By Local Democracy Reporter
Steve Shaw
AN independent investigation into allegations that failings at Thurrock Council contributed to the death of a toddler has found no evidence of wrongdoing.
The investigation was launched in September after the Chief Executive of the authority received anonymous letters in January and September that claimed council officers missed opportunities that may have prevented the death of a toddler, which happened in Grays in January.
They also raised concerned about several officers in Children’s Services and about the recruitment process.
A specialist children’s safeguarding barrister was asked to investigate the claims and has concluded that they were “unsubstantiated”.
While the outcome of this investigation was discussed at the council’s cabinet meeting on November 14, Thurrock Council did not include it on the meeting’s agenda and failed to publish a report on the investigation until after it had taken place.
National guidelines state that information must be available to the public at least five working days before a meeting takes place.
But the council insisted it was a item of urgent business, with the independent report unavailable five days before the meeting – although council officers had enough time to condense a 28-page report into just four pages prior to the meeting taking place.
At the meeting, council Rob Gledhill said this was because “information wasn’t received until the back end of last week” and admitted that even cabinet members had not been provided with the report until 30 minutes before the meeting.
He said: “We received two whistleblowing allegations, one was in January 2018 that was investigated as a significant amount of whistleblowing notifications are internally. The allegations were linked to the recruitment process, competence and references were checked by HR and reported to the monitoring officer. Everything assessed was reviewed against other reports from outside bodies and the monitoring officer completed the report in April, it was found the allegations were unsubstantiated.
“Later, a letter dated August 2018 was received by the chief executive on September 4. It was a lot more in-depth, it had more specifics in relation to a case and reiterated some of the previous allegations. Because of the seriousness of this, in days the whistleblowing case was put to an outside barrister who is a specialist in investigating matters of child safety and child social care. They have had unrestricted access to everything.
“The file was locked down immediately, so it couldn’t be altered or tampered with. The barrister could look at absolutely anything they wished, everything was reported to Ofsted who at the time were coming in to do one of their investigations and regular reviews, which focussed on social workers at the time.
“They were fully appraised of what was going on, they are quite happy that everything has been done and I’m going to reiterate again, the report makes clear that the independent barrister found the case-specific allegations were investigated and unsubstantiated.”
The cabinet report states there is “no indication” the service is experiencing difficulties and claims this is supported by an Ofsted visit in October which was largely positive. However, a council report from the same month found that just 27 percent of children’s services staff thought the management team makes changes for the better and less that half said they could cope with the workload without excessive working hours.
A council spokesman said: “This information item was heard under Items of Urgent Business on the agenda as the report of the independent investigation was not available five days prior to the Cabinet meeting. The information was communicated publicly at the earliest opportunity which was as an urgent item to Cabinet.
“Meetings can hear additional items that the Chair is of the opinion should be considered as a matter of urgency, in accordance with Section 100B (4) (b) of the Local Government Act 1972.
“The barristers report will not be published as it is legally privileged and contains extensive sensitive third party personal data.”
Why doesn’t this come as a surprise.
Not knowing the full details of the case I can only add one comment and it it in regard to the Ofsted visit that was mentioned (“The cabinet report states there is “no indication” the service is experiencing difficulties and claims this is supported by an Ofsted visit in October which was largely positive”).
Ofsted inspections and visits are NOT conducted without prior notice which enables schools, etc, to put on their best performances and hide any problems which means that a “largely positive” visit doesn’t necessarily mean that there isn’t something wrong going on. As a former governor at Thurrock Adult Community College, I am fully aware of this failure in the Ofsted inspection process and, being a member of the Standards Committee at the time of my governorship, found this to be a grave error on the part of Ofsted, not because of any problems at the college but because of the reasons I gave earlier.
Lets not forget a toddler died here.
Whilst TBC seem happy to abdicate responsibility here and Ofsted ticked all the boxes. Many people who have dealings with the social services dept will know it is a department of incompetence and turmoil.
