Nov 2008 19

Children's Trust Boards9

The tragic case of Baby P presents us with a rare glimpse into the structures which are supposed to  Complex_diagram_2

protect our children. In fact the case tells us something fundamental about today’s government in general.

Yesterday, beginning a series of new child welfare initiatives, Ed Balls (Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families) announced that Labour’s ‘Children’s Trust Boards’ – local groups designed to protect vulnerable children – will be strengthened. No doubt action is now needed, but this is a move which not only illustrates perfectly how this Government interprets the meaning of ‘action’, but one which is likely to only perpetuate the systemic problems that led to Baby P.

Children’s Trust Boards were set up in 2003, in the wake of the Laming inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbie. Responding to its findings the Government leapt towards legislation (its default reaction to any controversy and the primary substitute for any real action). This new legislation demanded that local public bodies work closely together, with child protection efforts co-coordinated between
local authority, health, police, schools and charity officials. This cooperation was supposed to design systems through which in-danger children could not
fall.

From the beginning Children’s Trust Boards have been the cause of more confusion than clarity. By 2008 many local authorities still had not set on up, and 31 per cent of those that had were confused as to their purpose. Only a month ago the Audit Commission concluded that Children’s Trusts had failed to improve outcomes for children and young people, or delivered better value for money than locally agreed cooperation. 

But of course – typical of a government so addicted to reviews and commissions that they don’t even consider the findings of one before instigating another – Mr Balls and the Government simply dismissed these findings of the Audit Commission as ‘out of date’. Instead the Government now intends to mandate Children’s Trust Boards for all areas, and demand that each of them draw up a ‘Children and Young People Plan’.

Perhaps I am overly sceptical, but the answer to Haringey’s problems is not a wordy, politically correct ‘Children and Young People Plan’. Such a document will only further blur the lines of responsibility and accountability, lines which are already too imperceptible. It will do nothing to substantively improve the lives of children.

Moreover, in the vein of many of Mr Ball’s previous initiatives this move to ‘strengthen’ Children Trust Boards implies that public bodies and ‘official guidance’ are the best answer to our problems. In short, that problem = quango.

This is not the case. I do not pretend to have the answer, but I do know that a diktat from Whitehall entrusting directionless, unaccountable committees with the welfare of children is not the answer either.

Expect to be blinded by a blizzard of such ‘initiatives’ over coming weeks. Anything to detract attention from the fact that what is needed is less ‘action’ and more transparency, less structure and more accountability. As long as no-one is responsible, nothing will improve. Programs like Children’s Trust Boards only make establishing that responsibility even harder.

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  • Hardeep Singh

    I am aware of the general consenus and feeling throughout the land with regards to this case. I am no exception and personally feel very strongly about it. However post event, problem, disaster, incident I would always wish and in this particular case pray for the most effective solution. If that entails ammendments to a system then stand up, own up and take it on the chin. This is no game and most certainly NOT A POLITICAL one! ……… Of that I have absoluetly no doubt.
    Playing politics with the over funding of the local cycle lane or highlighting fraudalent benefit claims is one thing but that’s only where it should exist. However as so evidently portrayed in the article above politicians have no shame, no honour (regardless of how they address themselves across the floor of the commons) and no sense of responsibility. To play politics with cchildren welfare is as low as Somolian pirates’ behaviour. Ed Balls you Sir are a national disgrace, how long did you spend exmaining the political implications and who long did you actually focus your attentions on this child’s plight. Your leader showed his ugly face on the TV more than you did during this story, I pity you Sir.
    The operation for damage limitaion has succeeded or at least is now underway with the manipulated and manageable conclusions in the pipeline. When does a member of the party, council, local authority actually resign….? For unpaid library book fines…? For loosing the keys to the staionery cupboard…? Instead of the most honourable course of action yet another layer of ill operating bureaucracy has been implemented on a broken system so that next time it happens it won’t make it to the public’s attention.
    You are a Member of the British Parliament act like it. The welfare of children is only as important as the votes it gets you otherwise like all commodities that are dispensable especially those that are mere babies, is that your interpretation Mr. Balls up.
    How much will this later caped crusading layer of bureaucracy cost the tax payers? Well as long as it keeps you in a job it’s affordable I presume, I hold my head in my hands what despair.

  • Stop using American spelling…

    “Perhaps I am overly skeptical..”
    Use the proper spelling – it is beyond annoying !

  • Steve Robson

    and your not playing politics Hardeep???? Actually you are almost as much of a disgrace as David Cameron who ineptly seeks political advantage from this and the Sun newspaper, who hound social workers rather than the perpetrators.
    I would love to see the TPA run child protection services (well obviously not real ones because the results would be disastrous). Dammed if you do, dammed if you don’t. I think you’d find this particular “non-job” a little harder than your own non-jobs as serial moaners, negative campaigners and general know it alls.

  • John Coles

    Clean up your grammar – it’s ‘you’re’ and know-it-alls.
    It’s beyond annoying!

