Agenda item

Report CEF19023

The report presented the Bromley Safeguarding Children Board Annual Report 2018/19, covering the period from April 2018 to March 2019.  It was a statutory requirement (under Section 14A of the Children Act 2014) for safeguarding partnerships to publish an annual report.  The Committee noted that in line with statutory guidance the report would be submitted to Chief Executive, Leader of the Council, the local police and crime commissioner and the Chair of the Health and Wellbeing Board.

Mr Jim Gamble, Chairman of the Bromley Safeguarding Children Board (BSCB) attended the meeting to present the report and answer questions from the Committee.

The Committee noted that the report covered 2018 – 2019 and a great deal had changed in the intervening year.  The data and analysis within the report was being agreed by Ofsted and the headline data demonstrated that that the Early Intervention services continued to be “the diamond in the Crown” and other services (such as the MASH) were developing well.  Partners participated well, particularly in the context of austerity.  It was important to acknowledge that it had been a year of instability far many partners.  Of particular note were organisational changes within the Police and National Probation Service which inevitably had an impact on the partnership.

Going forward, the ‘number one’ priority for the partnership was the health and wellbeing of the workforce.  As such a close watch was being maintained on caseloads, workloads and supervision.  There was also an ongoing watch on understanding vulnerability, listening to and reflecting the child’s voice in everything the partnership did.  Taking a strategic approach to vulnerability and considering issues such as County Lines, Child Sexual Exploitation, radicalisation, and harmful practices within vulnerability rather than as standalone issues.

Another focus for the partnership was ensuring that strong, viable leadership which invited challenge remained in place.  There was also a need to ensure that the partnership continued to apply the lessons that had been learnt in more difficult times.  The Chairman of the Bromley Safeguarding Partnership suggested that, going forward, it would be helpful if the Partnership were to report to the PDS on trends, themes and patterns on a more frequent basis.

In response to a series of questions from the PDS Committee, the Chairman of the Bromley Safeguarding Children Partnership made the following points –

·  Access to technology was acting as an accelerator to mental health issues and unhappiness at home and as such consideration needed to be given to the integration of online harms with offline circumstances.

·  Whilst it was important that the Adult Safeguarding Board and the Children Safeguarding Partnership remained separate it had to be recognised that children were often at risk because they were in close proximity to adults who were putting them at risk or were vulnerable themselves.  Consequently there needed to be collaboration between both the adults’ and children’s partnerships in relation to practice learning reviews and neither partnership was missing opportunities ti collaborate.

·  The Bromley Safeguarding Partnership recognised the need for a more comprehensive understanding of gangs.  “Digital collateral” was of particular concern as this allowed gangs to have coercive control and influence over vulnerable young people.  As a result of the work that had already taken place the Bromley Safeguarding Children Partnership now had a profile that it did not have before and a task force had been established through the MEGA (Missing Exploitation and Gang Affiliation) Panel which remained alive to the issue.

·  The Chairman of the Bromley Safeguarding Children Panel had been in contact with the Housing Department and was confident that going forward their attendance would improve.   The Chairman of the partnership emphasised that he was being extremely robust about attendance.  The Committee noted that going forward one of the concerns was that agencies would be willing to attend meetings but unable to deliver.

·  There was a concern that going forward hubris to set in amongst elected councillors and co-opted members which is why it was important that there was more frequent reporting of trends, themes and patterns to the PDS Committee.

·  Learning and improvement were an important element of the work of the Partnership.  Training was available through the Apps that had been developed by the Partnership.  The Partnership also audited and analysed reports from other Safeguarding partnerships across the UK.

On behalf of the Committee, the Chairman thanked Mr Jim Gamble for his attendance at the meeting.  The Committee also agreed that it would be helpful for members to receive more frequent reporting of trends, themes and patterns identified by the Bromley Safeguarding Children Partnership.

RESOLVED: that going forward the Children, Education and Families PDS receive more frequent reporting of trends, themes and patterns identified by the Bromley Safeguarding Children Partnership.