Commitment to our SEND partnership vision
In Blackpool we are deeply committed to our vision that:
“All children and young people with SEND, live happy, healthy lives in a community that is inclusive and supports them to achieve their ambitions”.
Working together
Improving the lives of children and young people with SEND is our priority; and alongside our SEND strategy and Improvement Plan; signifies our intention to make SEND ‘everyone’s business.
This means that all of us who work with children and young people with SEND in Blackpool will consider the needs of the individual and their family in everything that we do.
Background
Between 28 February and 4 March 2022, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission jointly inspected services in Blackpool, provided by practitioners and professionals who support children and young people aged 0 to 25 years and reported on what they found.
The Inspectors said that there were 4 areas of significant weakness that must be improved:
- The lack of specificity, ownership and accountability in the area’s improvement strategy for SEND
- The duties around preparing children and young people for adulthood not being fulfilled
- The poor communication with parents and carers across the area
- The long waiting times for some therapies
Ofsted Joint area SEND Inspection report
What is the written statement of action?
The written statement of action is a document that sets out what the partnership is going to do to improve each of the 4 areas of significant weakness, how the work will be done and when it will be completed.
It also includes information that tells us what difference our improvements will make for children and young people and the improvements to services and support.
How will progress on the written statement of action be checked?
The SEND partnership board has overall accountability for the progress on the written statement of action.
A SEND improvement group is responsible for ensuring that the actions are completed and reported to the SEND partnership board on a monthly basis.
Further details on governance and monitoring arrangement are set out on Pages 5 and 6 of the written statement of action.
Area of significant concern 1
The lack of specificity, ownership and accountability in the area’s improvement strategy for SEND
-What we are going to do:
- Finalise and publish the SEND strategy
- Share updates on progress in delivering the WSoA and improvement plan
- Hold an annual partnership review of the delivery of the SEND strategy
- Review and strengthen the SEND partnership governance
- Implement robust partnership programme management practices
- Review and build on current data dashboards and present monthly reports through SEND governance
- Develop a strategic outcomes framework with outcomes based accountability measures
Impacts for children and young people:
- Local provision for SEND will be stronger and will improve quickly due to a renewed focus on what really matters to children, young people and their families
- Children, young people and their families will genuinely feel as if they are an integral part of the SEND partnership and that their experiences are improving at pace
- Children, young people and their parents/carers can clearly identify the progress being made on improvements through updates shared via the Local Offer website
Outcomes for the partnership:
- The local area has a co-produced strategy that is owned by all stakeholders and partners
- The strategy is informed by the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment and a well-developed local SEND dataset that highlights strength and weakness
- All partners have increased clarity about what the strategy sets out to achieve within clear timescales, why this needs to be achieved, and who is responsible for each element
- Partners have a well-developed, shared understanding of the local area so that they can effectively track the progress being made in delivering the SEND strategy
- The strategy is a key part of the planning and delivery of local improvements at board level, for all partners
- There are effective governance structures in place to ensure accountability for the strategy at SEND partnership board level
- There are effective mechanisms in place at SEND partnership board level to manage risks, issues and slippage and to report by exception when these are evident
- All partners have a robust governance structure and robust mechanisms in place to ensure that they hold themselves accountable for the delivery of the strategy and can report by exception to the SEND board
- An effective framework incorporating outcomes based accountability measures is used to hold partners to account for the effectiveness of their actions.
The evidence we will provide:
- SEND Needs Assessment (part of JSNA)
- SEND self-evaluation
- Co-produced SEND Strategy and easy read version of the strategy.
- Written statement of action
- Co-produced improvement plan
- Board reports and minutes of meetings
- Co-produced SEND annual report
- Monthly highlight reports
- Co-produced partnership data dashboard updated monthly and reported to SEND partnership board illustrating progress
- You said, we’re doing, We did on the local offer website
- Impact case studies based on lived experience and feedback from SEND advisory groups
- SEND partnership governance structure and terms of reference for groups within SEND governance structure
- Quarterly partnership stocktake reports
Area of significant concern 2
The duties around preparing children and young people for adulthood are not being fulfilled.
What we are going to do:
- Raise awareness and build capability across the partnership in preparation for adulthood
- Co-produce a joint preparation for adulthood strategy
- Develop a set of preparation for adulthood performance measures
- Co-produce and share accessible information, advice and guidance
- Develop and implement local systems that support effective transitions between children and adults education, health and social care services
Impacts for children and young people:
- Young people and their parent/carers are provided with opportunities that support them through their journey to adulthood, including transitions
- Young people have access to good quality information, advice and guidance that enables them to make informed decisions about their future
- Each cohort of young people has confidence in transitions arrangements that they and their family will benefit from
- Young people experience effective transitions between and across services
Outcomes for the partnership:
- Partners know, understand and deliver their duties related to preparing for adulthood
- All partners have the necessary skills to support children, young people and their families in preparation for adulthood
- Partners know and understand the local area in relation to preparation for adulthood and transitions arrangements
- All partners have clarity about progress and delivery, and there are mechanisms in place to manage risks, issues and slippage
The evidence we will provide:
- Preparation for adulthood strategy.
