Issue - meetings

(Report of the Portfolio Holder for Regulatory and Community Safety)

The Portfolio Holder for Regulatory and Community Safety introduced the Partnership Vulnerability Officer who presented the Safeguarding Children and Adults at Risk of Abuse Report.  This report provided the Committee with one of the bi-annual safeguarding updates it received each year.

The Partnership Vulnerability Officer presented the referral statistics which recorded the numbers of referrals made through the council’s reporting procedure from 1 April 2019 to 30 September 2019, which for that period had remained fairly consistent with previous periods.

An overview was also provided on:

·         Stoke and Staffs Safeguarding Children Board – where new working arrangements were reported to be in place, such a district / borough council partnership group had been formed which aimed to share best practice across such councils.

·         Staffs and Stoke Adult Safeguarding Partnership Board – where work continued with our partners to support adults who were vulnerable in the local community but who did not meet the threshold for adult safeguarding. 

·         Safeguarding training – work areas include the assessment of all new / changed job roles within the council following the restructure to ensure appropriate safeguarding training was  identified, the ongoing taxi driving training which continued and the work being undertaken by Council Officers in local schools to raise awareness on internet safety, alcohol awareness, anti-bullying and safer strangers and streetwise.

·         Current work streams covering Modern Day Slavery, Domestic Abuse Forum, Domestic Abuse Workplace Champions, Vulnerable Adolescent Multi-agency Panels, Tamworth Vulnerability Partnership and Grant Funding.

The Committee sought further clarification on whether there had been any changes to the statistics trends since September, whether there were areas of particular pressures in the service and where additional resources could potentially be applied.  One area of focus identified by the Partnership Vulnerability Officer was for vulnerable 17/18 year olds as they leave the childrens’ safeguarding framework. 

The Committee also sought further clarification on how grant funding had been applied locally to support activities in this arena.  It was reported that all successful grant funding applications were reported on the Council’s website. 

RESOLVED that the report be endorsed.

(Moved by Councillor S Goodall and seconded by Councillor J Faulkner)