It is almost with disbelief that those in charge of Birmingham’s child protection services have greeted the assessment from Ofsted chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw that they are a ‘national disgrace’
This is not so much the assessment itself, after all Birmingham children’s services have been officially inadequate for getting on for five years and several children have died in preventable circumstances.
And the line from Birmingham’s latest director of children’s services Peter Hay is that children in Birmingham are not safe and that the service needs to focus on massive improvement in performance – a view echoed last week by Labour council leader Sir Albert Bore who said this is his number one priority.
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The surprise is more that this should come from the head of an agency charged with helping Birmingham children’s services improve through its regular inspection and check list of recommendations.
Ofsted, along with officials from the Department for Education, have been in regular contact with Birmingham Children’s Services and overseen them through several changes in leadership and reorganisation.
Children’s service officials are also wondering, with an Ofsted team due in next month, how that inspection may be influenced by Sir Michael’s comments.
I am also reliably informed that Sir Michael, during a recent visit to meet school head teachers in Birmingham, sounded them out over the failures of children’s services.
They wonder if there is an agenda. His only solution seems to be to break up Britain’s largest local authority into smaller districts, but Mr Hay and the Labour leadership have strenuously argued that the service does not need any more reorganisation.
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Sir Michael’s comments over low incomes, high deprivation, unemployment and infant mortality have been raised many times before. These issues and the diverse population make Birmingham a challenging city for social workers.
Sir Albert is firstly correct to say that this simply undermines the council’s efforts to recruit good social workers – the key to its recovery – which makes the comments even more puzzling.
And he rightly points out that these problems have been listed as priorities for his administration, and that they are as much as result of prevailing economic circumstances and Government austerity measures and local governance – other major cities share the same problems.
It also runs contrary to the remainder of Sir Michael’s speech, at which Mr Hay was present, in which he said that more half of councils are failing to protect the nation’s most vulnerable children, with one in seven councils unacceptably poor. 20 of 152 are currently rated as ‘inadequate’.
Lib Dem MP for Yardley John Hemming, who is known for his campaigns on family law, adoption and child protection services, even says that this is clearly a national problem.
The Department for Education has been deeply involved with Birmingham’s various improvement plans throughout the last five years, attending monthly meetings and at times seconding staff to the department – this is not just a problem for the Second City.
Children’s services are a national disgrace, with the emphasis on national.
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The Labour cabinet member needing the largest tin hat could arguably be Coun James McKay, the man ultimately responsible for delivering, amid considerable controversy, wheelie bins to Birmingham households.
He has had to withstand an almost constant barrage of criticism from opposition councillors and angry green-ink letter writers over the roll-out. His new extra charges for garden waste collections have further fanned that anger.
As expected, the broader wheelie bin debate has now withered away along with the collapse of civilisation that opponents suggested would accompany their introduction.
So what does Coun McKay do next? He decides to front the council’s new 20 is Plenty policy – under which 20mph speed limits will be introduced on 90 per cent of Birmingham road network over the next seven years.
The evidence in support of this is overwhelming both from a safety, environmental and cost perspective. Experience in other areas suggests it will save lives. But I predict that Coun McKay will once again need to dust out that tin hat as the city’s motorists vent their fury in his direction.
Personally I don’t see what the fuss is about.
Anyone travelling around the city’s uselessly gridlocked roads during the morning and evening rush hours considers reaching 20mph a major achievement.