Inspecting Cafcass

The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) represents children in family court cases.

These include care proceedings, or public law cases, private law cases where separating parents cannot agree on arrangements for their children, and adoption spanning both public and private law.

It is the largest employer of qualified social workers in England, operating out of 33 offices across the country and supporting more than 140,000 children each year (see graphic).

Cafcass is inspected by Ofsted. In April, the regulator launched a new regime designed to bring Cafcass inspections in line with Ofsted's other inspections of social care.

The move followed a consultation in autumn 2020, which generated more than 300 responses – mainly from parents – as well as local authorities and some young people.

Under the new inspection framework, Cafcass will be inspected every three years and given a national inspection rating.

In between it will receive focused visits looking at a specific area of the service or cohort of children.

The organisation will complete an annual self-evaluation of practice in public and private law – similar to the self-evaluations done by local authorities under the Inspection of Local Authority Children's Services (ILACS) regime.

As with local authorities, there will also be an annual engagement meeting between Ofsted and Cafcass leaders.

The way the organisation has been inspected has changed over the years – linked to improved performance – with Cafcass services moving from “inadequate” to “outstanding” over the course of a decade thanks to a major turnaround effort.

Prior to 2013, its 17 regional service areas were inspected by Ofsted as part of a rolling programme.

In 2013, Ofsted published the first framework for the inspection of Cafcass as a national organisation.

Areas continued to receive individual ratings for the quality of leadership and management. But that will no longer be the case under the new regime with a move to a single national judgment on the impact of leaders.

Cafcass was rated “good” in its first inspection as a national organisation in 2014 and in 2018 was judged “outstanding” overall (see below).

The most recent change in inspection reflects how far the organisation has come.

“We wanted inspection to be more proportionate – recognising Cafcass's continued good performance but with the flexibility for us to act should standards fall,” explains Ofsted's national director for regulation and social care Yvette Stanley.

“Our new framework draws on the success of our ILACS approach, which – since it began in 2018 – has shown the benefits of a ‘whole-system’ approach to inspection with more frequent contact between inspections.”

She says the new approach has a number of advantages including a “greater focus on the quality and impact of Cafcass's practice with children and families”.

“Our ability to pick up issues sooner, so they can be addressed, will also have a positive impact on families,” she says.

Shorter national inspection

Under the new system there will be a shorter national inspection announced with five days' notice. It will consist of off-site analysis followed by up to two weeks of on-site fieldwork with inspectors working in small teams in different geographical areas.

If performance drops, the new framework allows Ofsted to increase the length or frequency of inspection. Should Cafcass be judged “inadequate” the regulator would introduce monitoring visits three or four times a year.

Some who responded to the consultation were concerned the proposals represented a “scaling back” of inspection and were sceptical about whether weaker areas of practice would be uncovered.

The size of the organisation means inspectors can only evaluate the quality of practice in a sample of areas, explains Stanley.

But the introduction of focused visits – which will cover at least three different areas each time – will give inspectors access to more of Cafcass's teams across England, she adds.

“Inspectors don't just evaluate practice in the areas they visit, they also look at practice in other locations too,” says Stanley.

“Our recent experience during the pandemic of speaking to practitioners via online platforms will also help inspectors to widen the sample beyond the areas they visit in person.”

There was a mixed response to the scrapping of judgments on local leadership with more than half – 54 per cent – of consultation respondents in favour, 34 per cent against and others unsure.

There were fears a single national judgment on leadership would fail to hold local leaders sufficiently to account and risked masking local variations.

“We decided to stop individual grading of local leadership when we introduced this more risk-based and proportionate approach,” says Stanley.

“That said, inspectors will still be absolutely clear with the Cafcass senior leadership team when they find any weak leadership or managerial failings. Where appropriate, we'll highlight poor leadership in our inspection reports.”

She is confident the new regime will identify any issues. “Inspectors will make sure that the sample of practice with children and families includes strong teams as well as those performing less well,” says Stanley.

