Agenda item

To receive and consider the Annual Report of the Director of Social Services.

Background:

The report…

• Was a requirement from the Director of Social Services from the Social Services and Wellbeing Act (2014).
• Had been presented to full Council in July 2024.
• Had been translated into Welsh and would be published soon. Copies would be shared with Welsh Ministers and Care Inspectorate Wales and be published on Powys County Council’s website. It was noted that translation costs had been reduced by piloting an AI translation tool.

• Work had been aligned to the Council’s vision; Stronger, Fairer, Greener and contributed to regional and national agendas of prevention, intervention and collaboration.
• Positive Feedback and recognition were received from external regulators, including the Joint Inspection of Child Protection Arrangements, which praised multi agency partnership working and safeguarding practise.
• The report noted a reduced reliance on agency workers and improved staff engagement and retention.

Challenges:

Challenges, post COVID included an increased:

• Demand on services,
• Complexity of care needs,
• Cost for commission.

Children’s Services Performance:

• Children’s Services had seen an improved position over the previous year. A revised and updated improvement plan continued to be implemented following self-evaluation.
• The number of Children on the Child Protection Register decreased by 15% from 309 at the end of March 2023 to 263 at the end of March 2024. This reflected improved decision making, risk management and increased use of alternative plans and interventions.
• The total ‘Looked After Children’ had increased by 11% from 213 to 236, mainly caused by an increased number of Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children who arrived in Powys as part of the UK Government’s resettlement scheme.
• The number of ‘Children in Need’ had decreased by 5%. This reflected the improved application of threshold criteria and the stepping up and stepping down processes.
• The service had enhanced its early help and prevention offer through the development of the Family Support Service and expansion of the Flying Start Programme.
• Timeliness of statutory assessments had increased from 79% to 84%, which exceeded the national average.
• The percentage of children with an up-to-date care and support plan had improved.
• The percentage of ‘Looked After Children’ who had three or more placements had increased, which was over the national average, this was mainly due to the increased number of Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children. A placement sufficiency strategy and an action plan were being put into place to improve this.
• The percentage of ‘Children Looked After’ participating in reviews had improved to 91%, again above the national average.

Children’s Services Priorities were to continue to:

• Embed and sustain improvements in safeguarding practice.
• Develop and implement early help and prevention.
• Improve the timeliness and quality of assessments, care plans and reviews.
• Improve placement stability and permanence for Looked After Children.
• Promote the participation and engagement of children and young people.

Adult Services Performance:

• 4.5% increase in contacts that came into the service from the previous year.
• Improvement of proportion of assessments completed within the 42 days from 84 to 88%, exceeding the national average.
• Adult services delivered significant savings through efficiency measures over the last year although the ongoing challenges of budgets and increased costs were noted.
• The service received positive feedback from service users and carers with 92% of annual survey respondents being ‘satisfied’ or ‘very satisfied’.
• There were ongoing challenges due to increased service demand and staff absences.
• Across children’s and adults’ services difficulty in recruiting and retaining staff remained, particularly in rural areas and specialist roles.

Priorities for Adult Services:

Priorities included to:

• • Promote independence and wellbeing,
  • Enable choice and control,
  • Support carers,
  • Improve outcomes for people with complex needs.
  • Strengthen partnerships and collaborations.
• Strategic objectives would continue to be pursued.
• Digital and technological solutions were an ongoing priority.
• Improving data, intelligence, embedding co-production and engagement and support in development and well-being.