Agenda and minutes

In the absence of the Chair, the Vice Chair, Councillor Michelle O’Doherty welcomed everyone to the meeting and acted as Chair for the duration of it.

Councillors Vic Pritchard, Joanna Wright and Rob Appleyard had all sent their apologies to the Panel.

Kevin Burnett, Co-opted Member had also sent his apologies to the Panel.

At this point in the meeting declarations of interest are received from Members in any of the agenda items under consideration at the meeting. Members are asked to indicate:

(a) The agenda item number in which they have an interest to declare.

(b) The nature of their interest.

(c) Whether their interest is a disclosable pecuniary interest or an other interest,  (as defined in Part 2, A and B of the Code of Conduct and Rules for Registration of Interests)

Any Member who needs to clarify any matters relating to the declaration of interests is recommended to seek advice from the Council’s Monitoring Officer or a member of his staff before the meeting to expedite dealing with the item during the meeting.

Councillor Gerry Curran declared an other interest with regard to agenda item 8 ‘Cabinet Member Update’ as he is an employee of HCRG Care Group.

There were none.

The Panel confirmed the minutes of the previous meeting as a true record and they were duly signed by the Chair.

The Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Communities will update the Panel on any relevant issues. Panel members may ask questions on the update provided.

Councillor Dine Romero, Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Communities addressed the Panel, a copy of the update will be attached as an online appendix to these minutes.

Councillor Liz Hardman asked that with the 25% increase in SEND cases nationally and with the scarcity of places in our special needs schools as reported in the media, what are we doing to increase our capacity to provide for these children and should our Special Needs schools only admit children from B&NES.

The Head of Education Inclusion Service replied that this is a recognised issue in B&NES and as such she is leading on increasing the sufficiency of places in B&NES. She said that there are 2 main strands to this, to increase the number of Resource Bases attached to mainstream schools and to submit a bid to the DfE to open a new free special school.

·  Currently B&NES has 5 Resource Bases and the plan is to increase this by an additional 5-7 bases in the next 2 years using the grant money allocated by the DfE.  The places in a Resource Base vary from 10 - 20 places.

·  The DfE have opened the wave to enable LA’s to bid for new free special schools.  In the SEND Green Paper they have committed to opening 60 new schools.  B&NES has submitted the first part - an expression of interest to open 120 place all through generic special school on the Keynsham/Chew side of the authority.

She stated that under the legalities of the SEND system (Children & Families Act 2014) it is not possible for our special schools statutorily to admit only pupils from B&NES. However, the 3 schools in B&NES have a very high percentage of B&NES pupils in comparison to other LA children.  B&NES also places in other LA schools.

·  In Aspire in June 2022 – 92% of the pupils are B&NES pupils

·  In Three Ways in 2020/21 – 84% of the pupils are B&NES pupils

·  In Fosse Way in 2020/21 – 88% of the pupils are B&NES pupils

She said that work will take place with MATs and individual schools to embed SEN support.

Councillor Gerry Curran said that news of a potential new special school was good to hear and asked if any sites had yet been identified and was Keynsham an option.

The Head of Education Inclusion Service replied that no sites had yet been identified and that discussions were ongoing with the Planning department.

Councillor Andy Wait asked what the St John’s Foundation Primary Empowerment Programme look like in practice.

The Director of Children's Services & Education replied that St. John’s are engaged with the 7 primary schools that have 40% of the most disadvantaged primary school children in Bath and North East Somerset to provide pupils with additional support with foundational reading, writing, oracy, and mathematics, as well as emotional support. She added that there was a particular focus on speech and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 33.

The Panel will receive an update from the B&NES, Swindon & Wiltshire Clinical Commissioning Group (BSW CCG) on current issues.

The Chair introduced the report to the Panel and explained that a representative of the Board was unable to attend and therefore any questions would be responded to in writing. A copy of the update will be attached as an online appendix to these minutes.

The Panel had no questions regarding the update.

The Chair invited Jane Rowland, Associate Director of Mental Health Transformation (BSW ICS) to address the Panel.

