Issue - meetings

That the value of the work being undertaken to ensure the Council is meeting its corporate parenting aims and obligations be recognised.

The Head of Children’s Services introduced the annual report on corporate parenting progress within the Council.  She provided information on the role of the Children’s Services Forum which monitored the Council’s activity in this area and ensured that the views of looked after children were heard.  Information was also shared on Independent Reviewing Officers who chaired children’s planning meetings and had the powers to refer cases to the Welsh Government if there were concerns around the care of an individual.  As part of the arrangements, a resolution protocol had been adopted to give assurance that unresolved issues were escalated to a senior officer to pursue.  The Head of Children’s Services advised that the outcomes of a recent CSSIW inspection would be reported in due course and went on to draw attention to a report published in July 2013 on looked after children across Wales, copies of which were available upon request.

Councillor Ian Dunbar spoke of the annual Pride of Flintshire Awards which celebrated the achievements of looked after children in the county.

Councillor Paul Shotton praised the success of the ‘A2A’ identification card initiative, and asked about safeguards on the use of internet sites.  The Service Manager (Resources) explained that children and young people were provided with basic information on accessing websites as part of their educational experience, which included an element on protection.  In addition, a foster carers’ safety policy ensured that foster children had fair access to the internet with monitoring carried out by the foster carers as part of their role.

As members of the Children’s Services Forum, Councillors David Mackie and Hilary McGuill spoke favourably about its important role within the Council.  Whilst it was recognised that progress was being made on the format of reports and joint working with Housing on accommodation for care leavers, there were some concerns about the delay by the Health Board in rolling out the A2A card in health settings.

In response to a query regarding safe use of websites, the Service Manager (Resources) confirmed that foster carers were given the opportunity to attend school training sessions and agreed to provide more detail on this to the Committee.

The Chairman referred to concerns about the potential for misuse of social media and said that the same expectation for parents to monitor their children’s safety on the internet also applied to foster parents.

The Cabinet Member for Social Services reiterated that Members were corporate parents and encouraged those present and others to take part in the corporate parenting training.  As part of the recent inspection, representations had been made for this training to become mandatory.

As Chair of the Children’s Services Forum, the Cabinet Member for Education expressed his gratitude to the Head of Children’s Services for the positive contribution that she had made to the service and to the Pride of Flintshire Awards which placed value on the achievements of children and young people.  He paid tribute to her influence in raising the profile of the Forum of which  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12