Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from Mrs Brenda Williams (Council of Oxfordshire Teacher Oragnisations) for this meeting and retrospectively for the meeting held on November 9^th.

There were no declarations of interest.

To approve the minutes of the meetings held on 9 November 2010 (CH3a) and 20 December 2010 (CH3b) and to note for information any matters arising on them.

The minutes of the meetings held on 9 November 2010 and 20 December 2010 were approved and signed.

An overview of the services provided by the Children’s Services Directorate and the challenges which will need to be addressed in the future (CH5).

The Committee is invited to receive the presentation which will be followed by a question & answer session.

Members agreed that items 5 and 6 should be taken together. The Director of Children, Young People and Families provided an update on the latest issues affecting the Directorate. Members welcomed these regular presentations as a means of keeping up to date with the rapidly changing world of schools and services for children. It was agreed that they should continue to be a standing item on the agenda.

A discussion took place around a range of current issues. The following were the main points made:

• The Munro Report on Child Protection – Professor Munro is undertaking on behalf of the Government an independent review of the child protection system, problems within the system, how they have arisen and how the service could refocus on the child’s journey from needing to receiving the right help and ensuring that the needs of the child is at the core of all safeguarding.

So far Professor Munro has published two interim reports and she intends presenting her final report and recommendations to the Government in April. This could lead to changes in areas such as inspection, performance monitoring, and referral and assessment and the Committee will need to be aware of proposals for change in the future.

• Health and Wellbeing Board – must ensure that the voice of children is included. The Director of Children’s Services will be one of the posts that will have statutory membership of the Board.
• Consultations on two Directorate reviews are being undertaken at present – one on Service Redesign and the other on the new structure of the Directorate. Members were provided with intranet links to both reviews. The consultations will run from February through to April 4^th from when the Directorate’s name will change to Children Education and Families.
• Service redesign – the “support tap” for schools and governors will not be turned off but the reduction in funding will plainly have an effect on the type of response available.
• Youth services – “hubs” will not be just youth centres by another name. They will provide a completely different service with “the right professional in the right place”. “Outreach” services will be provided with professionals going out to where people are using local resources e.g. Children’s Centres.
• Members asked for a further update on hubs at their next meeting in May. The Director undertook to ensure this happened and that members would be updated on a regular basis on the progress of the hubs and other service developments.

A short item to remind members of what was agreed at the budget meeting in December 2010 and what was consequently added to the work programme. A paper setting out what was agreed is attached (CH6).

See above.

In February 2010 the Committee was addressed by the Anti-Bullying Co-ordinator and colleagues who were about to review the anti-bullying strategy with the County Council’s multi-agency partners. The Committee made a number of comments and recommendations which were set out in a letter to the Director. A copy of the letter is attached for information (CH7).

The Anti-Bullying Co-ordinator, Jo Brown, and colleagues will present a paper  (to follow) and bring the Committee up to date on the strategy. Members will be able to see how their comments have been taken into account in the strategy and ask questions.

Members of the Committee will then be invited to comment on what they have heard and, if they wish, to forward any comments to the Director for Children, Young People & Families.

Members received a presentation that provided information about the Anti-Bullying Strategy’s response to recommendations made by the Committee last February. The report provided information about how committee recommendations had been addressed and other key areas of work that had been undertaken over the last year.

The Anti-Bullying Strategy is a collaboration of multi-agency partners with the overall aim of reducing levels of bullying across Oxfordshire.

Members were pleased to see the degree to which their recommendations had been incorporated into the anti-bullying strategy. They were further pleased to see that progress was being made in reducing levels of bullying.

During the discussion members emphasized the importance of school governors being made aware of what was happening in their schools. Anti-bullying reports should therefore go to governing bodies as well as the head teacher.

The issue of cyber bullying was discussed. Attention was drawn to the importance of ensuring that parents are aware of the dangers of this form of bullying and educated in how to recognize and combat it.

Members were very interested to hear about the Junior Citizen Trust. Junior Citizen has been running since 1991 and is offered free to every year 6 state school pupil in Oxfordshire. Every year about 4,500 children visit Junior Citizen.

During their two hour visit the children experience 7 different safety scenarios and each child gets the chance to practice making a 999 telephone call. Each of the scenarios is run by staff from the various agencies involved with the Junior Citizen Trust.

Around 25% of schools do not take part in the scheme and action is being taken to encourage them to participate. It was agreed that a visit for members to see the work of the Trust would be beneficial.

Members were informed that the strategy would be updated in August. They asked to be informed about the contents of the new strategy and it was agreed that this would be done as soon as the new strategy becomes available. Members also requested that the Anti-bullying Coordinator and her colleagues should return to the Committee in February 2012 to update them on progress.

