Issue - meetings

The Board gave consideration to a report and presentation updating them on the Ofsted/CQC Inspection and Progress on Written Statement of Action

WSOA) May/June 2018.

The Board were informed that in October 2017, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC), conducted a joint Inspection of Oldham to judge its effectiveness in implementing the disability and special educational needs (SEN) reforms as set out in the Children and Families Act 2014. Although this outlined areas of strength/further improvement it was determined that a joint Written Statement of Action was submitted to Ofsted because of significant areas of weakness in the local area’s practice.

A joint Written Statement of Action (WSOA) from the LA/CCG was produced with input from key partners and submitted to Ofsted on 2 March 2018.  WSOA approved by Ofsted - 22 March 2018. Ofsted noted that the statement of action could be further improved by having clearer outcomes and this has been responded to.

The WSOA was published on the Oldham SEND Local Offer on 23 March 2018. In line with a WSOA the LA and CCG were subject to joint Bi-Monthly Monitoring and Support reviews from the Department for Education (DfE) and NHS England (NHSE).  3 joint review meetings had been held in Dec18, Mar18 and May18 with DfE and NHSE to review progress against the WSOA. Further meetings were due in July 2018 and September 2018.

In October 2018 the DfE would submit a report to the Minister detailing progress within Oldham. This report would also recommend whether progress against the WSOA was sufficient for ongoing oversight from DfE and NHSE to cease. Progress would be considered under each priority.

The Board understood that the agenda around SEND was very large and the need to produce constant progress reports had diverted resources. It was hoped these could now be freed up and they were informed that initial recruitment to the service would be over and above the structure to support the necessary change and deal with the huge influx of work. Progress on SEND would be reported to the Partnership Board.

RESOLVED that the extensive improvement was noted and further updates would be received.