ago. This meant that there had been an overall 8% increase in the number of children in care in Medway since September 2017.

The Children and Young People Overview and Scrutiny Committee considered this report on 10 January 2019. The comments of this Committee were set out in an addendum report.

Reasons:

Publication of the updated Sufficiency Report will enable the Council to fulfil its statutory requirement to take steps to secure, so far as is reasonably practicable, sufficient accommodation for Children in Care within the local area and will enable Medway to act strategically to address gaps in provision.