« Previous | Contents | Next »
Listen
19. RECOMMENDATIONS
19.1 The terms of reference asked the Inquiry to make recommendations relevant to ensuring that the contributory factors which led to abuse at Kerelaw occurring and not being acted on for a protracted period cannot happen again. Kerelaw has closed, and the particular combination of history, geography, function, size, and stewardship which contributed to the circumstances in which abuse took place may not recur. Moreover, there have been important changes in regulation in the past decade or more, and further changes are planned. Inspection arrangements are now backed with powers of enforcement. We do not consider that further legislative or regulatory provisions are needed to prevent a Kerelaw happening again, or that they would necessarily do so.
19.2 However, there is no room for complacency, and there can be no guarantees. The unpalatable fact is that most of the factors which contributed to what went wrong at Kerelaw have been identified by Inquiries into child abuse time and again over the years, whether in residential establishments or elsewhere. Recommendations have been made in relation to regulation, recruitment, management, training, supervision, scrutiny, resourcing, systems, policies and procedures which stretch to many pages of print. We could repeat most of them here but do not intend to do so. Nor is it within the Inquiry's remit to make recommendations about residential child care practice on a wider scale. The NRCCI is the appropriate vehicle for that.
19.3 The main failings at Kerelaw were not so much to do with legislation, policies or procedures, of which there was no shortage, as with people failing to comply with those procedures, failing to give leadership and direction, failing to deal with difficult management issues of which they were aware, and failing to care as they should have about disadvantaged, difficult and vulnerable young people with whose welfare they were entrusted. The failings were not confined to Kerelaw. As senior managers in Glasgow City Council struggled with the financial consequences of local government reorganisation, balancing budgets, and internal strife, attention was diverted from a staff and client group who were for much of the time out of sight and out of mind.
19.4 Perhaps the most important recommendation the Inquiry can make is one that reflects the key message from past failures: that those who carry responsibility for the welfare of others must always put the client first and simply do their jobs. However, to support care workers and managers in their task, and to safeguard children in their care, we also make the following recommendations, which we acknowledge include much that is already recognised as good residential practice and part of current National Care Standards. Most of the recommendations are addressed to residential child care providers, by which we mean all providers, whether local authority, voluntary or independent.
Leadership and management
19.5 In appointing senior managers of residential units, providers of residential child care should take into account candidates' leadership qualities as well as their professional competences and experience.
19.6 Providers should ensure that senior managers of residential units fully understand the corporate and organisational priorities and procedures and are clear as to their accountabilities for compliance. This should include formal responsibility for monitoring violent incidents and complaints and for quality control over statistics provided to the managing authority or board.
19.7 A clear understanding of the key roles and responsibilities of the external manager must be embedded within all residential child care provision. Local authorities who commission such provision should ensure that well established links are forged with the external manager.
19.8 Providers of residential child care should maintain, so far as possible, reasonable continuity in external management, and in senior management teams in residential units, and should plan ahead to ensure that there is an appropriately skilled pool of candidates to fill vacancies when they arise.
19.9 Providers should ensure that external management is adequately resourced to fulfil all aspects of their responsibilities, as set out in Volume 2 of The Children (Scotland) Act 1995 Regulations and Guidance, and that postholders have a clear understanding of their dual role of challenge and support to local residential unit management.
19.10 In line with recommendations in the report of the Edinburgh Inquiry, providers should ensure that external managers have sufficient opportunity to visit residential units, be recognised by staff and residents, and talk to young people in their living areas.
19.11 Providers should review their external management arrangements in the light of this Inquiry. Glasgow City Council should review its recently introduced arrangements for the external management of residential children's units in consultation with those working for their services.
Performance management and appraisal
19.12 Providers should ensure all heads of residential units have a personal performance plan for the year ahead covering organisational and personal objectives, including development objectives, and accountability for the performance management of those reporting directly to them. The plan should be agreed in advance with the external manager and performance reviewed in a face-to-face discussion with the external manager at least twice a year. This management review should be in addition to any professional practice-related supervision which may also take place.
19.13 Providers should ensure that other senior residential unit managers should have a similar plan, agreed by the head of the unit, and reviewed by him or her in a face-to-face discussion at least twice a year. Plans should include the number and frequency of supervision sessions to be carried out with staff who report to them.
19.14 The external manager should also have a performance plan, which should include targets for the number of visits to residential units to be achieved, and in which his or her accountability for the face-to-face performance review of the head of the residential unit should be explicit.
19.15 Providers of residential child care should consider whether the transparency and supportiveness of performance management might be enhanced by the introduction of peer review and 360 degree appraisal processes. This should include feedback from peers, residents and agencies using the service.
Supervision
19.16 Providers of residential child care should develop and implement a supervision policy which is based on regular, planned and recorded supervision sessions between all grades of staff and their line managers up through the management chain.