Under the Government's plans for schools it will be much easier for charities, universities, businesses, educational groups, teachers and groups of parents to start new schools. In addition the government plans to increase the number of academy schools by allowing all schools judged to be outstanding to become academies.

The attached paper (CH8) explains the latest position in Oxfordshire. A representative of CYP&F will attend the meeting to answer questions and bring members up to date on any further developments.

Roy Leach, Strategic Lead for School Organisation & Planning, presented a paper on the development of Free Schools and Academies in Oxfordshire. In addition to the information contained within the paper, the following points were made.

Mr Leach explained that a meeting had taken place with about ten promoters of free schools in Oxfordshire. The County Council’s aim is to see such schools develop via a collaborative approach. The situation is changing almost weekly as more advice and guidance comes form the Government. It is unlikely that there would be more than two free schools launched in Oxfordshire by September 2011.

The criteria for developing academies have now changed. Previously they would have come out of “failing” schools however now outstanding or very good schools can also become academies.

In answer to members’ questions the following emerged in addition to the information in the paper provided with the agenda:

All free schools will be new schools but both they and the academies will have to abide by the same admissions code of practice as existing schools. They will however be able to form their own admissions policy within that code.

A free school could be set up even if it would be in an area where there are surplus places provided that the business case was sufficiently robust.

If an existing secondary school were to become an academy it could, in theory, delete feeder primary schools. None to date have done that.

The Local Authority would continue to make available advice on matters such as teacher contracts and Health and Safety. However new schools would have the option of whether or not to purchase the services from the LA or elsewhere.

There is a lack of clarity around the position of pupils with SEN statements but it is expected that they would have any right to go to a free school or academy that was named in their statement; refusals to admit would need to be referred to the Secretary of State.

Concern was expressed as to what might happen if all City secondary schools were to become academies and not take SEN statemented pupils. It was explained that the LA is only a consultee in this process and that the business case has to address need and, crucially, demand. So, if all other aspects such as finance were in place a school would get the go-ahead if a demand could be demonstrated. It was explained that most of the current crop of promoters had expressed a willingness to work with all children. Despite that members remained very concerned over this aspect.

The LA would have no right to be represented on governing bodies but could be invited in.

Finally, members were assured that they would be notified of any plans for free schools or academies in their divisions.

Mr Leach was thanked for his input and invited back for a further report later in the year.

The Chairman will propose that the Committee should undertake a review of attainment throughout Oxfordshire at Key Stage 1. Creighton Muirhead, Joint Interim Head of the Raising Achievement Service, will present the information contained in the attached paper (CH9).

Members should then decide whether they wish to undertake a select committee style review and agree a possible date in July.

The Committee AGREED to undertake a Select Committee style review of Educational Attainment at KS1 across the whole of Oxfordshire. The meeting would take place in July. A number of initial questions were identified. These were:

·         How does Oxfordshire, and in particular the City, compare with similar places elsewhere?

·         If some are better; what are they doing that Oxfordshire could adopt?

·         What is being done already to try to deal with this problem?

·         English as an additional language (EAL) is often put forward as a major factor in low attainment - but is it?

·         Did the change from 3 tier education to 2 tiers have any effect on attainment?

·         How do the figures appear when added value/improvement is taken into consideration?

Members were asked to forward any further questions or comments to Roger Edwards.

In September the Committee agreed to nominate members to participate in a joint working group with members from the Safer and Stronger Communities Scrutiny Committee that would consider a management report on current policy and procedure for the admittance of young people to youth centres. This followed on from concerns that had arisen following an incident at The Sweatbox in Wantage. The members nominated by this committee were Councillors Nicholas Turner, Dave Sexon and Val Smith.

The management report was published in November 2010 and is attached (CH10a). The working group met in December with the officers responsible for youth centres in Oxfordshire. A short paper comprising the notes of that meeting and identifying the main issues raised by the working group is also attached (CH10b).

Members of the working group AGREED that, having reviewed the procedures they would recommend that they should be endorsed.

Members are requested to AGREE the recommendation of the working group.

Members AGREED to accept the report and asked that there should be a report back in twelve months time to evaluate the success of the procedures.

The Committee is asked to suggest items from the current Forward Plan on which it may wish to have an opportunity to offer advice to the Cabinet before any decision is taken, together with details of what it thinks could be achieved by looking at any items.

A short discussion took place around the question of funding for school sports activities and the level of sport undertaken in Oxfordshire schools. Members AGREED to add school sports activity to the future work programme.