Agenda item

To receive a report from the Chair of the Family and Childrens’ Services OSC.

Councillor Daley, Chair of the Family and Children’s OSC advised that interim reports from the Committee would now be presented at Council replacing the minutes of meetings which had previously been included. The membership of the Committee included co-opted representatives from different educational faith organisations along with teacher union representatives providing a detailed level of debate and scrutiny overview of the very granular detail provided in the reports.

A comprehensive introduction was provided on the report with Council advised that the Annual Report of the Principal Social Worker was a statutory report providing assurance on the work of the Social Work team.  In response to the reliance of agency staff the Council had created an Academy initiative to support newly qualified social workers in their first year which had been very successful.  Of the 36 key recommendations from the Home to School Transport Review 30 of them had now been adopted. The work had been undertaken in conjunction with an interested parent to develop a solution to issues with the system.  The School Improvement Team was made up of very experienced and knowledgeable staff who worked with schools to improve attainment and attendance.  A recommendation had been made to Cabinet not to reduce the funding for this service, which has been agreed. There had been a massive increase in the number of children and young people with an EHCP (Educational and Healthcare Plan) and a great deal of work had been undertaken to improve the quality of these plans and support pupils to stay in mainstream education. 

He offered thanks to Councillor Richard Dodd who had previously served as Vice-Chair of the Committee and welcomed Councillor Eve Chicken to that position, and thanked all those involved with the education of children and young people for their continued work.  Members were asked to contact him if they wished questions to be asked at the Committee or if there were issues that they felt required the Committee to scrutinise.

Councillor Grimshaw thanked the Committee for their excellent report and asked what was in place to ensure that the children of refugees were able to attend schools or SEND provision closest to their homes and if siblings were still being split up and sent to different schools.

Councillor Daley advised that the children of Ukrainian, Syrian and Afghanistan refugees were given priority in being offered the nearest school with available places, he was unable to answer whether siblings attended different schools, however Councillors should contact the Executive Director - Children, Young People and Education if they were aware of this as a guarantee had been given that children would attend their nearest school and that support with translation and mental health would be provided.

Councillor Gallacher wished to acknowledge the work undertaken by the School Transport section who had professionally dealt with problems caused by Covid, cost of living crisis and increases in fuel prices along with contractors entering into liquidation.   There was always an open dialogue between the Section and the contractors in developing different ways to provide the service. 

Councillor Daley stated that as part of the review, Officers spoke to other local authorities and looked at different models and they had now developed a pilot model offering different ways of providing the service and was a really innovative solution for both urban and rural mix.  He would ask A. Kingham to pass on the thanks and comments to the team.