Daily roundup: Council improves, head teachers, and pester power

Children’s social care services in Cornwall are no longer subject to central government intervention. Children’s minister Edward Timpson has revoked the improvement order placed on Cornwall County Council in 2009 after a recent Ofsted inspection rated its services adequate. Lucy de Groot, who chaired the improvement board in Cornwall, said: “I am very impressed with the progress Cornwall has made. It should not be underestimated just how serious the deficiencies were in 2009 and the report at the time was rightly damning.”

Head teachers in Wales are getting younger reports WalesOnline. The latest figures from the General Teaching Council for Wales shows that the proportion of heads over the age of 50 has fallen to 43.7 per cent, the lowest level in a decade. The statistics also revealed that the proportion of male teachers in Wales has slipped below 25 per cent.

A 50-strong group of MPs, academics, authors and charity bosses have written a joint letter to the Telegraph calling for a ban on all advertising to children under 11. The letter says that advertisers are exploiting “pester power” and that the nation is “in danger of turning out young consumers rather than young citizens”. It calls for the UK to adopt measures to curb advertising to children along the lines of those already in place in Greece, Sweden and Quebec in Canada.

Up to 600 families in Scotland are to be offered free home safety equipment by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. The charity’s Home Safety Equipment Scheme is backed by £265,000 from the Scottish Government and will target families in East Dunbartonshire, Edinburgh, Inverclyde, West Dunbartonshire and West and East Lothian. The charity will offer to install equipment such as fireguards, corner cushions and cupboard locks in the homes of families identified by local agencies.

And finally, the National Deaf Children’s Society (NDCS) has reported 26 local authorities to the Information Commissioner for failing to reveal their budgets for services for deaf children. The charity had been trying to identify how cuts by English councils were affecting deaf children’s services using the Freedom of Information Act but 26 authorities failed to respond within the 20 working day legal deadline. Jo Campion, deputy director of policy and campaigns at NDCS, said: “Parents of deaf children are taxpayers and they deserve to know how their money is being spent. This silence from councils makes us fear the worst – that even more deaf children’s services will be falling under the axe this year, with parents being kept in the dark until it is too late.”