I would like to request some information in relation to the fostering service provision of your Local Authority:
* Request 1: Information in relation to the looked after children (LAC) population and the number of registered local authority (LA) children’s homes:
Total number of LAC
LAC placed with LA children’s homes
LAC placed with independent children’s homes
Number of local authority registered children’s homes 30/09/2021
Number of local authority registered children’s homes 30/09/2021
Please see this spreadsheet for the response to this question.
* Request 2: Information in relation to number of children and average weekly fee for children placed with independent residential providers by type of placement and staffing levels:
Please provide the number of children and average weekly fee for children placed with independent residential providers by type of placement and staffing levels and also at a total level.
Devon County Council does not keep records in a format which would make this information readily available, as this question requires a breakdown of placement costs, types of care, staffing levels and so on.
From our preliminary assessment, we estimate that compliance with this request would exceed the appropriate costs limit under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 because in order to comply with this request for information we would have to manually review each record which would involve locating the placement contract, identifying the type of placement, and noting the staffing levels for over 80 placements. As this would take approximately 20 minutes per record, we estimate that this would well exceed the appropriate limit of 18 hours of officer time.
* Request 3: Information in relation to number of children and average weekly fee for children placed by independent residential providers by staffing levels:
Please provide the number of children and average weekly fee by staffing levels for children placed with each independent residential provider. Also please provide discounts by independent residential provider.
Devon County Council does not keep records in a format which would make this information readily available, as this question requires a breakdown of placement costs, types of care, staffing levels and so on.
From our preliminary assessment, we estimate that compliance with this request would exceed the appropriate costs limit under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 because in order to comply with this request for information we would have to manually review each record which would involve locating the placement contract, identifying the type of placement, and noting the staffing levels for over 80 placements. As this would take approximately 20 minutes per record, we estimate that this would well exceed the appropriate limit of 18 hours of officer time.