Wigan child social care is blasted by watchdog

The findings of a new Ofsted inspection make tough reading in places as it flags up a lack of forward planning by senior staff, weaknesses and delays in communication between the department and police, and an avoidable over-reliance on agency staff.

The watchdog says some team managers are trying to supervise every case open to a social worker - up to 350 a month - making it tough to maintain an overview and offer clear guidance.

The authority today said it had already identified the issues raised and that measures are being taken to recruit extra staff, reduce caseloads and improve partnership working.

Over the last six months the department has been conducting an overhaul of thresholds: the points at which social services deem further action and/or referrals for help need to be taken.

This has included a rise in the number of contacts deemed to meet the threshold for statutory services from 30 per cent to a peak of 70 per cent. The report by HM inspector Peter McEntee welcomes this and also acknowledges that a greater number of children and families are receiving more appropriate assessments of need.

But it points out that this has led to a big hike in workloads which the authority failed to anticipate. And two out of four assessment duty teams are wholly staffed by agency workers. It says the authority’s ability to deal wih demand “remains fragile.”

And Mr McEntee writes: “Staff in the assessment duty teams have high caseloads, up to 40 cases, and some state that this is impacting on the quality of their work and their ability to maintain up-to-date records. One social worker reported that her caseload was ‘horrendous’, making her feel as if she is not doing her job.”

His report highlights poor partnership working between the department and police, adding: “The lack of timely partnership discussion and agreement on child protection issues and planning means that there is an increased risk to children.”

He adds: “The majority of cases assessments are too focused on parents and carers, and do not identify children’s needs clearly enough.”

James Winterbottom, council director for children’s services, said: “The points raised by the inspectors were issues we had already identified in the service due to unprecedented demand into children’s social care, as many local authorities are experiencing across the country. We were already working hard with our partners to address these issues and continue to do so as a priority.

“Plans to address the areas for improvement are already in place, including a wider recruitment strategy, work to further reduce individual caseloads and partnership working, to ensure we always provide a quality service with children and young people at its heart.

“We welcome the feedback and are pleased that the inspectors have highlighted the effectiveness of our single front door response for children’s social care in providing robust, timely and effective decisions for children.

“We will work closely with families and partner agencies to continue to improve in line with our ambitions to ensure every child and young person can have the best start in life.”