“Inspectors routinely consult the family judiciary and local authority senior leaders in preparation for a visit or inspection. We'll also take account of feedback Cafcass has received from children and families and any other intelligence available to us.”

LEADERSHIP AND OUTCOMES FOCUS KEY TO ‘OUTSTANDING’ RATING

Cafcass was given an overall rating of “outstanding” following its last inspection in 2018. Inspectors praised the “exceptional” leadership and found staff at all levels “provide excellent quality services for children, their families and the family courts” resulting in “better outcomes for the majority of children”.

“Most direct work is well planned, done at the child's pace and ensures that the child understands what is happening,” said the inspection report.

“Reports are enhanced by using the child's own words, resulting in the powerful voice of children informing recommendations to the court.”

Inspectors found senior managers had worked hard to “develop and support a culture of continuous learning and improvement”.

“Despite having high workloads, staff who spoke to inspectors felt extremely positive about working for an organisation in which they are treated well, as professional adults, and their views and needs are important and highly valued,” said the report.

One of its key delivery priorities – published in March this year – is to ensure these high standards are maintained.

Cafcass saw demand for its services reduce significantly early on in the pandemic although the amount of public law cases soon returned to pre-Covid levels.

As things start to return to normal, another priority will be dealing with a backlog caused by lower rates of applications at the start of the crisis and the impact of adjournments and delays in family court hearings.

Like other areas of children's services and the justice system, the organisation moved to remote working but in March this year announced a return to at least one in-person meeting with children during the course of proceedings – wherever possible.

“Whilst remote working is effective and there is absolutely a place for it as we move forward, we want to establish in-person relationships to enable us to make good assessments about what is in children's best interests,” said chief executive Jacky Tiotto.

Cafcass's delivery priorities also include measures to support staff, work in partnership with others and strengthen communication with children and families.

The organisation is supported by the Family Justice Young People's Board – a group of more than 50 young people who have had direct experience of the family justice system or are interested in children's rights and the family courts.

As part of efforts to listen to feedback from children and families, the board has been involved in setting up a new “family forum” for families where Cafcass's service has “fallen short and who want to work with us to put things right for them and other families in the future”.

INSPECTIONS SHORTS

YOUTH JUSTICE
The prisons inspectorate has been consulting on new expectations for the leaders and managers of adult prisons and establishments for children. The move is part of efforts to strengthen inspection of leadership and management which is seen as a key factor in driving improvement in the sector and ensuring better outcomes for prisoners. The final leadership principles will be unveiled later this year.

SCHOOLS
Just over half of local areas inspected to date have significant weaknesses in provision for children with special educational needs and disabilities, new figures show. Of the 116 areas inspected by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission since 2016, 59 have been required to submit a written statement of action. The figures show inspection results have not changed much in the last three years with a similar proportion of areas found to have significant weaknesses each year.

HEALTH
A hospital was told it could not admit any more children solely on the basis of acute mental health needs due to concerns about the quality of assessment and treatment. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) put the emergency condition in place at The Princess Royal Hospital in Telford following an inspection of children and young people's services. Inspectors found children and young people with learning disabilities or those admitted due to a deterioration in their mental health did not receive adequate risk assessments and there were no systems in place to ensure restrictive practices – such as restraint – were used safely or appropriately. Managers said action had been taken to address the CQC's concerns.

YOUTH JUSTICE
Full inspections of prisons and young offender institutions are now under way again having been suspended for 14 months. However, HM Inspectorate of Prisons said inspectors would continue to take the challenges posed by Covid-19 into account. During the pandemic the inspectorate moved to a system of much shorter scrutiny visits.

SCHOOLS
Ofsted has carried out a snap inspection of relationships and sex education at a Catholic school following complaints about a controversial resource. St Mary's Roman Catholic High School in Hereford has come under fire from Humanists UK for use of the A Fertile Heart programme which says “men are created to be the initiators” and women “receivers-responders” in sexual relationships. Humanists UK hoped the inspection of the school's relationships and sex education and personal, social, health and economic education would lead to the resource being withdrawn.