The Right Placement, at the Right Time in the Right Place

Below are a few recent articles referencing to the unfunded statements made by some MP’s in recent weeks which from a very non bias stance, are unfounded from “over inflated weekly fee’s”, statements of “No child shall be placed out of authority when our party get in” and “how can we have a system where perpetrators know where Childrens homes are and we don’t” and further distortions of the truth all to continue the current scaremongering of Childrens Homes.

Ofsted have again published there Data Sets for Childrens Homes and summery documents within based on fact, not fiction. These documents show the collated information from the governments own watchdog and regulator about distance placements, overall judgement grades and the amount of GOOD and OUTSTANDING children homes there are out there and range of services available. http://media.education.gov.uk/assets/files/pdf/c/childrens%20homes%20data%20pack%202013.PDF

Jonathan Stanley, the CEO of ICHA the Independent Childrens Homes Association has given a good response to these documents within the Huffington Post and shows that a just a little bit more understanding of what Childrens home are, can achieve and where we should really fit into the social care system should be reviewed and views updated and practices changed to put the child first. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/jonathan-stanley/government-data-telling-n_b_4012055.html

This is by no means to the benefit of the private provider, in my opinion it makes it harder for ourselves but if you provide, operate and maintain a good solid ethical service and operate for the right reasons then these reports are not a cause for concern but only aid you to aim higher.

If interpreted properly then it is all for the benefit for the child and allows everyone involved, commissioners, placement officers, social workers and providers to provide a placement that is the Right Placement, at the Right Time in their life and in the Right geographical location for their needs.

The Inspector from Ofsted, they say YES to The Hollies

Great and exciting news today, we have been granted approval for our second home to formally open and offer our exceptional care service to more children.

Though there is still some work to do before I’m ready to open the doors. The whole staff team, regardless of past experiences have a 1 ½ week induction course to complete, inducted in to the home’s processes, paperwork, further training in First Aid, Health and Safety, Safeguarding inc CSE awareness, Behaviour management, ASD behavioural needs and understand and many others before I’m happy we can open our doors.

It’s frustrating for all but I want things right as i don’t think our first residents will want us learning on the job, they will have high expectations of us too and I’m not prepared to let them down at all in any way

Accelerated reports on CSE, Hollies update

There’s been a tremendous amount happening within the Residential Childcare, further convictions of CSE perpetrators, reports of the investigations in to the Rochdale events and others being accelerated and rumours of what changes that will bring the Childrens homes, OfSTED and the DoEMNSand regulations for Childrens homes having further revisions & a general unease within the sector.

From my perspective and how Harmony strives to keep it residents, staff and home safe from abuse in and out of the homes I feel that we are in a good position to take on board and embrace any changes for the better as a result of these developments and it makes a for a better safe life for the children not just in our care, but any care anywhere in the country then that’s no bad thing.

Closer to home, I have been advised OfSTED plan to conduct their registration inspection of The Hollies later on in the month, bit like a driving test, keeping schtum on the date.

Confident as always in what we offer and can offer, as we have taken the practice of Harmony House, added some further one pertinent to The Hollies and hopefully developed a better home that continues the path of continuous progression we started back in 2011.

Recuitment is going well, we have identified our registered manager and confident in their appointment that they will absorb, embrace and continually promote the Harmony ethos of nurturing, understanding and life long learning and embed this in all their staff and the resident we will care for.

Well its back to the last bits of painting, finishing the homely decorating off, checking paperwork is all in place and some therapeutic gardening for me still to do before the visit mid May.

The Hollies, Accelerated CSE reports, keeping kids safer

There’s been a tremendous amount happening within the Residential Childcare, further convictions of CSE perpetrators, reports of the investigations in to the Rochdale events and others being accelerated and rumours of what changes that will bring the Childrens homes, OfSTED and the DoE MNSand regulations for Childrens homes having further revisions & a general unease within the sector.

