Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Jack Proud, Karin Sedgwick and Monika Slater.  The following substitutes attended as follows:

·         Councillor George Jabbour attended for Councillor Karin Sedgwick

·         Councillor Steve Mason attended for Councillor Monika Slater

·         Councillor Steve Shaw-Wright attended for Councillor Jack Proud

All Members are invited to declare at this point any interests they have in items appearing on this agenda, including the nature of those interests.

There were no declarations of interest.

Members of the public may ask questions or make statements at this meeting if they have given notice to Melanie Carr of Democratic and Scrutiny Services and supplied the text (see contact details below) by midday on Thursday 30 July, three working days before the day of the meeting.  Each speaker should limit themselves to 3 minutes on any item.  Members of the public who have given notice will be invited to speak:

·         at this point in the meeting if their questions/statements relate to matters which are not otherwise on the Agenda (subject to an overall time limit of 30 minutes);

·         when the relevant Agenda item is being considered if they wish to speak on a matter which is on the Agenda for this meeting.

If you are exercising your right to speak at this meeting, but do not wish to be recorded, please inform the Chairman who will instruct anyone who may be taking a recording to cease while you speak.

Mrs Caroline Garrod attended the meeting to read out the following statement:

My husband and I have discussed the report at great length. Although in principle we are happy that Cauwood will continue but we have deep reservations and concerns that the report in its current state doesn’t outline what the future of Cauwood etc will be.

Before Natasha went to Cauwood we spent over a year transitioning her to somewhere she could go after she finished at Henshaw’s College, we thought it was the right fit for her but sadly we were wrong and it all came crashing down around us.

Natasha is very rigid in her routines and before she goes to bed she asks us the same thing every night, ‘where am I going tomorrow and who with’. She started to say, ‘not there again’ and not sleeping because the anxiety was starting to show. She was reluctant to get into her taxi. Her PA at the time in the taxi was brilliant with her and they had a strong bond. She told me that she was quieter in the taxi on those days and didn’t see her bubbly self. She would go into the building reluctantly and was always keen to come home at the end of the day.

One day I got a phone call from the placement saying you need to come and get her as she had attacked a member of staff. I was shocked and all the signals started to kick in, her

reluctance, her comments, her anxiety, the non-sleeping and I knew deep down something

was wrong.

I contacted the taxi as they had only dropped her o􀆯 20 mins before and asked them if they could go back and get her. On arrival Natasha was waiting in the car park with the member of staff who had been allocated to her that day, she was crying, shaking and physically upset and she clung to her PA sobbing saying ‘please take me home’. She was quiet on the way home and to this day won’t tell us what happened. Yes, we had a meeting with the staff, but we never got to the bottom of it. The only information we got was that there had been an issue with one of the other young people and Natasha needed to leave the room. Her exit route was blocked, and she needed to get out. She pushed the member a member of staff into a wall as her anxiety was heightened. She felt scared and trapped and to her that terrifies her as they were blocking her from leaving the room. She needed to get to her safe space, and that didn’t happen.  The whole incident left us all traumatised and that is one of reasons we are deeply concerned.

After the incident we spent a long time with her previous social worker trying to come up with a

way forward. We agreed on Cauwood. We went to visit it again and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 92.

The Chair thanked Mrs Garrod and the attending councillors for their contributions, and sought the committee’s feedback on the planned way forward for the Cauwood Day Centre as detailed in the Executive report.

Members sympathised with service users dealing with the effects of service changes.  They also agreed that change was good as long as it was understood, and that users and their families needed assurance on what the new model would deliver. 

They acknowledged that calling-in the coming Executive decision would only add to the stress felt by families, and therefore suggested there should have been more opportunities for scrutiny engagement in the process before it got to this stage.

In response to Members questions, Abigail Barron confirmed the following:

·         No.5 Whitby Road currently used for storage, would be refurbished to a higher standard than the current centre.

·         There was a process for achieving Autism accreditation.  This would be sought once a formal decision was taken about the way forward.  The building used and its location was an important part of the accreditation process  

·         In the longer term the Council would like to work with a partner to deliver the proposed new model.

·         The Council was wedded to a quality of service not a building.

·         Cauwood Day Centre would not close until the entirety of the new service was running, Whitby Road was open, and each of the current users had be given sufficient time to transition to the new site, in line with their individual needs.

·         The existing changing places facilities in Malton were not up to standard. 

·         There were two changing places in Pickering and other suitable sites would be identified.  Members suggested that the North Yorkshire Moors National Park Authority may be able to provide new sites within their villages.  

·         Opportunities for the provision of new changing places facilities would be explored as part of new extra care housing schemes.

Finally, consideration was given to both the recommendations arising from the recent meeting of the Thirsk & Malton Area Committee and the suggestions for monitoring progress suggested by Cllr Lindsay Burr i.e. that the Committee receive:

·         Monthly detailed reports on how works are progressing, in line with parents needs front and foremost

·         A detailed timeline of works, locations and facility specifications detailing provision, including changeable facilities in Malton.

·         Full details of budgets set aside for closure and refit/refurbishment of all premises needed for the continuation of services.

The Executive Member for Health & Adult Services welcomed the proposals but drew attention to the need to respect the confidentiality of users when providing detailed updates, given the very small cohort.   

Members accepted they could not scrutinise individual care arrangements, or detailed operational arrangements, as by their very nature those would be very personal.  With that caveat, they voted unanimously in favour of the above proposals, and it was

Resolved – That:

i.       The recommendations of the Thirsk & Malton Area Committee be endorsed to the Executive.

ii.      The following be provided to enable the Committee to scrutinise progress against the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 93.