Secure children's unit slapped with third improvement order in just 10 months

Monday 24 October 2022

Secure children's home Greenfields has been called out by its regulator for failing its young residents for the third time in less than a year - this time as a result of "woefully inadequate" education, lack of staff confidence to deal with violence, and failing transition plans for care leavers.

Issued in September, the urgent improvement notice followed one in November 2021 and a second in April 2022 following an unannounced inspection of the care home by the Jersey Care Commission.

April's unscheduled inspection of Greenfields uncovered seven apparent regulatory breaches and led the facility to be slapped with its second urgent improvement notice in less than six months.

Just days later,  the Government's Director of Safeguarding with responsibility for children's homes resigned. However, Mark Owers claimed his departure was not linked to the critical report about Greenfields – but because he is setting up a children’s charity.

Since Mr Owers' departure, Greenfields now falls under the remit of Rob Sainsbury as acting Director General for Children, Young People, Education and Skills.

The most recent urgent improvement notice, issued last month, set out three regulations which had been contravened.

This notice is an update of the one issued in April 2022, which laid out 12 areas for improvement. Nine of these actions were completed which has left the following three areas outstanding.

Pictured: Former Director of Safeguarding and Care in Children's Social Care, Mark Owers.

The first regulation which had been contravened at Greenfields was the failure to ensure that proper provision is made for the education and leisure of any child who is a care receiver.

The improvement notice declared that the "education provision for one care receiver was not in place at the start of the new term in September 2022 and what was offered to the care receiver was woefully inadequate to meet their needs".

It advised that "immediate steps" must be taken to "ensure that all care receivers accommodated in this home have access to an appropriate and sufficiently resourced education provision, as is their right under Articles 28 and 29 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child".

Pictured: The education provision for one child at Greenfields was criticised as being "woefully inadequate to meet their needs".

The second issue raised in the urgent improvement notice relates to the de-escalation and physical intervention model (MAYBO).

It is reported that the staff at Greenfields "continue to report they do not feel confident in the use of MAYBO in terms of physical intervention techniques" due to the failure of those in charge to undertake the necessary review of the model.

The care home must now take immediate action to "ensure that the review of this intervention model is carried out and any recommendations made are followed through, which made include the recommendation for a new intervention model".

The report continues: "This places staff at risk of harm, where staff may be reluctant to intervene in a situation with care receivers and also place care receivers at risk of harm by their own actions."

Pictured: Robert Sainsbury, acting Director General for Children, Young People, Education and Skills is currently in charge of Greenfields.

The improvement notice also outlines how Greenfields compromised a care receiver’s potential to be rehabilitated to his home successfully by failing to ensure an adequate transition plan. The transition plan failed to include "regular visits to re-establish and strengthen relationships with carers from their substantive home in the community".

Going forwards, the report says that the care home "must ensure that the transition plans for care receivers are co-produced with their substantive care givers in the community to ensure that relationships are re-established and strengthened to improve outcomes for care receivers".