- Mapping report from current on-going work with the National Development Team for Inclusion (NDTI)
- Workforce development strategy for preparation for adulthood and transitions
- Delivery specification for work with the National Development Team for Inclusion (NDTI)
- Numbers who undertake training, and evaluation of training activity, including training delivered by NDTI and evaluation of training activity
- Reports from reviews, and action plans, including action plan for next step as a result of NDTI training
- Local Offer and partner websites
- Preparation for adulthood data dashboard
- Evaluation of feedback from families on the usefulness of information, advice and guidance available to support transition arrangements
- Reports from use of Impact Tools and focus groups that describe feedback from young people
Area of significant concern 3
The poor communication with parents and carers across the area
What we are going to do:
- Co-produce a communication, engagement and co-production plan to ensure there is a planned and co-ordinated approach to improving communication and engaging with young people, their parents/carers
- Gather feedback from parents/carers to better understand their communication experiences and expectations
- Co-produce a SEND communications charter which is adopted across the partnership
- Embed the Blackpool model of co-production so everyone works together as equals to co-design both new resources, services and systems and to improve existing one.
- Establish a parents’ SEND advisory group and a young people’s SEND advisory group to facilitate co-production with parents/carers, children and young people across the breadth of improvement work
- Co-produce a redesign of the organisation, layout and content of the SEND local offer website
- Re-launch and publicise the SEND local offer website to parents, young people and professionals
- Survey the SEND local offer website on a 6 monthly basis to ensure continued relevance
Impacts for children and young people:
- Parents and carers trust the information that is available and provided to them regarding SEND and SEND services
- Parents and carers are involved in making important decisions that affect the lives of their children and young people
- Parents and carers inform us that they are treated equitably by professionals, in line with the Blackpool Families Rock principles and trust the information that is being provided
- Parents, carers, children and young people will understand the concept of co-production and will be confident to engage in the co-production of services and systems
- Parents, carers, children and young people find the local offer website informative and easy to navigate
- Parents understand the purpose of the local offer website and how it can be accessed
- Parents and young people report that the information is current and meets their needs
Outcomes for the partnership:
- All partners know and understand the ways in which they can improve their communications with parents and carers
- All partners are confident to engage in communication and co-production with parents and carers at individual, service and strategic levels, as appropriate
- A single model of co-production is owned, understood and embedded across the partnership
- Parents, carers, children and young people are involved in making important decisions that affect their lives
- Our local offer website is a valuable source of information and support to parents and carers, children, young people and professionals
- The information and support on our local offer website is relevant, up to date and easy to understand
-The evidence we will provide:
- Communications charter
- Feedback from half-yearly engagement events
- Feedback and case studies from parents and carers
- Annual survey of parents and carers
- Evidence of changes to pathways and ways of working that demonstrates responsiveness to complaints and feedback
- Feedback from half-yearly engagement events
- Case studies from parents and carers
- Annual survey of parents and carers
- Model of co-production published on the local offer website
- Reports from SEND advisory groups
- Reports from SENDIASS
Area of significant concern 4
The long waiting times for some therapies
What we are going to do:
- Review therapy data against national and regional data to benchmark our performance
- Develop understanding across the partnership of the Universal and targeted support offers of the graduated approach to meet speech, language and communication needs
- Share the monitoring and accountability for the therapies data dashboard with the SEND prtnership board
- Strengthen pathways before referral into health services to ensure support for therapy needs is available, starting with speech and language service, neurodevelopmental pathway and Blenheim Child Development Centre
- Work with partners to strengthen pathways from the point of referral into health services starting with speech and language services
- Develop a recovery plan that reduces waiting times for therapy services using NICE guidelines/national standards
- Complete a workforce planning review for therapy services to understand skills gaps and workforce issues impacting on waiting times to reduce the workforce deficit
- Publish health information, advice and guidance that supports parents and carers when a therapy need is identified, starting with speech and language services
- Provide partners and parents and carers with assurance of improvements to therapy waiting lists
Impacts for children and young people:
- Parents and carers have access to information, advice and guidance that can reduce the need for a referral to specialist therapy services
- Parents and carers know and understand how they can support their child or young person during longer waits
- Children and young people receive support at the point when a need is identified
- Parents and carers have access to information, advice and guidance that can reduce the need for a referral to specialist therapy services
- Parents and carers will know and understand what they can do during longer waits so that they can support their child or young person
- Children and young people receive support at home and in school, at the point when a need is identified
- Children and young people will experience improved waiting times for speech and language therapy
Outcomes for the partnership:
- A recovery plan is in place that targets the reduction of waiting times
- Partners know and understand waiting times for therapies
- Partners know and understand the local area in relation to waiting lists and the graduated approach
- Partners are able to make informed decisions in relation to supporting children and young people who require therapy support
- Partners understand the speech, language and communication needs of the child population in Blackpool and understand how services need to be structured and resourced in order for these needs to be met
- Partners are able to support children more effectively based on the therapeutic input and advice
- Reduction seen in waiting lists in speech and language therapy
The evidence we will provide:
- Therapies data dashboard – monthly reports and analysis of data
- Diagrams and/or standard operating procedures that clearly illustrate pathways into health services
- Statistical process control reports that demonstrate the impact of interventions on waiting times in the context of increasing numbers of referrals to therapies
- External review report from Balanced System
- Workforce plan
- Reports and business cases related to therapy service redesign and improvements
- Updated service specifications
- Resources
Next steps
Department for Education and NHS England Monitoring
Progress monitoring against our written statement of action will take place at regular intervals over the next 16 months. The first meeting will be held mid-January 2023 and the final meeting will be held in May 2024. Attendees will include senior representatives from the Department of Education and NHS England, Blackpool Council, Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care Board and Blackpool Parent/Carer Forum.
The purpose of these meetings is to provide assurance that we are making sufficient progress in addressing our areas of weakness. These are formal meetings where we will be required to evidence and demonstrate the impact of our actions/improvements on the lived experiences of children, young people, parents and carers.
Inspection re-visit
Inspectors will return to Blackpool to undertake a re-inspection to decide whether we have made sufficient progress in addressing the weaknesses.