HERTFORDSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL

CHILDREN’S SERVICES AND CORPORATE PARENTING PANEL

WEDNESDAY 4 JULY 2012 AT 10.00 A.M.

HertfordshireCounty Council Corporate Parenting Strategy

Report of the Director of Children’s Safeguarding and Specialist Services

Author: Marion Ingram, Operations Director, Specialist Services. Tel:01992 588620

Executive Member: Richard Roberts, Executive Member for Children’s Services

  1. Purpose of report

1.1To introduce the draft Corporate Parenting Strategy

  1. Summary

2.1Corporate Parenting is the term used to describe the collective responsibility of the Council and its partners towards Children Looked After and Care Leavers. Effective Corporate Parenting requires that ‘the local authority’ should look after the children in its care as any other parent would look after their child.

2.2The draft Corporate Parenting Strategy, attached at Appendix A, has been developed to describe the way that Corporate Parenting responsibilities will be met by both elected Members and officers. It also identifies a series of actions that we will carry out together, over the coming year, to evidence our commitment to ‘our’ children and to improve their lifechances.

3.Recommendation

3.1Members endorse the model for implementing Corporate Parenting and the overall strategy.

3.2Members consider the actions identified as being associated with their role and either propose amendments to the Strategy or commit, as individuals, to working to achieve the actions specified.

4.Background

4.1“Central government, local authorities and their partners inchildren’s trusts, individual professionals and carers all share aresponsibility for ensuring the best for children and young peoplein care – as they would for their own children. Children in careshould be cared about, not just cared for” (Care Matters: Time forChange, DFES, June 2007)

4.2When a child becomes cared for by Hertfordshire, the Council becomes their

Corporate Parent. This means that the councillors elected to represent the Council, everyone who works for the Council and all relevant partners assume a responsibility in fulfilling the corporate parent role.

4.3At the Children’s Services and Corporate Parenting Panel, 01.02.12, following a discussion about Corporate Parenting, the Children in Care Council gave a presentation which included them telling the Panel their aspirations with regard to their Corporate Parents.

4.4The young people listed the following aspirations:

  • Get to know (about) Children Looked After and Care Leavers
  • Put Children Looked After First
  • Use their influence to help us
  • Be ambitious for us
  • Promote the educational aspirations of Children Looked After
  • Give us employment and apprenticeship opportunities within the County
  • Help us have stable, consistent relationships with social workers and carers
  • Help Children Looked After and Care Leavers cope with loneliness
  • Give better support to Care Leavers
  • Give us a mentor if we want one (young people aged 16 years and over).

4.5The Panel recommended that the young people’s aspirations be taken forward by a sub-group of the Health and Wellbeing Board and that the subgroup develop a Corporate Parenting Strategy for Hertfordshire.

4.6The Strategy attached at Appendix A has been developed through the work ofthe Children and Young People Living Away from Home (CYPLAH) Strategic Commissioning Group,further meetings with the Children in Care Council, improvement planning across the different service areas and using the paper originally presented to Panel.

4.7The Strategy outlines a council-wide vision of how we will fulfil our role as

corporate parents and ensures that we are all, supported by our partners, working

towards common ‘ends’ regarding our Children Looked After and Care Leavers. It does not provide an exhaustive list of activities but rather, it identifies some of the activities that we are carrying out in those areas that ‘our’ children identified as being amongst the most important.

4.8The Strategy will be monitored over the course of the year through the CYPLAH SCG and it will be formally reviewed for 2013/14.

5.Financial Implications

5.1Implementation of the finalised Corporate Parenting Strategy does not, in itself, have any financial implications. Elements of the Strategy which may have resource implications will be addressed through the ongoing management and development of the relevant service area.

6.Equalities Implications

6.1Children in Care and Care Leavers are amongst the most disadvantaged within the community and every effort must be made to improve outcomes for this group of children and young people.

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