Introduction Hello, thank you for having myself, Yvette and Sally here today. It’s always great to spend the day in Manchester and particularly great to be speaking to all of you during this highlight of the annual ADCS calendar. On Tuesday we launched our new consultation on how we can improve inspections of children’s social care. We’re here to speak with you about what we’re consulting on and, of course, to invite...
Introduction Hello, thank you for having myself, Yvette and Sally here today. It’s always great to spend the day in Manchester and particularly great to be speaking to all of you during this highlight of the annual ADCS calendar. On Tuesday we launched our new consultation on how we can improve inspections of children’s social care. We’re here to speak with you about what we’re consulting on and, of course, to invite you all to express your views as part of that consultation. I want to say from the outset that all of this work is in service of getting the best outcomes for children, young people, parents, carers and families. As you know very well, we have to work together to do that – to improve things for all children who need help, protection and care, especially those with the most complex lives. We are committed to playing our part to the full. The Big Listen That aim, to make things better for the most disadvantaged and vulnerable, stretches back to our Big Listen consultation. It informs every aspect of Ofsted’s work and, personally, it’s a real core belief of mine. The Big Listen was the first step towards making the biggest overhaul we’ve ever made to how we inspect education. We are still using what we learned from those thousands of responses, and it has informed the consultation we launched this week, too. In education, I am pleased to say, the changes we’ve made are, largely, being received positively. Now, change is always difficult. We’re talking about a system under which 91% of schools had an overall judgement of ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ with a dizzying 98% of early years settings achieving the same – so I wouldn’t expect universal delight at a new way of doing things with more grades and more granular detail. But we see more and more professionals sharing their positive experiences of inspection – saying that it’s rigorous, yes, but also fairer, more collaborative and more representative of their work. We see a mix of grades coming through that are giving parents and carers more nuanced and detailed information about their children’s education. And we continue to listen to what professionals in the education sector tell us. You have a role in these education changes, too. Some of you ask us what you can do if you have concerns about a school – for example, if you’re worried that safeguarding isn’t properly in place, or you’re seeing practice that you believe falls short of being truly inclusive. In early years, too, you’re seeing the settings that our youngest children attend and making your own judgement calls. Is regular contact lacking? Are there issues at pick-up time? I would ask that you tell us before we turn up. As soon as you have concerns about inclusion and safeguarding, let Ofsted know. Use our annual conversations and enduring relationship to share your knowledge about the provision in your community. It helps us put the pieces of the jigsaw together so we can see a clearer picture of education and care in a particular area. It means we can look at it holistically and support your local work to get better outcomes for children there. I am determined to draw better, connected insights from across all our regulatory and inspection work. As I have said many times now, the more vulnerable, the more disadvantaged a child is, the more Ofsted is involved in their lives, through all manner of our work, just as you are too. Success stories Before we get into the details of the consultation, I want to celebrate some positive outcomes we have seen over the last year or so. Earlier this year I visited North East Lincolnshire Council, who have turned around their ‘inadequate’ judgements into ‘good’ with elements of ‘outstanding’ practice. I am not exaggerating when I use the word ‘transformation’. Anne-Marie and her team have made profound change. They now have very strong early help arrangements, good-quality assessments of children’s needs, and strong management oversight. They have achieved this by recruiting and training staff who are skilled, experienced and able to deliver really impactful services. They have built new and better relationships so that there is shared accountability. Crucially, they have rebuilt trust, both with their partners and with children and families. They have also leveraged the power of the community, through their Fostering: Bright Futures work and the foster-friendly businesses they have partnered with. They are making a genuine difference and it was a pleasure to visit and to see how far they’ve come. We know that you will all come from different starting points. For example, their neighbours over in North Lincolnshire have been ‘outstanding’ in many areas for a number of years, with their provision for care leavers judged as ‘good’. This is really a powerful region – I have absolutely no bias whatsoever in singling this out having been born and raised in Lincolnshire! If you then go over the Humber bridge, we now have Hull who are ‘good’, York with ‘outstanding’ and North Yorkshire, where I live, also ‘outstanding’. Perhaps you might now be detecting a bit of home pride! Just to the south, we recently inspected Norfolk, who have ‘outstanding’ practice. Something wonderful is happening down the eastern seaboard! We found inspirational leadership, confident and committed partners and a very successful example of a family help model. It means that help is provided when families need it, and as a result fewer families need to go on to more intrusive interventions. Inland, Coventry too has ‘outstanding’ practice: practitioners know children and families well