Issue - meetings

Members welcomed former Councillor, Nina Wood-Ford, who presented the findings of the Scrutiny of Care Leavers’ Short Sharp review on behalf of the group.  During the delivery of her presentation the following points were highlighted for Members’ consideration:

·                Following a notice of motion to Council in January 2018 Members had been tasked with undertaking an overview and scrutiny review of the financial support available to care leavers.

·                The group had focused on; the legal duties of local Councils towards care leavers; the position of care leavers in Redditch in 2018; the steps taken by other Councils to meet the needs of care leavers; and the options available to assist care leavers.

·                Evidence had been gathered from a range of sources including; interviewing officers from Worcestershire County Council, interviewing officers from Redditch Borough Council who managed the Council Tax service, the Wolf at the Door report; Worcestershire Care Leavers’ Strategy; and information about how other Councils were supporting care leavers.

·                The group had found that legal reforms had led to improvements to the support available to care leavers, including better planning for those aged over 18, young people remaining in foster placements for longer and personal advisors being provided to care leavers.

·                As a Corporate Parent Redditch Borough Council had a duty to have regard to care leavers when carrying out its functions.

·                Debt problems and difficulties with budgeting had been identified as problems for care leavers, though many received good advice in relation to this.

·                The government had no plans to introduce guidance as to how Councils should treat care leavers in relation to Council Tax.  This therefore needed to be determined at the local level.

·                There were 72 care leavers residing in Redditch, 28 of whom were recorded as having Council Tax liability.

·                In total 19 of these care leavers qualified for support under the Council’s Council Tax Support Scheme and nine were liable to pay Council Tax.

·                In proposing their recommendations the group had aimed to secure actions that would be cost effective, easy to administer and apply for and would be available to care leavers.

·                The proposals would require means testing of care leavers aged 22 to 25.

·                The group felt the best option for supporting care leavers would be to amend the Council Tax Support Scheme.  This was preferred to amending the Hardship Fund as that was meant to be used on a discretionary basis.  Changing the Council Tax support scheme would also be cheaper for the Council than amending the hardship fund.

·                The group had concluded that the fairest approach would be to include care leavers from outside Redditch.  However, Officers could not forecast the costs involved in extending the scheme to care leavers from outside Redditch as it was uncertain how many would move to the Borough.

·                The group’s third proposal had been made as any changes to the Council Tax Support Scheme would only come into effect in April 2019, following consultation.

·                The third recommendation proposed that assistance should be provided to care  ...  view the full minutes text for item 20

The Chair confirmed that this item had been postponed.