Daily roundup: Bexley improvement plan, untapped IT skills and Ombudsman fine

Bexley Council has set out its improvement plan after Ofsted judged the council’s overall effectiveness in safeguarding services as inadequate, but found the effectiveness of looked-after children’s service were good.
Out of 22 judgements, Ofsted found Bexley was performing to a “good” level in 12 areas including partnership working and user engagement; “adequately” in five areas and “inadequately” in five areas including whether children and young people are safe and feel safe.

Digital skills such as web design, coding and social media among unemployed young people are left untapped by UK businesses, according to research undertaken by mobile phone company O2.
A survey of 400 businesses found that digital skills were rated highly as a means to develop business. A further survey of 1,000 young people revealed that 90 per cent can use social media to promote an event, idea or cause; two thirds can design a webpage; one in five can develop an app and 13 per cent are confident with coding.
O2 chief executive Ronan Dunne said: “It’s a travesty that while businesses are crying out for digital skills, they are excluding from the workplace the very people who have them.”

The Local Government Ombudsman has ordered Lambeth Council to pay nearly £20,000 to a mother of two autistic children, after failing to provide sufficient daily care to the family.
Dr Jane Martin criticised the council for failing to offer the mother respite care and not writing care plans for the children or updating core assessments, which meant the children were not provided with the daily care they needed for more than a year.

Another children’s services chief has resigned from Walsall Council following a critical Ofsted report into safeguarding services, according to Walsall’s Express and Star.
Assistant director Michelle Whiting has left her post, following the resignation of outgoing director of children’s services Pauline Pilkington. Council chief executive Paul Sheehan said: “People have taken difficult personal decisions about their roles and I’m content the council is making the right decisions.”

The Association of Directors of Children’s Services has called for the Department for Education and Ofqual to investigate allegations that exam board AQA changed grade boundaries for GCSE English exam results.
Vice president of the association Andrew Webb said: “The reported differences in grade boundaries in English are very concerning and there must be an investigation to see if there is any substance to these concerns.
“If it is true, this will have a significant effect on the futures of both individual children and schools. It is right that the government takes steps to ensure that exams are rigourous, but they must also be fair.”

Founder of Childline Esther Ranzen has warned that porn is “warping” children’s understanding of what normal sex is and encouraging them to copy behaviour that is “disturbing and dangerous”.
Rantzen made the comments in an interview with the Daily Mail after research by Childline found its counsellors deal with more than 50 calls a month from teenagers upset at seeing adult images. The number of calls has risen by 34 per cent over a year.