and are also identifying and meeting their needs early. Leaders have done an excellent job ensuring there’s enough local provision for children in care, so children can stay in the communities they know and can flourish in. Family help and sufficient provision are themes we’ll come back to in a moment. And one thing that we saw in both Norfolk and Coventry that struck me was the consistency of quality service that children benefit from. That is what we want to see, because it is what stops children slipping through the cracks. Reliable, targeted support no matter who is accessing it, what their needs are, or whether Ofsted are visiting on that particular day. So congratulations to North Lincolnshire, North East Lincolnshire, York, Norfolk and Coventry on your positive outcomes. We want all local authorities to be able to tell similar stories of success. The consultation that Yvette and I are about to talk about aims to change inspection in a way that helps identify more excellent practice that changes lives. I have listened to you; you remain the single biggest group that I have personally engaged with in the first half of my time in office and I hope you hear reflected back in our plans what you have told me. So let me set out our ambition in more detail. Our ambition for this consultation We want our inspections to act as a force for good. The whole purpose of inspection is to encourage the very, very highest quality of practice, to improve the quality of social care services and to get the best possible outcomes for children, young people, parents, carers and families. And to do that we have to put their voices at the heart of inspections. So, we will improve how we engage those with lived experience of children’s social care in our inspections. We want them, and all of you, to be involved regularly and in a meaningful way as we: focus more on what matters to children, young people and families report our findings in a more nuanced and consistent way and improve practice and help keep children safe This consultation is about building on your existing good practice. Help us to define these changes, help us to deliver them and to make things better for everyone – including those with the most complex lives. We’re not speaking for the whole hour today – Yvette is now going to dive into a few of the most important areas we want to discuss with you, and we have time for a Q&A at the end. Moving in line with government’s vision I will first turn to how we propose to bring our frameworks more closely in line with the social care common inspection framework ( SCCIF ) as we have done regularly since ILACS ’s inception. The government has set out its vision for a children’s social care system that focuses on helping families get the support that they need to stay together wherever possible, to build stronger multi-agency child protection work which is swift and timely, to strengthen and grow kinship and fostering arrangements, and to put enduring relationships and family networks at the heart of all we do. Our proposals would bring our inspection frameworks more in line with those goals, focusing on how services nurture and protect the connections children have with people who are close to and important to them. In doing so we hope to give you one, single, consistent set of expectations to work towards. In looking at the SCCIF , we think we can do more to highlight the importance of enduring relationships. We are therefore proposing to keep the 3 existing graded evaluation areas and to introduce a new evaluation area about children’s enduring relationships. All of these evaluation areas would be independent of each other and we would no longer make an overall judgement on the experience and progress of children. SCCIF has always been rooted in children’s experiences. And we see that far too many children, particularly those with the most complex lives, are being let down by a fractured care system. Getting the right and consistent support and services close to home for children in care and care leavers is the bedrock, and foundation for, the enduring, loving, positive lifetime relationships they need to thrive. This is what their future is built on. Every single child deserves to grow up with people who know them, care for them, and stand by them. Family, chosen family and professionals who help them to know that they’re safe. Who prove that they belong. And who provide the secure base on which children can build their identity. We believe that introducing this discrete evaluation area is the best way to reflect and evaluate this important aspect of your work. We want your thoughts on that and your suggestions on how this evaluation area could be drafted so that it captures the essence of what local authorities and providers can do together to build stable, loving relationships for children. In ILACS we are also proposing changes to be more in line with the government’s long-term ambition for children’s social care. As ever, we make sure all of our frameworks are fully aligned with the professional and regulatory standards expected of everyone. Ofsted is here to report on standards, and to measure what we see against the standards expected by government. So in ILACS , we propose to split our current ‘help and protection’ judgement so that we can shine a light on both areas in equal measure. We want to be able to recognise how family help can provide that crucial co-ordinated support to families as early as possible – acting before needs become even greater, and giving children and their families the right help at the right time. Working with them, not doing to them. We must do that without losing our sharpest focus on protecting children when they are at risk of significant harm. We have to get both these things right. In ILACS we are also proposing to introduce a graded evaluation area on how local authorities engage with family networks. This would take evidence from across all the practice evaluation areas and align our framework with the outcomes of