Ofsted strikes defiant note in furore over ‘one-word' social care judgments

At a National Children and Adult Services Conference session on inspecting services for vulnerable children, Jones said Ofsted has a “responsibility to tell the public a clear and simple story” about the standard of services.

But she added that the inspections process will focus on conversations that “show us the whole picture” of how services are delivered. The new framework comes into force next month.
 
Jones’ stance was supported by former Birmingham director of children’s services Peter Duxbury, who warned that failing to back Ofsted’s improvement drive could be perceived negatively by the press and public.
 
“There is a danger of people turning this debate into one where the sector is in denial. What message would that send to the public? We should be seen to be embracing the framework,” he added.

Association of Directors of Children’s Services president Andrew Webb said he had seen “no evidence” that the introduction of one-word graded judgments would improve services or outcomes.
 
He said that the introduction of the tougher inspection regime, which reclassifies the "adequate" grading as "requires improvement", had unfairly moved the goalposts for local authorities in a way more akin to an “Orwellian world”.
 
“It creates a series of judgments that say this is where the bar is, and then the next year it will say the bar has been moved. But no one has ever measured where the bar should be,” he added.
 
Simon White, director of children’s services in Sandwell, also criticised Ofsted for being partly responsible for the high turnover of children’s services leaders.
 
He said: “I was very struck in the Ofsted annual report by the chief inspector highlighting problems in turnover of senior management and the reliance on agency staff in children’s services. But Ofsted is part of the system that has generated that result.”
 
David Jones, chair of the local safeguarding children board in Leicester, added that while it was important to tell the public about the standard of social services, “one-word overall judgments are problematic”.
 
“If we don’t give a word for inadequate services, then the press will. We have to manage the public perception of social work. But this is not helped by former head teachers making statements as if we’re in a classroom,” he added, in reference to recent criticism of child protection services by Ofsted chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw.