Meeting documents

To consider the MTFP report for Children and Families Services and discuss the recommendations. The report considered at the Cabinet meeting held on 19 January 2022 and associated appendices is also attached.

A PowerPoint presentation outlining the context to the Children’s Services Business Plan will follow.

The Chair welcomed the Council’s Deputy Director Children Services, Ms Claire Winter and Ms Sian Kenny, Strategic Manager, Finance Business Partnership to the meeting for this agenda item. The advisory board had received a report from the Director of Finance which summarised the key areas of specific interest within the Medium-Term Financial Plan (MTFP) for Children and Families Services for 2022/23 together with the report considered at the Cabinet meeting on 19 January 2022 and associated appendices. The advisory board was invited to (a) consider the proposed budget for 2022/23 for Children’s and Family Services budgets; and (b) review / comment on specific proposals for changes from previous years, to offer assurance to Cabinet and/or identify any matters for consideration that would like to highlight to the Cabinet.

The advisory board additionally received a PowerPoint presentation which provided the context and the links and inter relationship with the Children’s Services Business Plan and the Children’s Services MTFP 2022/23.

In the presentation, Ms Winter highlighted the following: -

·         outlined how Children’s Services supports the SCC Business Plan

·         how the Somerset Children & Young People’s Plan (CYPP) links to the priorities and the Children’s Transformation Programme (including, for example SEND Improvement) and the affiliated programme / joint commissioning (for example CAMHS Transformation Plan)

·         the different time periods for the areas of work under the transformation plan and that the discussion on the MTFP relates to the 2022/23 budget

·         there is the business-as-usual work / statutory functions they undertake, so this isn’t the totality of the budget.

The Chair thanked Ms Winter for the time and effort in putting the information together and asked that the information be shared with all Councillors.

The Chair then invited Ms Kenny to present the Children’s Services MTFP for 2022/23 and the following main points were raised: -

·         total investment in Children’s Services is £12.3m, an increase of £13.3% and referred to the information in Table 1 of the Report, which provided detail on the Children’s budget

·         Director confidence in the MTFP / budget is ‘medium’ – this is a robust process but there are unknowns / risks, such as the impact on staff capacity across health and social care and education (and unforeseen pressures) and there are mitigating actions

·         provided information on the additional funding of £9.8m, as detailed in Table 2 of the Report

·         provided information on anticipated cost reduction from transformation, savings and income proposals as detailed in Table 3 of the Report

·         referred to the earmarked use of reserves, relating to 2 programmes – Family Safeguarding (£1.3m) and school reorganisation (Crewkerne and Ilminster) (£0.43m) and the capital programme new bids, around building local capacity and sufficiency, including the purchase of residential properties for care placements and investment in homes for children with disabilities (£9.9m across the next 3 years of the MTFP)

·         highlighted next steps in budget process ahead of the Full Council meeting on 23 February 2022, which sets the revenue and capital budgets for 2022/23 and Council Tax levels.

The advisory board asked detailed questions and made a number of comments on the Business Plan and the MTFP proposals, which were responded to at the meeting, as follows: -

·         request for clarity on the information relating to Children’s Services, re SEND, as set out in Appendix 2 of the Cabinet Report (Transformation, savings and income generation proposals). The Council’s Assistant Director Inclusion, Dr Hart confirmed that there is no plan to take money out of SENDIAS and what has been agreed is to put additional funding into the SENDIAS budget. Dr Hart said that he is happy to circulate an explanation in writing and share with the Committee. Ms Kenny further explained the principle that a negative figure equates to reinvestment in budget and a positive figure is a reduction in budget. For Children’s Services specifically, the figures in the pie chart in the PowerPoint presentation add to £2.1m (anticipated cost reduction from transformation) and is the savings required for Children’s Services in 2022/23.  It was agreed that a note be circulated to the Committee providing clarification on these points.

·         question around the additional statutory capacity for educational psychology and confidence that its sufficient to meet demand – Dr Hart said that work has been done based on assumptions on the number of assessments, reviews and future need. Also aware of the pressures SENCO’s are under, especially in smaller schools and are looking at ways to offer practical support to them, to try to reduce some of the burden.

·         comment made as to why the ‘transport for Yr7 and Yr8 pupils from Ilminster to Crewkerne’ is detailed separately to ‘home to school transport’ in the Report – the Council’s Assistant Director, Education, Partnership and Skills, Ms Walker said that this is because of the difference between the MTFP and the budget and are at point of transition, so next time we would not expect to see that separated out in any way.

·         question about what work is happening around the home to school transport budget – Dr Hart confirmed that work is ongoing focusing on this issue and are also engaging regionally and at a Council wide level.

·         clarification requested on the Early Years funding situation, detailed in the Report. In response Ms Kenny referred to the appendix to the Cabinet Report and to the report to the Schools Forum on 12 January 2022 re the Dedicated Schools Grant Settlement (DSG) 2022/23. The Schools Forum is looking at the Early Years Block of the DSG allocation and the increase in entitlement rates. It was agreed that further information will be shared with the Committee, to help members understand the impact on the whole system (to be added to Scrutiny Committee’s work programme).

·         question asked about the confidence levels expressed in the Report and the robustness of assumptions around demographics and demand – Ms Winter said that the assessment has been made that the risk is ‘medium’ based on a number of factors - the demographic information which comes out nationally inputs into the likely demand; the impact of the pandemic on demand for Children’s services is not fully known but the key factor locally is complexity and older children coming into care system, which in turn is more expensive.

·         question as to whether there is sufficient resource / capital for the Homes2Inspire building local capacity programme. The Chair highlighted that Homes for Somerset will be an agenda item on the next meeting of the advisory board and will cover these issues. Ms Winter outlined the benefits of Somerset having its own capacity and resource and the Cabinet member, Cllr Chilcott highlighted there had been extra funding received from the DfE which enables more to be done than initially planned and that she welcomed the increase in budget.

·         the Chair said that it was important for the advisory board to express the concern that there seems to be a degree of uncertainty around elements of the budget and that risks are ever more complex.

·         question as to why the timeline information had been presented in a ‘Gantt chart’ and also on use of acronyms – Dr Hart said that, for example, the solid arrow on the chart for the Written Statement of Action SEND & Improvement Plan, reflects the period of time for the piece of work but there will be continued workstreams beyond then. Ms Winter confirmed that ‘FDAC’ stood for the Family and Drug Alcohol Court. This is a national initiative which the Council received funding for / match funding from the Ministry of Justice.

On behalf of the advisory board, the Chair thanked officers for the presentation and that Members still have the opportunity to feed into the budget and MTFP process. The advisory board noted the MTFP for Children and Families Services 2022 – 2023 and the Children’s Services Plan and requested additional information / clarification on the following: -

·         With reference to the additional funding information set out in Table 2 on page 41 of the Report, information on reasons for increases

·         Clarification on how the Ilminster & Crewkerne transport position is shown in the Budget Report

·         Clarification on Early Years funding / hourly rates, detailed on page 47 of the Report

·         Clarity on SENDIAS funding and clarity on how investments and savings were displayed in Appendix 2 Cabinet Report

·         Acceptance of the uncertainty in the budget due to unknowns around the long-term effects and impact of Covid.