  • Bob Stott

    Complexity.
    The page from which the ‘complex diagram was taken ‘Strategy Survival Guide’ Prime Ministers Strategy Unit, represents one of the problems with describing complexity, that is, it is in its self far to complex. It is the job of strategists (consultants) supporting organisations, including governments, to strip out the complexity, and create a process (for processes shape behaviour) that is easy to implement, reliable, measurable and capable of improvement. Before any such process could be implemented, a dramatic reduction in bureaucracy across a wide range of stakeholders, would be necessary, for it was the bureaucracy that ignored the call for help from the social worker in the case of Baby P. Unfortunately without; a simple process, a determination to dramatically reduce bureaucracy, or any understanding of how to bring about radical change in a complex environment, Ministers respond with high profile, high publicity, highly visible solutions, that eventually become part of the problem. The law of ‘unintended consequences’ always applies – the unseen, unanticipated consequences of hastily thought through decisions – as in the decision to create another level of bureaucracy that would presumably use the same redundant, systems and tools and techniques, otherwise known as, conventional wisdom.
    Einstein wasn’t kidding when he said that ‘to keep on doing the same things and to expect different results’ is an act of absolute insanity. He also said something that those responsible for the personal development of Ministers of State, would do well to consider, ‘It is seeing with complexity and more dimensions, that enables the development of simple solutions.’
    It is not as thought there wasn’t a good example of surviving and thriving in a complex system and rapidly changing world – visit Toyota. The simple but critical difference in thinking between the success of Toyota and organisations worldwide is simple.
    Toyota’s leaders view their organisation as a network of interdependent self-organizing parts, they believe that the company’s long-term results emerge from a particular pattern of relationships among all parts of the organization, including customers, suppliers, employees, shareholders, and the communities that sustain the organisation.
    Toyotas strategy is to continuously improve the system of relationships among all parts of the business, in ways that eliminate waste and increase efficiency and effectiveness.
    The most significant problem Local Authorities face, is the massive bureaucratic burden placed on it by central government. Unlike the Government, Toyota’s leaders don’t rely on tick boxes, second-hand reports or tables and charts of data to achieve a true understanding of the root cause of problems. Instead, they go to the place where you can watch, observe, and ask why? In other words, just as in the Toyota model, we need ‘frontline staff’ in the Public Services’ to tell us what works, what doesn’t and what can be done to reduce bureaucracy.
    This ‘empowering’ approach should now be a ‘priority’ of the Prime Minister and his Ministers of State and the Toyota message to the Prime Minister; the key to performance improvement is to nurture the system that produces results, not to drive the system to achieve unrealistic targets. Leaders in the Public Sector will be successful if they are genuinely empowered to apply a Toyota ‘living system’ approach, for it strips the complexity out of complexity – the major problem is that it is a ‘bottom up, and not a ‘top down’ approach, and that would require a dramatic cultural shift across Government – without that cultural shift, which many in Government have advocated, nothing will change.

  • Hardeep Singh

    Bob Scott I am indebted to you Sir. That piece comparing the respected entity of Toyota to that of ‘modern’ government is very informative. However Toyota lives in the real world whereas the government is an elected committee that uses other people’s money and when it runs out, well so what. Toyota can’t afford to daydream but government can that’s the difference.
    The result is politics before service delivery and one of the contributing factors that led to this and no doubt other non-highlighted cases around the UK. I don’t want politics left, centre or right I expect and demand fundamental services for children FULLSTOP.

  • Tim

    Funnily enough, steve, the TPA campaigns against the waste of taxpayer funds, and against poor policies, which they are good at. If there is a new policy which is obviously flawed, surely its a good idea to point it out and explain why.
    Maybe they wouldn’t be good at protecting vulnerable children – but clearly nor ware haringey council, who were being paid to do so.

  • gildedtumbril

    I am only semiliterate so I crave reader’s indulgence. I think that should be readers’…
    Oh! What the hell.
    Politics is bleeding taxpayers dry.
    It is painfully obvious that 90% of Snivelling Service ‘jobs’ are for supernumeries without whom we would do so much better.
    ALL quangos should be abolished at once.
    All quangoloids should be permanently barred from any public office.
    It is time to reverse the policy of protection for monsters and zero protection for victims.
    It is time to withdraw from all idiot conventions of the United Nitwits and uther such protocols which are burdening Britain with ever increasing lunacy.
    All town hall staff who juggle paper need a 90% prune.

  • Hope

    Family Group Conference are mandatory policy in most Local Authorities, which should save taxpayers millions of pounds in legal/court fees, by asking families to step in (as many would if contacted or allowed to)prior to etremely costly’care proceedings’
    All LA must be made accountable as to why they are not following their own policies.Dare I say maybe alot of adoptive parents prefer non-damaged children!!
    Forced adoption does not save any child from abuse and diverts money from where it is really needed.It must not keep people in non-jobs and definately not in legal/court costs, where unfortunately many still have their noses in the trough!