Closer to home, I have been advised OfSTED plan to conduct their registration inspection of The Hollies later on in the month, bit like a driving test, keeping schtum on the date.

Well its back to the last bits of painting, finishing the homely decorating off, checking paperwork is all in place and some therapeutic gardening for me still to do before the visit mid May.

The Hollies is near opening

What a busy month it’s been for Harmony.

We have secured and in the process of fully renovating our new 3 bed home, The Hollies in Huddersfield up to our usual high standards authorities have come to expect from Harmony.

The dated duck egg blue bathroom suit has gone, bedrooms redesigned, en-suites plumbed in, full redecoration and a big thank you to furniture suppliers at InStore inLeeds. Simon has always been able to provide the sturdy, robust furniture for all our rooms and provide bespoke if needed.

That said I’m getting tired of seeing the inside of IKEA with names you can not pronounce, but when the home comes together for the Ofsted Inspection it will look a lovely, homely environment I expect from all our homes.

Now to get the photographer in for shots for the website, get more paint and best get back to varnishing all our internal doors before my brush dries out.

The Needless Criminalisation of Childrens in Care

My attention was drawn to something this week that has been an ongoing concern of mine since starting as a support worker 15 years ago. I have often come across children in my care who have records of assault, battery, racial abuse or other violent and anti social convictions.

The article I read on the BBC web site( http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-21773742 ) put me at ease that my approach as been right for some time that far too many of these convictions were unjustified and more down to heavy handed tactics from the support worker and at times encouraged by the organisation as sanction / consequence of the young persons actions.

The BBC article discuss the use of Restorative Justice as a tool and I am proud to say we have been using this method within Harmony since opening, use this methodology as basis of our ethos and myself and Julie have been using this approach for a number of years before Harmony.

That is not to say that it is inappropriate to use the police for criminal activities but I personally would like to see real criminality, e.g street robbery, offensive weapons, GBH etc most of which are pre meditated and use of the powers of the police is justified.

Having read various reports and referral information I have at time had to re-read and seek further information from professionals on what the mitigating circumstances must have been in order to get these convictions. Some of them have bee laughable but have potentially ruined the prospects and life’s of the young person.

Their card is marked so speak when ever a DBS check (CRB in old money) is carried out if they wish to work in a shop with money perhaps and /or even turn their life around and like some wish to give something back by become a support worker to help others.

It is important to understand where the young person has come from in their life, what has made them who they are and what their understanding of their behaviours is after you have considered all that and the reasoning behind their actions you are more than likely to have much more progress after clear reflective discussion on their actions, advising of alternative options and only after that , discuss the criminal aspects of their actions and that continued repletion will result in a course of actions.

This approach and what has become the “Harmony Way” then allows them to start making changes to their behaviours and then allows our staff to see, praise ad reward their progression.

Poverty, neglect, deterioration in parenting skills and the effects or a quicker train – you decide???

Hello again,

It’s been a busy few months at Harmony, children coming and children moving on to further independence in their own right and hopefully using the skills and knowledge taught to them whilst at Harmony.

My time has been taken up on other new areas within Harmony but right now I’m not able to go into detail as things are not quite finalised, but they are nearly there and will provide further strings to our bow so to speak.

I have been reading and watching what has been happing and being highlighted within our industry not just within theUKbut all over the world. Childrens being used in theSyriaconflict, the shocking start to the year with the tragic and senseless shootings in Sandy Brook school in theUS. The other shootings, paedophile rings being broken up and children being found murdered over the last few months have really highlighted the shift within the US since their financial troubles have started to hit the nations. The government is starting to take control with changes in the gun laws are a good start. Though an interesting fact, during the 8 days when there was heavy snow inNew York, not one murder was reported.

