Social services chiefs were unaware that a small number of “highly vulnerable children” in South Gloucestershire live in unregistered temporary homes, watchdogs found. Ofsted also concluded during a recent focused visit to the council’s children’s services that youngsters in care have “too many changes of social worker” while some are kept waiting too long for a permanent home.
But in a letter to bosses, inspectors said many improvements had been made since the local authority’s service was rated as “requires improvement” in 2019, which came three years after it was judged to be “inadequate”. South Gloucestershire Council has welcomed the findings as “encouraging” but accepts more still needs to be done to “accelerate the pace of change”.
Ofsted inspector Sarah Canto said in the letter on Thursday, October 20, to executive director for people Chris Sivers: “Most children in care are living in homes that meet their needs. However, children are not receiving a consistently good service.
