Senior council managers get a grilling from young inspectors
Ten young people from Plymouth’s Young Inspectors group have been talking to the Council’s most senior managers about the experiences of children and young people in the city’s child protection processes.
The project was started to make sure that the voice of the child was included in all aspects of work around children’s social care. Managers wanted to gain a thorough and accurate understanding of young people’s experience of child protection in Plymouth.
In order to build up a full picture the inspectors were put through an intensive training programme to understand more about child protection and how it worked. The group then held interviews with social workers and senior managers as well as developing questionnaires for young people who had had direct experience of the system, carried out a detailed inspection of Midland House before all their findings were fed back directly to Carole Burgoyne, the Council’s Strategic Director for People and her senior management team including
Alison Botham Assistant Director for Children, Young People and families and Judith Harwood Assistant Director for Learning and Communities.
Some of the highlights included:
• Some staff individually adapt to children and young people’s needs
• Good consideration of age appropriateness
• Advocates represent and support some young people, help prepare them for the process
• Specialist teams for children with a disability
• Family Group Conferencing often offered
The recommendations that were put forward were very much focused on making sure children are involved and fully understand the child protection process.
This will involve working closely with young people to improve the quality of the information that is available to them so that have a better understanding of the processes, the support available and the reasons why certain services are provided in the way they are.
Alongside the valuable content of this inspection, the project offered the young people, all of varying ages, abilities and needs the opportunity to learn, explore and grow their personal, social, and educational skills.
20 year old Megan said: “I really enjoyed this project. It's great to see our recommendations being taken seriously.”
15 year old Michelle said: “My experience here has been magnificent. I feel I have grown as a person, therefore I feel my confidence has really improved.”
16 year old Liam said: “Being asked to do this shows they are taking young people’s views seriously”
18 year old Rob said: “My experience with the Young Inspectors has helped me make some new friends and helped me grow in areas such as confidence and teamwork. It has given me the knowledge and understanding of inspections and assessing in specific areas. I can take away a lot from the Young Inspectors group that can help me throughout my life.”
Alison Botham, Assistant Director for Children, Young People and Families said: “We welcome the feedback from the Young Inspectors and as a result of this process we are already acting on a number of recommendations including; brightening up the reception area at Midland House, improving privacy at reception, looking at how better to use the TV screens for signposting and support and involving young people's views through a survey and developing young-people friendly versions of documents.
“Keeping children and young people safe is one of the most important jobs that we have as a council and we are committed to making sure that all children and young people we work with feel listened to.”
Plymouth Young Inspectors groups are already running throughout Plymouth, with several groups of young people across the city trained in the range of skills required to conduct effective inspections of services including; The Plymouth Life Centre, The Zone and local libraries.
Services can request an inspection, in order to gain feedback from the perspective of young people, and following the inspection would receive a report outlining strengths, areas for development and key recommendations.