19.17 In addition, in order to promote group learning, consideration should be given to introducing shift or other forms of group supervision.
19.18 Supervision should include 3 core elements: performance management; staff development; and staff support - as suggested in the Report of the 21 st Century Social Work Review (Changing Lives) in 2006.
Training and learning
19.19 Where training or learning is offered by the provider to support new policies or new working practices, managers and staff should, wherever possible, be given the opportunity to train alongside staff from other residential units and fieldworkers.
19.20 Training should supplement and support, not be a substitute for, communication and leadership by senior managers.
19.21 External managers and heads of unit should use the twice-yearly performance review discussions to evaluate, from the perspective of the individual and the organisation, the benefits of any new learning which has taken place.
19.22 Unit managers should use supervision with staff as an opportunity for similar evaluation of new learning.
19.23 We welcome the requirement for the registration of residential child care workers with the SSSC, and agree with SIRCC that the baseline registration qualifications should require relevant content to the correct academic standard.
19.24 Providers of residential child care services should ensure that sufficient resources are available for managers and staff to enable them to advance their professional development and inform their practice in line with SSSC registration requirements.
19.25 Providers should ensure that training in crisis intervention, such as Therapeutic Crisis Intervention, is refreshed regularly as prescribed in the relevant instructional literature, and uptake monitored. External and internal managers must continually reinforce that Therapeutic Crisis Intervention is first and foremost an option for de-escalation and not for restraint.
19.26 Providers should ensure that residential care staff fully understand the circumstances in which physical restraint may be employed so that staff feel confident that they will be supported by management when they act appropriately. Staff should also be aware that if, following assessment of the context, they are deemed to have acted inappropriately they will be held accountable.
Listening to children
19.27 Providers of residential child care should make their complaints process easily accessible to all young people placed with them, and should assist them to differentiate between a non-criminal complaint and an allegation of abuse. The procedure should not be dependent on completing a complaints form. Other options for communicating complaints and concerns should be offered: for example, using information and communications technology.
19.28 External managers of residential units should review with the head of unit, at least quarterly, a record of complaints and allegations over the previous period, noting any trends or patterns.
19.29 Providers of residential child care should maintain a central log of complaints and allegations and their outcomes, and incident reports, which should be reviewed regularly by senior managers and made available to the Care Commission during their inspection visits. The log should include an analysis of the nature of the complaints, allegations and incidents, and how they were resolved, and the young people and staff members involved.
19.30 Providers should ensure that scrutiny of complaints and allegations for all their services for children within a residential child care setting is subject to appropriate professional review outwith the line management structure. Similarly, purchasers of residential child care should scrutinise providers' logs of complaints and allegations.
19.31 The Scottish Government should develop a national mechanism to gather, collate and analyse the patterns of complaints and allegations originating in residential child care units.
19.32 Glasgow City Council should review the capacity of its current Children's Rights Service to ensure it is able to provide the level of service needed
19.33 The Scottish Government should review the funding of children's advocacy services to ensure all looked after children have access to an independent, quality service.
Inspection
19.34 Inspections require to be followed up rigorously by the inspection bodies in order to effect change and improvement in services. Inspection agencies should check that internal and external managers of services are fully engaged in taking forward agreed actions.
19.35 As key concerns from inspection of Kerelaw by North Ayrshire Council were not passed to the Care Commission in 2002, the Scottish Government should ensure that, when changes in external scrutiny of social care services in Scotland take place in 2011, the new body has access to information gathered by previous inspections of the services in which it will have a locus.
Investigation and disciplinary processes
19.36 Where possible, investigations of allegations referred by providers of residential child care to the police should be carried out jointly by police and providers until the appropriate course of action - through the Courts or disciplinary procedures - can be determined.
19.37 Local authorities and other providers of residential child care should consider including independent support from outside the organisation for fact-finding in large and complex investigations of the kind required for Kerelaw.
19.38 Legal advice should be sought as early as possible in investigations where the possible outcome is the dismissal of employees. Such advice should reflect up to date expertise in Employment Law.
19.39 Providers of residential child care should review the application of their Codes of Discipline, and Disciplinary and Appeals Procedures and should keep up-to-date with best practice in HR and Employment Law.
Record keeping
19.40 While we do not wish to reiterate the recommendations of the Shaw report here, Glasgow City Council should reflect on these and ensure that records relating to looked after children are properly managed.
DWCL
19.41 To support improvements in the listing process from the new Protection of Vulnerable Groups legislation, employers and ex-employers should work quickly and efficiently to compile information and examine the robustness of the evidence before making a referral. Openness and co-operation between all parties, including the referred individual, are key.
19.42 There is no legal impediment to an employer investigating allegations about a former employee. As the ability to investigate thoroughly assumes that there is sufficient information, employers should ensure that they maintain accurate records of allegations, complaints, fact-findings and disciplinary disposals and any related material.
« Previous | Contents | Next »