Devon County Council

The Head of Service and Operations Managers are provided monthly with details of every child approved for adoption but not yet adopted, with details of any delay or obstacle to progress.  This is part of a systematic approach to performance improvement in children’s services.

A Rapid Improvement Plan which seeks to ensure that every child who might benefit from adoption if offered that opportunity, and to identify and tackle delays in implementing adoption plans, is regularly monitored by a group led by the Head of Service.

A six monthly report on the County Council’s adoption activity is presented to the Senior Management Team, the Adoption Panels and the Executive Portfolio Holder for Children’s Services.  This includes statistical information, identifies trends and reports on performance against national indicators and local targets.

The Statement of Purpose is reviewed yearly.

The Adoption Panels, the Head of Service and the Director of Children’s Services receive reports every two months on the progress of each child whose case has been considered by the panels and who is awaiting placement or adoption.

Established staff receive monthly supervision and annual appraisals of their performance.  Sessional staff are accountable to a specified manager and receive face to face supervision appropriate to their activity and at least annually.

A Practice Quality Audit system is in place which provides for managers to regularly check the quality of records and ensure that procedures are being followed.

Awareness training for staff was provided as part of the implementation of the Adoption & Children Act 2002, a three-day training course on adoption and permanence was run twice in 2006 and training on adoption issues will be included in the core child care training programs for staff involved in adoption work. All in-house training is evaluated.

Training events have been provided for the Adoption Panels from time to time, including in-house sessions and forums facilitated by BAAF.  A training day for adoption panel members and social workers was held on 30 January 2008 jointly with the adoption service of Torbay Council.

The Annual Performance Assessment (APA) provided to the DCSF provides information on the County Council’s performance against government performance targets including adoption targets.

The Director of Children & Young People’s Services acting as Agency Decision Maker is aware of the detail of all cases subject to adoption decision making and is thereby alerted to any instance of poor practice and able to take it up in her line management role.

The South West Adoption Consortium produces quarterly reports of its activity which are circulated to each member agency and include information on the number of children and adopters from each agency for whom a placement is achieved.