Closer to home, and I have to say I am surprised the report has taken so long to come out, Sky News have ran and article on “Poverty blamed for increase in child neglect”. http://news.sky.com/story/1048173/poverty-blamed-for-increase-in-child-neglect

Having working for too many years to remember in care I have seen the financial strain, one way or another, be it social economic or just the cost of looking after there disabled child faced by parents with children in need and I am not surprised by the content, only the time its taken to come to light.

The times austerity were, (and I don’t thing anyone can argue really) needed to try to get the county back in the black. But at what cost??. There were always areas that should not have been affected and cutting millions from our Childrens and Adults funding pots was only a quick fix, with little thought for the future and consequences of the decisions which will ultimately prove more costly in the long run.

The causes of poverty can only be addressed so much by governments and councils to alleviate the root causes of poverty, loss of employment, victims of over spending / committing etc etc….

However something can be done to help the innocent victims in all this and address the deterioration in parenting skills bring with it neglect, poverty and internal psychological damage that can be caused to children from the effects of neglect and help address these so the patterns are not repeated in later life with their own children as can often happen.

As the article goes on to explain how the services there in place to work with and deal with the effects of poverty are having their budgets cut, mounting pressure on services that are now unable to cope and have become less able to deal with the effects effectively, thus adding to the problems faced.

I am not going to say I have a fix that easy, I don’t own the royal mint to print more money, I can not fix the budgets given to the councils or dictate where it is spent, all I can do is make a difference to the kids that come to Harmony as a result of a background of poverty, neglect and to make a difference to their life’s. What I do know is that the estimated £32.7 billion on a couple of train tracks can be spent better else where.

Next time I hope to be able to share some better news about developments within Harmony and the additional and exciting new routes were are hoping to branch in to.

Childrens commissioner’s interim report published

The long awaited Childrens commissioner’s interim report from the ongoing 2 year enquiry on child sexual exploitation in the UKas been published on the 21^st November, with the final report scheduled for publishing in autumn 2013.

http://www.childrenscommissioner.gov.uk/content/press_release/content_486

Maggie Atkinson, the Children’s Commissioner for England, said:

“This report is a wake-up call. Each and every one of us owes it to all victims to be vigilant, to listen and to act to stop the sexual exploitation of children. Identifying the warning signs listed in the report is the first step to identifying and protecting children.

“We welcome the increase in awareness of child sexual exploitation and the progress agencies have made in their approaches to tackling the issue. However, much still needs to be done to prevent exploitation and rescue child victims.”

The report goes further to give the factual account of individuals about their experiences and being coerced and embroiled in CSE at different levels. For me it’s the different levels that have being highlighted that should cause us the concerns with our own children and those in our care.

The gangs and gang culture involved in this practice are for some a new area that was not though about before and should make some parents take further action to protect their children from their supposed fiends and even more reasons to bring in stronger laws to help manage the gang culture in major cities up and down the country.

Professor Jenny Pearce, University of Bedfordshire goes on to say in the report “Our interviews with children living in gang affected neighbourhoods across England leave us shocked by the extreme levels of sexual violence that are assumed to be inevitable in the everyday lives of the children concerned. Evidence shows routine serious sexual assault of girls for whom saying ‘no’ is not an option because they are threatened and forced into sex. Although boys needed prompting to talk, they spoke about sex being used as both intimidation and humiliation between boys who are in conflict with each other.

The report covers the expected areas supplying statistical facts towards the race creeds & ethnic cultures and ages which allow you to draw your own conclusions with some statistics that would surprise you, of the 1514 identified perpetrators, 545 were classified as white, 514 Asian and 244 black. The remaining 211 were classes as unknown (which is somewhat a concern).

Children and young people Now magazine has a good article that demonstrates the various important statistics. http://www.cypnow.co.uk/cyp/news/1075410/inquiry-identifies-thousands-victims-sexual-exploitation?utm_content=&utm_campaign=211112_Daily&utm_source=Children%20%26%20Young%20People%20Now&utm_medium=adestra_email&utm_term=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cypnow.co.uk%2Fcyp%2Fnews%2F1075410%2Finquiry-identifies-thousands-victims-sexual-exploitation

What I find most disappointing is that, not only has the exploitation of children been going on for years, as the TV is keen to now point out all the old figure heads children used to look up to are being questioned 20-30 years later.

