POLICY COMMISSION FOR CHILDREN AND
SCHOOL RESULTS - 7 JUNE 2006
CHILDREN’S SERVICES STRUCTURE
REPORT OF THE STRATEGIC DIRECTOR FOR
CHILDREN’S SERVICES
SUMMARY
/ PURPOSE
1. This
report outlines a revised structure for the Children’s Services directorate to
make it fitter for purpose. It
proposes that a permanent Director of Children’s Services should be appointed
as soon as possible and that the Children’s Services directorate should appoint
a new Head of Service for School Improvement and Learning Services.
BACKGROUND
2. Over
the past year, two heads of service posts, have been lost from the management
structure for Children’s Services. This
has left the whole of Children’s Services being managed by just two heads of
service. At the same time, the
Director’s post has been vacant and has been covered by an interim
director.
STRATEGIC
CONTEXT
3. The
Children Act 2004 identifies a lead role for a Director of Children’s Services. The scope of this post is clearly outlined
in statutory guidance.
4. The
responsibilities of the Children’s Services directorate are broad and, with
schools included, account for more than half of the Council’s overall
budget.
REPORT
Director of Children’s Services:
5. The
credibility of the leadership of Children’s Services is compromised by the
‘interim’ status of the current incumbent.
Given the substantial change management agenda facing Children’s
Services, it is important to secure a more sustainable leadership as soon as
possible. The leadership task
includes:
·
challenging the culture
of underperformance and low aspirations;
·
securing long term
accountability across the whole of Children’s Services;
·
building the capacity
for school improvement;
·
resolving the issues
around the management of data and its use to raise standards and to safeguard
children and young people;
·
Maintaining tight and
consistent procedures around the safeguarding of children and young people;
·
consolidating a Children’s
Trust and continuing the implementation of the Children Act 2004;
·
delivering the outcomes
of the Joint Area Review;
·
undertaking a major
consultation around Building Schools for the Future, extended schools, children’s
centres, federation, and trust schools;
·
jointly leading the
corporate and Island wide improvement agendas.
6. In
the light of the developments of the Public Service Board and in the
relationship between the Council and the Health Trusts, the political
administration and the new Chief Executive will wish to review the structure
and membership of the Council’s senior management team.
7. There
are two distinct core areas of responsibility within children’s services – for
safeguarding children and young people and for educational standards. A case could be made for giving the
statutory accountability for safeguarding to a strategic director of social
services, thereby overcoming the transition issues which exist when social care
is split between children and adults; and allowing a greater focus on
educational standards from another strategic director. However, given the vulnerable position
that Children’s Services faces in the eyes of several government departments,
particularly the DfES, it might be better to follow more conventional
arrangements, at least for the duration, not least because the whole thrust of
the government’s Change for Children agenda plays up the advantages of joining
up, rather than dividing, the different services for children and young people.
8. Overall,
at least until April 2008, when the Children’s Act 2004 must be fully
implemented, there are powerful arguments for having a Director of Children’s
Services as one of the key posts in the Council’s management structure, just as
there is a statutory requirement for there to be a Lead Member for Children’s
Services. Among these arguments are:
1. the
statutory accountability for the safeguarding agenda;
2. the Aim
High priority for improving outcomes for children and young people,
particularly for raising standards in
schools;
3. the need
to implement the Children Act 2004, which specifies the partners
to a
Children’s Trust and gives lead responsibility to the Director of
Children’s Services.
Directorate Structure:
9. The
Children’s Services Directorate currently has two heads of service, for
Learning and Effectiveness and for Children and Family Services. The current structural organisation is
attached to this report as Appendix 1.
10. A
year ago, the directorate had four heads of service; the additional two being a
Head of Policy and Planning and a Head of Special Educational Needs. The responsibilities for these two divisions
have been brought into the Learning Effectiveness and Children and Families
Divisions respectively.
11. It
is unrealistic to expect the full scope of Children’s Services responsibilities
to be carried out effectively by just two Heads of Service, particularly if they
are also to be able to contribute properly to cross-corporate working.
12. It makes sense to organise the
directorate into three divisions:
·
for schools and
services, such as early years and youth services, which are meant to be
universally accessed by all children and young people;
·
for safeguarding and
inclusion services, which are targeted towards particular children and young
people;
·
for commissioning,
planning, policy and resources – infrastructural services – which would include
the implementation of the Children’s Trust arrangements; any necessary reviews
of school organisation; and provide the client function for those services,
such as human resources or information technology, which are provided
centrally.
13. A
possible distribution of responsibilities within these three divisions is shown
in appendix 2. This is not a firm set
of proposals but an illustration of how responsibilities might be
allocated. If the appointment of an
additional head of service is approved, there will need to be full consultation
on the organisational structure that follows.
14. Close
scrutiny of these responsibilities will reveal that, even with an additional
head of service post, each of three heads of service would still have posts
with a broad scope. In some other
unitary authorities, there is further sub-division, to create five posts:
·
school improvement;
·
community learning,
such as early years and youth services;
·
safeguarding services;
·
inclusion services,
such as learning difficulties and behaviour support;
·
commissioning and
infrastructure.
15. This
becomes a matter of debate about the relative advantages of delegating
responsibility downwards into lower tiers of the structure, as opposed to
creating more expensive posts at the top of the structure. Provided it is understood that team managers
can also represent the directorate in cross-corporate task groups, then a three
directorate structure should be more cost-effective.
16. In
some other authorities, particularly the larger counties, there management
responsibilities are devolved into area teams. On the Isle of Wight, we need to consider how local access and
local service-delivery will evolve and work.
In the possible structure outlined in appendix 2, a team has been
included to provide safeguarding advice across the whole island, organised into
East and West teams. At this point,
this is included for illustrative purposes.
Further consideration needs to be given to how any local access should
fit with the 5 hubs proposed in the Council’s asset management strategy.
FINANCIAL
AND LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS
17. The
cost of the Director of Children’s Services and a third head of service are
currently paying for most of the work being carried out by Mouchel Parkman / Outcomes
UK, including the cost of the interim Director. Apart from any decisions to be made about the level at which the
Director’s salary should be set in order to recruit a strong candidate, the
proposals are cost neutral.
18. The
ideas laid out in this paper take full account of the statutory guidance on the
roles of the Director of Children’s Services and the Lead Member for Children’s
Services.
CONCLUDING
COMMENT
19. It
is important to move quickly to sharpen the effectiveness of the Children’s Services
directorate. The appointment of a
permanent Director will ensure that the positive desire and determination to
add at least 10 percentage points to the Island’s GCSE higher grade pass rate
will be realised sooner rather than later.
The identification of a third head of service who can take the lead on
commissioning, Children’s Trust arrangements, workforce development and school
organisation will help the Island to make the step changes that are so urgently
needed, particularly as it will free up the opportunity to recruit new senior
school improvement expertise to the Island.
Appendix
1: current structure of the Children’s
Services Directorate – to be found at:
http://eduwight.iow.gov.uk/the_lea/images/2LearningEffectiveness.pdf
http://eduwight.iow.gov.uk/the_lea/images/2ChildrenandFamilyServices.pdf
Appendix
2: illustrative
structure of Children’s Services Directorate into three divisions.