Jane Rowland gave a presentation to the Panel entitled ‘B&NES Child and Adolescent Mental Health Update’, a copy of which will be attached as an online appendix to these minutes and a summary is set out below.

She said that colleagues from Oxford Health would like to attend a future meeting of the Panel to provide a further update.

Aligning priorities – MH and BSW Model of Care

·  Working together to empower people to lead their best life

o  Starting well

o  Living well

o  Ageing well

·  Personalised care – We want health and care to be right for every individual – not ‘one size fits all’

·  Healthier communities – We want people to live in communities that help

them to live healthier lives

·  Joined-up local teams – People from the NHS, local authority, third sector and other partners will form teams together and we will have the right teams in your area

·  Local specialist services – We will provide more access to routine

appointments, tests and treatments closer to where you live

·  Specialist centres – Our specialist centres like hospitals will focus less on routine care and more on specialist health and care

Context – Population

NHS England benchmark data for us every year in relation to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services.

B&NES has a lower percentage of the population aged 0 – 18 that receive these services. Swindon has the highest across the BSW footprint.

Context – Needs

B&NES is higher than the national median and mean for the percentage of school pupils with social, emotional and mental health needs.

Important to consider this when we structure the services required within our local communities.

National context

Covid has had an effect on the mental health of children and young people – this cannot be underestimated.

Referrals to CAMHS increased significantly during the pandemic.

Regional context

The number of referrals accepted by Oxford Health (BSW) is high in comparison to other South West areas and that should be seen as a positive. This shows that the right number of children and young people are being referred to receive the services they need.

Waiting times

Oxford Health (BSW) performs really well in terms of waiting times and is low in comparison to neighbouring areas.

There is a need to try to provide access to local services whilst waiting for actual CAMHS treatment to lessen the impact of waiting times.

Key findings (BSW)

Overall our children and young people are less affected by income deprivation and their mental health needs are slightly lower than the national average.

The number of children and young people in need due to abuse / neglect is also lower than the national average.

We are however higher than the national average for the number of school pupils that have with social, emotional and mental health needs and the number of 16 – 24 year olds  ...  view the full minutes text for item 35.

The attached report outlines the rationale behind the decision to no longer engage a B&NES young person to be a Member of Youth Parliament and the next steps that will be taken to ensure a wider engagement plan for children and young people.

The Director of Children's Services & Education introduced this report to the Panel. She said that it outlined the rationale and next steps that will be taken to ensure a wider engagement plan for children and young people.

She said that an event was due to take place on July 20^th with young people to discuss local decision making.

She stated that the current contract with Off The Record (OTR) 2021-2024 will be delivered within the current financial envelope.

She added that the proposal has the support of the Cabinet Member for Children and Young People, Communities.

Councillor Liz Hardman said that she agreed with the recommendations from Off The Record to be more inclusive in the delivery of children and young people’s participation by focusing more on the Youth Forum. She added though that the Youth Member elections were always an excellent opportunity for young people to participate in an electoral process.

She asked if OTR could still support the UKMP elections in BANES by promoting them through other networks.

The Director of Children's Services & Education replied that OTR would still support anyone who wants to stand in this election.

Councillor Hardman commented that the newly formed Bath Student Parliament sounds a very exciting project and said she had noticed that we are supporting the development and expansion of it. She asked if there is anything in place yet to include schools in North East Somerset.

The Director of Children's Services & Education replied that the Strategic Commissioning Officer will follow up directly with OTR about participation of North East Somerset young people. She added that they would welcome any updates on local youth groups from across the Council and would support their interaction with the Youth Forum.

Councillor Hardman asked how local groups will be informed of events held by the Youth Forum as they are normally informed by Youth Connect South West.

The Director of Children's Services & Education replied that Youth Connect South West works alongside the Youth Forum and that OTR will seek to promote future network events as widely as possible.

Councillor Paul May commented that he has a long-term connection with OTR and asked if there will be a recommissioning process in the future and an assessment made of what has worked / not worked.

