Agenda item

The Board gave consideration to a report of the Director of Education, Skills & Early Years which gave Members an update on the outcome of the SEND re-visit which took place on the week of September 26th, 2019. Due to the election there had been a delay in the final publication of the letter, and it had gone live to the public on the Local Offer on December 23rd, 2019.

Members were informed that the Local Authority, together with the local Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) (‘Local Partnership’) had responsibility under the Children and Families Act 2014 for an effective SEND provision.

An Inspection by Ofsted & the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in 2017 found that arrangements were not satisfactory and required the Council and CCG to co-produce with parents/carers a Written Statement of Action (WSOA) by 2 March 2018 on five recommendations.

In September 2019 an Ofsted/CQC re-visit took place and three of the five recommendations were signed off as completed. Two recommendations required further action, and these were being worked on at present. It was important to note that the revisit letter praised the Local Partnership in significantly taking forward all the recommendations, including the two outstanding recommendations. The report summarised the key points made in Ofsted CQC revisit and set out the strategy to take forward the remaining recommendations.

The Board were reminded that there were five areas in the original written statement of action. The inspection team said that sufficient progress had been made against three areas, with two remaining outstanding. Members noted there were many very positive comments and one of the key areas that had received positive commendation was leadership of change by the local partnership.

Robust processes had been put in place in respect of the remaining areas to ensure the necessary progress was made.

Members sought and received clarification on:

·       Managed moves – if a young person had an EHCP, there would not be managed move. For those with SEN support, there would be monitoring and evaluation, and a move would only happen with the support of the family and young person. Occasionally, a short-term measure of a move of 2/3 days in a different environment was used. Among secondary schools, clusters had been set up and pastoral support was being provided.

·       Improvement in ECHP’s – 1200-1300 reviews were undertaken in 12 months by the schools. The Council was working closely with schools and SENCO’s and all Plans should meet the required standards within 12 months.

·       Increased exclusions at Key Stage 4 – some new Heads had started with a zero-tolerance policy, which had caused an upturn in the figures. This had now been resolved and the rates were back where they were expected to be.

·       Minimising disruption caused by change – if the move was likely to be disruptive, it would be avoided.  Move would only be used if it was appropriate in a particular case.

·       Speech and language therapy – communication was a priority. Work was being undertaken with other organisations to avoid duplication, increase capacity and develop strategies. The best successes were where the family was totally engaged. A report on this would be brought to a future meeting.

·       Support for parents and children with new languages – the Council was working with the Harmony Trust on immersion programmes and there was a lot of good work happening.

·       Bringing those children permanently excluded back into the schools system – initially they would go to Kingsland and would then go back into school via the Fair Access Programme. Children would usually be back in school within 12 weeks.

·       Does a named person have an overview of EHCP’s – every family with an EHCP has a named Council officer to contact in addition to the SENCO. Quality control audits were now undertaken every month and a robust system was in place.

·       Inconsistency between schools – much less than in 2017-18. There were around 8500 pupils with SEN support and schools were willing to share and learn. SENCO meetings had a very high percentage of attendance.

Members noted the progress that had been made and requested that an update be brought to the Board in January 2021.

RESOLVED that:

1.     The Overview and Scrutiny Board commended the Local Partnership for their efforts made between 2017- 2019 which had resulted in a positive Ofsted re-visit letter that commended the transformational changes and improvement in outcomes achieved over the two years

2.     The Overview and Scrutiny Board requested an update report in January 2021.