the National Framework. What might that look like? Inspectors could consider things like the quality and timeliness of your work harnessing the strengths across the family network and involving families in many types of decision making, including family group decision-making meetings. It could be how well extended families and friend networks who provide care or respite care are supported to do so. Or your work to safely reunite a child with their family after a period in care or as care leavers. One thing we are not proposing we change is having separate graded evaluation areas for the experiences of children in care and the experiences of care leavers. This is because, in 45% of our current inspections, those 2 judgements receive different grades. It means in almost half of inspections we see that children in care and care leavers are getting a different quality of support. By keeping these areas separate we can make sure we are being as clear and accurate as possible about those distinct experiences, and we can identify both the strengths and future areas of focus for different services. This is how we support children to have happy, settled and fulfilled futures. Keeping them with and near loved ones wherever possible. Giving them the stability on which they can build a life. Making sure they have the relationships they need to thrive now and in the future. A more nuanced grading scale I’ll turn now to how we communicate our findings back to you, your teams, partners and local parents and carers. How we distil your achievements into something readable and nuanced, useful and simple. Across both ILACS and SCCIF we are proposing to introduce a 5-point grading scale. Many of you will be familiar with the grade names we are proposing because they are consistent with what we have introduced in education. But to recap, those grades start in the centre of the scale with ‘expected standard’. This would be the starting point for all inspections, where all the legal requirements, regulatory standards and expectations for practice are being met. From there would be ‘strong standard’ where criteria are being consistently met and we are seeing lasting improvement in children and families’ experiences. At the top of the scale would be ‘exceptional’, where practice makes a significant and lasting difference and is sustained over time. This would be for practice that’s among the best nationally, and it’s practice we’d expect to be shared to help others improve. With this we also propose using a ‘secure fit’ approach to grading to make inspections even more consistent. Local authorities and social care providers would need to show how they are achieving the full set of evaluation criteria for ‘expected standard’, ‘strong standard’ and ‘exceptional’ grades. Where the ‘expected standard’ is not met, we would have 2 possible grades. These would be ‘needs attention’, where inconsistent services impact on children and families’ experiences – but there are no widespread failures that could cause harm. Something to improve, not something broken. And ‘urgent improvement’, where action is needed to immediately correct serious or systemic failures. Where we find urgent improvement is needed in any one practice judgement, those local authorities will receive Ofsted monitoring visits, and we are working with the Department for Education to clarify their future local authority intervention and improvement arrangements. We also believe that consistent grade labels across education and social care would make things easier and more straightforward. I’ve just outlined those grade descriptions, and we want to work closely with you about where we set these grades, to make sure they reflect the quality of practice across the sector. During our consultation, we will be engaging with you, other stakeholders and children and their families to hear your views, so there will be plenty of opportunity for further discussion on this over the summer. Later in the year we will want to test our grades with some of you so we can learn, refine and develop them before we publish the renewed framework. We propose to present these grades through a new way of reporting. We have mocked this up in the consultation so you can see how it might look. Martyn will now take you through our proposals around unregistered children’s homes. Sufficiency and unregistered children’s homes One area where we are very, very keen to push for improvement is around sufficiency of provision and the problem of unregistered children’s homes. For a long time we have seen a serious mismatch between what children need, and what type of provision is available in the right place. You, your commissioning teams, and sadly the children see the impact of this each week. We know that no DCS wants these placements and that you do not take these decisions lightly. But the result is too many children have been living in unsuitable homes, often many miles away from their family and friends – taking them out of their communities and away from people who care about them. That is not conducive to their wellbeing and building enduring relationships. And in the worst cases, we have genuine concerns about safety. So we will encourage providers and commissioners to work together to get the right homes for children in the right places. We do have enough children’s homes in this country. Right now, there are over 15,000 places in registered children’s homes and 10,000 children in care. The number of children’s homes increased by 63% between 2019 and 2025 – but the number of children in residential care increased by just 10% in the same time period. In the last 14 months alone, the number of homes has gone up by 22%. So the problem is not with overall supply. We have a real issue with having the right homes in the right places and ensuring that registered providers are offering places for children who most need their care and support. With this consultation we are asking you to do even more to make sure you have safe, registered homes in your