Agenda item

The purpose of this report is to update the Committee on the work of the Medway Safeguarding Children Board (MSCB) during 2015-16 and to provide members with an update on the MSCB Business Plan for 2016-17. The report also provides members with an update on the review of the MSCB undertaken by Ofsted between September and October 2015.

Discussion:

The Independent Chair of the MSCB, John Drew, introduced the report which updated the Committee on the work of the Board during 2015-16 and its Business Plan 2016-17.  It also provided Members with an update on the review of the Board undertaken by Ofsted in 2015.  He undertook to liaise with officers about the scheduling of future MSCB reports to the Committee in order to ensure they were presented in a more timely manner.  He drew the Committee’s attention to the four recommendations from Ofsted and confirmed that improvements in these areas had been made and summarised the Board’s involvement in the ongoing investigations at Medway Secure Training Centre (STC).

Members then raised a number of questions and comments which included: -

·         Medway Improvement Board’s final report into Medway STC – The Board had issued a final report of its advice to the Secretary of State (SoS) for Justice.  A review had been commissioned following a television programme which had been broadcast, relating to behaviour of staff to young people at Medway STC.  The Committee were advised that they would be circulated the link to the report for information.  The key outcome of the report was that the SoS had placed the running of the STC with the National Offender Management Service.  A Governor had been appointed and would commence on 1 July 2016 and would take the statutory role on the MSCB.  The Independent Chair also undertook to provide a briefing note, around September 2016, on how new arrangements at Medway STC were going.

·         Work with Medway Youth Parliament (MYP) – In response to a member seeking clarification of the work the Board had done with MYP, the Independent Chair explained that the Robert Napier School had produced a short film which raised awareness of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) which had been shared with Medway secondary schools.  A view was expressed that more needed to be done in sharing this information with schools more effectively which the Independent Chair undertook to action.  The information and film was also published on the MSCB website and the Independent Chair undertook to circulate information to Members. 

·         Missing Children Incidents – in response to a request for more recent data on this, as in the report data was only provided up to June 2015, the Independent Chair confirmed collaborative efforts were ongoing and undertook to provide the Committee with more up to date information.

·         Possibility of conducting a Serious Case Review (SCR) on the Medway STC issue – The Independent Chair confirmed that no formal decision had been made with regard to whether or not a SCR would be conducted but assured Members that a review of some kind would be undertaken to ensure lessons learned were identified.  A broader review of all STCs across the country was one option that would also be explored.  He also informed the Committee that a national review of youth justice was currently being undertaken and this was expected to be reported in the Summer.

·         Prevention of the recruitment of young people into gangs – The Independent Chair confirmed that Medway Council had commissioned a peer review on gang and youth violence to identify preventative action partners could make.

·         Allegations of abuse – in response to a question about how allegations of abuse in large organisations are handled, it was confirmed that like every Council, Medway had a Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) and organisations were familiar with the LADO and knew to refer allegations to the LADO Team.  The LADO provided an annual report to the MSCB and information from this would be included in the next MSCB update to the Committee.

Decision:

The Committee noted the report.