One big issue is the lack of experience, consistency and leadership, the other being funding.
troglodyteguzzlesdownhumanswill – Compassion? From you? Well, it’s nice to see you’re capable of it. It’s just a pity that your compassion is selective and conditional for, if that was not the case, you might be a better human being. You must believe that everyone’s compassion is as conditional as yours to think that I missed the fact that a child died but I didn’t. I am genuinely saddened for the couple’s loss but I was only trying to make a point on the fallibility of investigations, not dredge up more misery for the couple if they read this article and the associated comments.
The point I made was obviously too subtle for you because I pointed out, using my knowledge of Ofsted’s processes, that even independent investigations are unlikely to show wrongdoings and failures because they are based on flawed processes. I didn’t think I needed to actually spell out that point because I imagine people to have more than a rudimentary intelligence to work things out from subtle messages on their own.
The fact that, according to the council, the “file was locked down immediately, so it couldn’t be altered or tampered with” doesn’t mean that it couldn’t have been altered or tampered with prior to the allegations being made or between the allegations being made and the file being locked down. Like my Ofsted example, the idea of a better face being put on before the investigation began is always a possibility and, therefore, even an independent investigation might come up empty.
We actually agree on TBC’s abdication of responsibility in this matter. As for the funding issue, you can blame the Tory government for that.
“The barristers report will not be published as it is legally privileged and contains extensive sensitive third party personal data.”
Interesting. I will have to take your word for the matter we all will.
Nothing to see fokes
Poor little girl though.
Cookie, I can see by your response above you are just a bitter twisted basket case. Making assumptions is what you do best. I can see why your mental.
I do not intend to darken this sad issue as you clearly do, so please do not use this post to show the readers your mental aptitude.
troglodyteguzzlesdownhumanswill – The points I made were valid both on the case which I stated I was genuinely saddened by and on your compassion being extremely conditional and selective. I made no assumptions so your comment that “Making assumptions is what you do best” is a childish non sequitur.
“I can see why your mental” – I can see why you’re as stupid as you are. You’re an uneducated oaf because you can’t use contractions.
“I do not intend to darken this sad issue as you clearly do” – I have not darkened this issue at all as my points on the issue were valid. The comments relating to your conditional compassion are a separate issue.
“please do not use this post to show the readers your mental aptitude” – I have only shown that I understand the reason that this case has been swept under the carpet due to my knowledge of the Ofsted processes and how that has an impact on all independent investigations that rely on government bureaucracy. I can’t help being mentally talented. It’s just the way I was born.
Show some respect for this tragic toddler you half wit.
troglodyteguzzlesdownhumanswill – I haven’t shown any disrespect for the child. You, on the other hand, have. My initial comment (November 20, 2018 at 3:08 am) distanced the tragedy from the investigation as it was a pertinent point about an aspect of the INVESTIGATION and was based on my knowledge of Ofsted processes. Your second comment (November 20, 2018 at 8:28 am) posted only 5 hours and 20 minutes after my comment was posted (and just over a full day after your first comment) was the one that dragged the tragic death into the matter and was not needed except as a response to my own comment. My second comment (November 20, 2018 at 10:03 pm) called you out on both your ignorance of the intent of my first comment and your very selective use of what you consider compassion whilst adding an extra point to consider. If you read to the end of the comment you may have seen that I said I agreed with your point that TBC is abdicating responsibility in the horrific events that led to a child’s death. Your third comment (November 21, 2018 at 8:25 am) posted about 10 hours after my own was a blatant attack against me (I suppose I should congratulate you on having the guts to openly declare war on me that time) and to further conflate the two issues of the investigation (that I had commented on) and the child’s death (which I tried to leave out of the conversation out of respect for the parents) out of a misguided and childish attempt to make me look as bad a person as you are for using a child’s death to further your own agenda of attacking me.
It seems that, once again, I have to teach you a lesson. As it feels like a full-time job, I feel you should pay me for being your personal tutor and then I can come off of the benefits you hate me for being on.
I do admire you for trying to keep your comments short though because it leaves fewer opportunities for you to show your lack of education by making fewer mistakes. Good for you on that score! (patronising pat on the head) But shame on you for dragging a couple’s grief at losing a child into a conversation about a related but different subject altogether to make cheap shots at me. (stern finger wagging) That’s a low…even for someone as dispicable as you. I pity you. I really do.
Veni, vidi, iterum calce asinus tuus.