The Children and Young People Services Scrutiny Committee are scheduled to meet to discuss the performance report for the first quarter of 2025/26, health assessments for looked after children, and the committee's work programme. The meeting will be held at St. Helens Town Hall, and is scheduled to be live streamed.

Quarter 1 Performance Report 2025-26

The committee is scheduled to review the Quarter 1 Performance Report 2025-26, which analyses progress between April and June 2025 against Priority 1 of the Borough Strategy: Ensure children and young people have a positive start in life . The report reflects a new performance framework that was agreed by the Policy Cabinet in May 2025.

The report splits performance indicators into two tiers:

• Tier 1: Key strategic performance measures linked to the outcomes of the Borough Strategy.
• Tier 2: Further performance measures necessary for the effective monitoring of performance at Directorate/Portfolio level.

Of the 93 performance indicators with available data, the report states that 83% of indicator targets have been either exceeded, met fully, or met within 95% of target , compared to 79% at Quarter 1 2024-25. It also notes that 17% of indicator targets were not met, compared to 21% at Quarter 1 2024-25.

The report also provides a commentary on performance against the delivery of the six Borough Strategy priorities. In relation to Priority 1, the report notes:

• Children's social care: Areas of good performance include the number of early help cases closed and not requiring further intervention, high numbers of Children Looked After adopted, and children leaving care through a Special Guardianship Order¹. Areas of concern include rates of Children in Need and Children Looked After, the rate of children subject to a child protection plan, and the percentage subject to a plan for a second or subsequent time.
• Children's aspiration and attainment: The timeliness of Education Health and Care Plan² (EHCP) completions saw strong improvement, and the number of young people Not in Education or Training (NEET) also saw a reduction.
• Children's health and resilience: Areas of good performance include low numbers of first-time entrants to the youth justice system and a reducing trend in youth reoffending. Indicators for breastfeeding rates and smoking during pregnancy are now meeting targets, as are numbers of children achieving a good level of development at 2-2½ years. The percentage of children aged 5 with 2 doses of MMR vaccinations reduced since last reported and remained below the 90% target.

The committee is invited to note the performance position at Quarter 1 2025-26, the actions planned to address specific areas for performance improvement, and to consider whether there are any potential items for further scrutiny.

Health Assessments for Looked After Children

The committee is scheduled to receive a report on health assessments for Children We Look After (CWLA). Louise Evans, Designated Nurse Safeguarding Children and Children We Look After ICB NHS Cheshire & Merseyside, is scheduled to present the report.

The report will demonstrate local performance for St Helens CWLA in relation to its statutory responsibilities and health activity specified in Promoting the Health & Well-being of Looked After Children (DfE/DH 2015- updated 2022).

NHS Cheshire and Merseyside (C&M) ICB has a statutory responsibility for ensuring safe systems of care are delivered. Promoting the Health & Well-being of Looked After Children is joint statutory guidance from the Department for Education and the Department of Health for local authorities, Integrated Care Boards³ (ICBs) and NHS England.

All Children We Look After must have an Initial Health Assessment (IHA) within 20 days of initiating care arrangements, with the health summary and care plan returned to the Independent Reviewing Officer (IRO) within those 20 days. Thereafter, they should have a yearly Review Health Assessment (RHA) between aged 5 years and 17 years old, and 6 monthly for children under 5 years of age.

The report notes that from the beginning of 2024/2025, IHA compliance sat at 20.2%. By the end of 2024/2025 compliance was over 80%, and Q1 2025/2026 is at 95.7% compliance. Children on the St Helens caseload, regardless of where they are living, receiving their statutory RHA within timescales has always been high, currently 98% in Q1 2025/2026.

The report also includes feedback from young people, such as:

She is super kind, she tells me everything I need to know, and I hope she will still be my nurse when I am older.

Scrutiny Work Programme

The committee is scheduled to review the items listed within its work programme document for 2025/26 and agree priorities and timescales.

The Children and Young People Services Scrutiny Committee Work Programme Cover Report updated Oct 25 sets out the process followed by members of the committee in determining their work programmes for the 2025/26 municipal year.

The report notes that overview and scrutiny activities play a key role in a successful democratic process, holding decision makers to account and contributing to the delivery of positive outcomes for residents.

During May and June 2025, the council ran a promotion of the work programme suggestion form on the scrutiny webpages of the council's website to encourage members of the public to submit their suggestions for possible topics. Councillors, officers and partners were also asked to submit their suggestions.

On 5 June 2025, an Annual Scrutiny Workshop was held to discuss potential ideas for work programmes for 2025/26 based on suggestions that had been submitted to the Scrutiny Team and other sources. At the workshop, shortlists based on suggestions submitted were considered by four groups, which developed draft work programme documents. These draft work programmes were presented to the Commission and Scrutiny Committees at their June/July 2025 meetings, where each of the Scrutiny Committees approved a version of the work programme.

The committee is asked to review the work programme and agree any amendments.