UPDATE NO 365 09 August 2019

AD Education Network – next meeting Friday 13 September

We are now planning for our next network meeting on the morning of Friday 13 September.  The focus for the agenda will be to continue our discussions about Children Missing Education.  Mike Stoneman from Portsmouth will lead this item for us, bringing together thoughts and recommendations from the task and finish group he has been chairing.

Please contact Alison Rendle (details below) for further information. Alison will be sending out an agenda in the next couple of weeks. If you would like to bring along a colleague with particular responsibility for children missing education, please let Alsion know so that she can keep track of numbers.

AD Safeguarding Network – next meeting 6 September 2019

The next meeting is just over a month off (diary invites have been sent this week), please send  through any suggestions for our agenda, so far we have 

• SEND/EHC Challenges and issues  
• Virtual school best practice
• Improving the quality of audit

Like all of our meetings it is 9.30 for tea/coffee with a 10.00 start. If you have any items you would like to add to the agenda, please contact Mark Evans (details below) the venue is The Abbey Centre, 34 Great Smith Street, Westminster SW1P 3BU.

Memorandum of Cooperation – Review of effectiveness

Over the next few weeks we will be carrying out a piece of research in relation to the perceived effectiveness of the Memorandum of Cooperation. This has been prompted by the DCS group who have concerns that the MoC maybe losing its effectiveness.  Since inception of the MoC in 2016 use of agency workers across the region has reduced from 16.5% to 15% (despite an overall increase of 322 new C&F SW posts across the region in the same period), the vacancy rate has also reduced from 16.8% to 15.6%.

Despite these changes we know there is huge variability across the region and last year saw a small increase in the use of agency staff (0.2%), consequently we will be conducting a survey with a view to identifying how we can re-energise the MoC. If you have views about what should be included please let Mark Evans (details below) know.

Parliamentary Education Committee Inquiry in Social Care Workforce

An inquiry into children’s social work will examine what the workforce needs in order to provide the best help and protection for families, the parliamentary education committee has announced. The committee aims to explore “what social work looks like in 2019” – focusing on the capacity of social workers to intervene early, as well as how effectively they can access professional development and support. More information is available here.

The inquiry will also look at how initiatives and reforms to social work training have impacted on the workforce and how far workers are supported to uphold their statutory duties.

The deadline for written evidence submissions is Friday 30 August

DfE Call for Evidence: Children’s homes workforce. Closes 27 August 2019

The DfE have launched a call for evidence on Children’s Homes Workforce, and invites views on:

• establishing professional registration for roles in children’s homes
• existing approaches to regulating the children’s homes workforce

Responses will inform the DfE’s thinking on where improvements could be made so children in children’s homes receive high-quality care in a safe environment.

The consultation closes on 27 August 2019. Click here for further information

South East Social Work Health Check

We are now collecting returns for the South East Social Work Health Check. If you have completed your health check using our methodology and would like your return benchmarked against others please contact Mark Evans (details below).

The deadline for submissions is 16 August 2019.