In this day and age when we are so much more aware of signs, professionals and parents and others that work with children. We should be much more pro active at stopping this from starting and dealing with things when we are too late, but at times I see that with children in care it quite often boils back down to lazy staff, poor relationships with staff and poorly staffed homes that don’t do enough to stop this before it’s too late and the young person is lost to the perpetrators.

We has responsible adults and provider of services essentially based on a moral code to what right for the young person, should not be too scared to say that at times the best solution is to move the young person out of the area and allow a fresh start away from the pull and possibility of seeing their perpetrators again. All too often, I see and hear of children placed in house or in the same area as they were experiencing the exploitation that they can never really escape it and just live in fear.

That said I’m not too naive to think it does not happen to other children from all walks of life from those in poverty and need through to those with expensive private education all are targets, it just that the methods are different.

How safeguarding has changed in the years – Savile and Co would never get close to kids now

I am trying to keep a healthy distance from the whole Jimmy Savile, and no doubt others, scandal as there has been so much on it already and no doubt more to be said in later weeks as hopefully all of it comes out in to the open.

It was, it seems, somewhat a quietly acknowledged fact that this behaviour occurs/ed at this level of unquestioned celebrity status and more so was allowed to continue without checks. All except the ill feeling he caused to the Children in Need producers, who have saved numerous children, from this county and maybe others from his evil actions and life long damage caused.

A good I read shows the time line of how child protection and what is now know as Safeguarding has developed, but it should have shown its real roots in the first prosecution though the Cruelty to Animals Act where it all started. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20093812

It discusses the effects of post mortems of different events, the most significant was the Ian Huntley murders where he was able to play a very week system to his advantage by just moving to a different region and even when questioned but not charged several times it was never flagged up. Thankfully we now have the soft evidence section on the enhanced CRB’s we receive where this type of information is flagged up that helps us now look further past the person at interview and what their references have to see.

At Harmony we carry out CRB’s on everyone who may come into contact with the young people placed in our care, this goes from myself as MD through to our maintenance team. I have also no issue with checking out external visitor from Reg 33’s even though they can provide extensive evidence themselves.

My major concern still remains, like any national check, it is only as good as the day the check was made. However, recently, I have learnt though some communications with senior staff within West Yorkshire Police that they have the ability to inform myself if any staff member is questioned arrested or charged, thus making our own reliance on staff informing ourselves as part of our routine supervision system more robust. We can inform them, before they inform us. Not a bad belt and braces approach. It is about finding out all the information you need without becoming too paranoid and over questioning everything to the point of losing the whole reason of why you were looking in the first place.

4 in a row for Harmony House

I am very proud to be able to say that Ofsted carried out an unannounced interim inspection on the morning of Monday 22nd October and came to a conclusion that we still deserve our “GOOD” rating and that we were demonstrating “good progression” with the home and with the children in our care.

Once again a big thank you to our Home Manager Julie and to all the staff and young people for helping achieve this recent praising endorsement by Ofsted.

Once the formal letter has been published I will share the link to it with you all in our Ofsted Section.

I’ve just read on Children and Young people Now web site about the Directors of Children’s Services have launched an inquiry into the purpose of the care system, as part of plans to radically improve provision for looked-after children across the country. http://www.cypnow.co.uk/cyp/news/1075093/adcs-launch-inquiry-care?utm_content=&utm_campaign=241012_Daily&utm_source=Children%20%26%20Young%20People%20Now&utm_medium=adestra_email&utm_term=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cypnow.co.uk%2Fcyp%2Fnews%2F1075093%2Fadcs-launch-inquiry-care

That looks like an interesting read.

Mark

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