The Director of Children's Services & Education replied that the participation contract would be reprocured at some point in the future and it would be hoped that the best provider would be successful. She added that within the contract it would be specified for the need to work with and support the Youth Forum on the wider participation of children and young people in BANES.

Councillor Andy Wait explained that he was a lead mentor for Keynsham Now, a similar organisation to OTR, and had noticed a change in emphasis from OTR and the Youth Parliament. He said that recently contact with OTR had increased and had included their attendance at a meeting in Keynsham and that Keynsham Now had chosen  ...  view the full minutes text for item 36.

The Plan sets out how services are to be organised and funded and what functions they will carry out to prevent youth offending and re-offending across Bath and North East Somerset.

The Director of Children's Services & Education introduced this report to the Panel. She explained that the Local Authority has a statutory duty, in partnership with Health, Police and Probation, to produce an annual Youth Justice Plan and that the Plan sets out how services are to be organised and funded and what functions they will carry out to prevent youth offending and re-offending across Bath and North East Somerset.

She stated that the Plan is also due to be presented to Cabinet, then Council for approval and then submitted to the national Youth Justice Board (YJB).

She also gave the Panel a presentation on the matter, a copy of which will be available as an online appendix to these minutes and a summary is set out below.

Crime and Disorder Act 1998

·  Establishment of multi-agency Youth Offending Teams (YOT)

·  Council as lead partner, with Health, Probation and Police Services having a duty to co-operate and help resource

·  Statutory purpose to prevent children offending

·  Requirement to produce an annual Youth Justice Plan

·  Receipt of national grant dependent on submission of the Plan

Child First Principles

1.  See children as children – Prioritise best interests of children, recognising their particular needs, capacities, rights and potential. All work is child-focused and developmentally informed

2.  Develop pro-social identity for positive child outcomes – Promote children’s individual strengths and capacities as a means of developing their pro-social identity for sustainable desistance…. All work is constructive and future-focused, built on supportive relationships that empower children to fulfil their potential and make positive contributions to society

3.  Collaboration with children – Encourage children’s active participation, engagement and wider social inclusion. All work is meaningful collaboration with children and their carers

4.   Promote diversion – Promote a childhood removed from the justice system, using pre-emptive prevention, diversion, and minimal intervention. All work minimises criminogenic stigma from contact with the system.

Prevention and Diversion

• Rate of children coming into justice system is lowest it has been since 2000
• More children go to Out of Court Disposal Panel or are diverted by Police

Re-Offending after 12 months

• Latest comparative data is for July 2019 - June 2020 cohort
• 32% children re-offended, lower than all comparators apart from ‘family’ group (31.5%)
• Of those who did re-offend, the average number of new offences was 2.88, much better than all comparators (range from 3.61 – 3.9)

Custodial sentencing

·  Number very low – none in the last 12 months. Also, no custodial remands in the last 12 months

·  Strong community proposals have enabled Court to sentence in the community

·  Wider context of considerably reducing child custodial population

Strategic Priorities

1.  Strengthen participation – Children’s, parents’/carers’ and victims’. YOT Management Board meetings to begin with either a case study or an item that highlights the ‘Voice of the Child’.

2.  Address disproportionality – Black and dual heritage children, girls and those with SEND

3.  Extend practice models – Trauma informed, systemic and restorative practice

4.  Tackle exploitation – Contextual safeguarding audit, serious violence duty  ...  view the full minutes text for item 37.

This report presents the latest workplan for the Panel. Any suggestions for further items or amendments to the current programme will be logged and scheduled in consultation with the Panel’s Chair and supporting officers.

The Chair introduced this item to the Panel. She said that during the course of the meeting she had noted that they wish to propose the following items to be added to the workplan.

·  Invite St. John’s Foundation to talk about their work within schools

·  Exam Results

·  School Standards Board update

Councillor Dine Romero also offered to bring an update report on ‘Addressing Inequalities’ to the Panel.

The Panel RESOLVED to approve these proposals.