local area rather than relying on unregistered provision – which I absolutely know, you don’t want to do. Unregistered provision is unjust provision. Some of the most vulnerable children are placed in homes with no regulation, no oversight, no way to check their living conditions. No way to check if they’re being adequately protected. Ofsted can investigate unregistered providers if we receive reports about them operating – but we can’t inspect or regulate. We know from our criminal investigations that many of the children placed in these settings are those with the most complex needs. I know that there is great, great pressure when it comes to finding appropriate placements for these children. I know that there are difficult decisions and judgement calls that you must make quickly. But as I said – unregistered provision is not only unjust provision. It is also unlawful provision. These unregistered homes are illegal. We all need to ensure that there is sufficient provision available locally. Provision that’s registered with Ofsted, inspected and regulated by us and can therefore be proven to be safe. I’m not saying that it’s always easy. But it can and must be done. Because no child should grow up in a setting that is potentially dangerous. In the consultation we ask you about where in our inspection we should look at use of illegal unregistered provision. Right now, it sits across both the ‘children in care’ judgement and the ‘impact of leaders’ judgement. And we are proposing to place it solely within the ‘impact of leaders’ judgement. This is because we think the fundamental issue is how well local authorities are meeting their duty to ensure safe places for children. Our other proposal around unregistered provision is to make using it a ‘limiting criterion’. This would mean that using unregistered provision would not meet the requirements for the ‘expected standard’ grade. That’s a change we’re proposing no matter which evaluation area this issue ultimately sits in. Whether the grade is ‘needs attention’ or ‘urgent improvement’ would depend on the local authority’s circumstances. So, are you using unregistered provision often – or only in truly exceptional circumstances? Are leaders doing all they can to stop using unregistered provision? What is being done to create more legal placements in that local area? Are the exceptions very short term, and are providers of bespoke provision registering quickly? These are the sorts of things our inspectors would consider. I know this is one of the more challenging proposals. Circumstances are tough. These decisions you are having to make are difficult – more so in some regions than in others. I recognise that and I do not want you to feel as though your grades are being unfairly capped. But we do believe this change is necessary if we are to end the scourge of illegal children’s homes. As the regulator, we can’t tacitly say ‘using illegal children’s homes is ok’, which is what we would be doing if using these homes had no bearing on grades. This is a deep, deep problem for safeguarding and so we want to throw everything at it to help you move away from it. One way we are doing this is fixing our registration backlog. We know that it currently takes a long time to register and so we are strengthening how we prioritise the applications we receive. We need to be able to quickly register the children’s homes that the system – that all of you – needs. The right homes, in the right places. By prioritising registrations in areas of need, we will be able to sustain shorter wait times where the documentation, suitability and premises all meet the right standards. It means less time stuck in limbo, feeling like you have no other choice than to use unregistered children’s homes. Together we have to keep children and young people at the heart of this. It is they who are being housed in places we can’t confirm are safe. I know their wellbeing is what is in your minds when you make hard decisions. So please, keep that focus – keep their wellbeing at the front of your mind when you fill in the consultation. Better, safer care Everything we have laid out today is in the interests of better, safer care. Our aim is to focus on where improvement is needed most so that we can raise standards quickly. We propose to inspect all local authorities using a standard inspection as their first inspection under the renewed ILACS framework, regardless of your previous grade. This would give us a fair and consistent baseline that we can all work from. It would also allow us to change our core inspection cycle from at least once every 3 years to one where we inspect every 4 years. I hope that proposed extra year of breathing room gives you confidence that you would be able to make the most of the changes that will come about after this consultation closes, whatever they shape up to be. It also means we can focus on where the most urgent improvement is needed. We hope to carry out more inspection activities with those who are at the lowest end of the grade scale, encouraging them to improve their grades more quickly so that the biggest risks are dealt with as quickly as possible. Improvement is what we strive for. Whatever your starting point, whatever the starting point of the children and families you work with, we must move forwards from there. Fill out the consultation So before we take questions, I will say it one last time: Please fill out the consultation ! As I spoke about at the beginning, those opinions and thoughts and responses were the lifeblood of the Big Listen. We need a similar effort, to make sure all views are represented. It’s the only way to make this system better for those with experience of it. We will continue to speak to you while it’s open so keep an eye on our blog and on our social media. Share your expertise. Help us make this transformation work as well as it can. Help us to get better outcomes and change this system for generations to come. Thank you, Yvette and I are pleased to take questions.
Speech Brief