Increase in 'good' and 'outstanding' council children’s services
Joe Lepper
Thursday, July 7, 2022
The proportion of council children’s services rated "good" or "outstanding" for overall effectiveness by Ofsted has increased post pandemic, latest figures show.
The inspectorate’s figures for the 12 months to the end of March this year found that the proportion handed its two top grades rose to 53 per cent.
Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, for the year ending March 2020, the figure was 50 per cent. This remained the same when last year’s figures were released, as no inspections that resulted in grading were carried out during the health crisis.
The figures for the year ending March this year show that 13 per cent of council children’s services are rated "outstanding", 39 per cent "good" and 35 per cent as "requires improvement".
Just over one in ten are rated "inadequate", a fall on the pre pandemic figure of 14 per cent.
Between April 2021 and March 2022 Ofsted made a total of 129 visits to councils, this included 23 standard and short inspections. Among these more councils showed an improvement in the overall effectiveness of children’s social care than a decline
Two councils visited improved by more than one grade. Sunderland’s rating was uplifted from "inadequate" to "outstanding", while in Wakefield overall effectiveness improved from "inadequate" to "good".
Over the last year Ofsted carried out 62 focused visits to council children’s services looking at specific areas of provision. More than a third of these visits related to support for children in need or subject to a plan and a fifth looked specifically at front door provision. Other themes included children in care and care leavers support as well as help for vulnerable teenagers.
Ofsted's social care inspection figures also show a 16 per cent cut in the number of complaints received about providers between 2021 and 2022. During the 12 months to the end of March this year the inspectorate received 780 complaints related to 575 providers.
Amid the previous pandemic-hit year there were 932 complaints about 629 providers.
Before the health crisis the number of complaints was similar to this year’s figure, at 788.
Meanwhile, the number of children’s homes has increased by seven per cent. There has also been a four per cent rise in the number of places, figures show. This continues a long-standing trend of the number new homes rising faster than places.
All regions saw an increase in the number of homes but “homes are still not evenly distributed across England”, warns the inspectorate. It found that the North West of England accounts for around a quarter of all homes and places.