Children safer since council overhaul

A commissioner sent in to fix issues at a council after the murder of a six-year-old boy has said there was a “sense of denial” when he first arrived.

Sir Alan Wood was appointed as a commissioner to help Solihull Council improve its children’s social care in the wake of Arthur Labinjo-Hughes’ death.

The authority came under intense scrutiny following the high-profile killing, which happened in Shirley in June 2020.

Sir Alan added that he was confident the borough’s children were safer now.

He was appointed in 2022, after former Education Secretary Kit Malthouse had said he was “unconvinced sufficient improvement had been made” at the authority.

In January 2023, Ofsted said Solihull children were not getting the help they needed, while inspectors identified “serious and widespread failings across all service areas”.

Sir Alan, the former director for children's services in Hackney, went on to publish a report recommending a three-year plan to urgently improve children’s social care services in Solihull.

He said: “Often when people go in there is denial. What happens after the inspection you hear: ‘The inspector got it wrong, they didn’t see this’.

“There was a sense of denial [in Solihull].”

Sir Alan said he felt the authority initially did not have the capacity to improve itself.

“I think some people expected I would recommend services were taken away from the authority,” he said.

“But because of some of the changes in leadership, with a new chief executive and a determined leader of the council, they were very open with me about what they wanted to do.”

He said they had accepted the inspection was a fair assessment of children’s services and were determined to sort it out.

Ofsted’s most recent monitoring visit, in January, found social work practice had improved and there had been progress after the council worked closely with Birmingham Children’s Trust on Sir Alan’s recommendation.

He said the quality of leadership, the authority’s initial contact with children at risk as well as its multi-agency working and the quality of social work had all improved.

“A key thing is the ethos and culture now is more clearly focused on children and the outcomes for children,” he said.

He added: “The council has put a great level of resourcing into children social care over the last two years,” Sir Alan said.

“I’m confident they will take the right decisions to keep children social care on its path to improvement.”

“The problems that existed two years ago do not exist now,” he said.

He believes the authority’s next Ofsted inspection will take place in autumn 2025.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.

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