Letter to Minister for Children and Housing re Government Plan - 27 August 2019

States Greffe: Scrutiny

Senator Sam Mézec

Minister for Children and Housing By email

27th August 2019 Dear Minister

Care of Children in Jersey Review Panel Government Plan Review

I write to inform you that the Care of Children in Jersey Review Panel will undertake a Scrutiny Review of the Government Plan, specifically project areas within the Panel's remit (the Terms of Reference for the review have been appended to this letter).

By way of background, a Review Panel has been established which has co-ordinated the overall scrutiny of the Government Plan. All Scrutiny Panels will be reviewing a number of programmes, capital investment projects and actions contained within the Plan and the Review Panel has allocated a number of these projects to each Panel.

The following projects have been allocated to this Panel which we understand come under your portfolio:

• Children's Change Programme (Supporting and Protecting Children)  (made up of 9 projects) (CSP1-1-01, CSP1-1-02, CSP1-1-03, CSP1-1-04)
• Jersey Care Inquiry (Supporting and Protecting Children) (made up of 12 projects) (CSP1-1-01, CSP1-1-02, CSP1-1-03, CSP1-1-04)
• Policy/Legislation service delivery (made up of 8 projects) (CSP1-1-01, CSP1-1-02, CSP1-1-03, CSP1-1-04)
• Children's Services Early Intervention (made up of 3 projects) (CSP1-1-01, CSP1-1-02, CSP1-1-03, CSP1-1-04)
• Redress Scheme (CSP1-1-05)
• Involving and engaging children (made up of 4 projects) (CSP1-3-01)

Request 1: We would be very grateful if you could provide as much information as possible on each of these projects, and let us know whether there is a crossover with other Ministers.

The information we are seeking includes, but is not limited to:

• Full business plans/cases for each individual project - it is noted that summaries are provided in R.91 but the Panel would like the full cases for each project and any other supporting documents;

• Any Council of Ministers papers;
• Details of any external stakeholders and internal groups or boards who may have been involved in the development of the project or who are expected to be involved as it progresses;
• The  underlying  policy  for  each  project  and  how  you  intend  to  measure  successful outcomes.

A number of capital programmes have also been assigned to the Panel. As you will be aware, the capital projects do not have a ministerial lead. Nonetheless we would still like to question a ministerial representatives on each capital project or at least about the policy underpinning the investment. We have identified the following project as one that may fall within you remit:

Request 2: Please could you identify if you have been involved in the project above?

Request 3: Please could you provide the full Capital Business Case submissions and any other supporting documentation?

We note that part 2 of the Government Plan sets out how the government will action on each of the five priorities in the Common Strategic Policy. In that regard, the Government Plan Review Panel has also assigned each Panel a list of actions to review. The actions allocated to the Panel are:

• Children's Services Improvement Plan
• High quality placements for children
• Entitlement for children in care
• Right Help, Right Time
• Progress policy and legislative change to underpin long-term reform
• Implement the Youth Connects Project
• Support and respond to the Children's Commissioner
• Bring forward primary legislation for indirect incorporation of the UNCRC
• Enhance availability of advocacy support

Request 4: Please could you identify which actions, from the list provided above, you have been involved in? We note that some of the actions will relate directly to a project and would be grateful if you could correlate these in your response.

Request 5: If you think we would benefit from a briefing on any of the projects in the first instance, please let me know so these can be organised promptly.

As I'm sure you can appreciate, this is a huge piece of work and will require thorough planning in order to cover all aspects under our remit. In terms of the timescale, it is the intention of the Panel to provide the Government Plan Review Panel with its report and any amendments by 4th November. I have asked the Panel's Officer to liaise with your Private Secretary to confirm a date on which to hold a public hearing. Should the Panel require additional hearings, then these will be arranged to take place during late September to early October and we would appreciate your availability during this period.

We look forward to working with you and thank you in advance for your assistance on this issue and would be grateful of your response to the requests above by 5:00pm on Thursday 5th September.

Yours sincerely

Deputy Robert Ward

Chairman

Care of Children in Jersey Review Panel

 Scrutiny Office | States Greffe | Morier House | St Helier | Jersey | JE1 1DD Tel: 01534 441080 | Fax: 01534 441077 | email: scrutiny@gov.je

Appendix

Terms of Reference (Generic) Government Plan 2020

Care of Children in Jersey Review Panel

The terms of reference for the review are as follows:

1. Note that sections/projects of the Government Plan will be allocated to Panels by the Government Plan Review Panel (GPRP) on a best fit' basis.
2. Undertake an in-depth review of the allocated sections/projects of the Government Plan 2020, considering:

• Whether funded projects meet the Ongoing Initiatives, Common Themes and, ultimately, Common Strategic Priorities?
• Ensuring that the projects and amendments to be lodged are consistent with the requirements of the Public Finances (Jersey) Law 201-
• The level of resourcing, of all forms, allocated to projects and whether this is sufficient or excessive in enabling the project to meet its stated aims.
• If project resource allocation is appropriate in relation to overall departmental budgets?
• Whether funded projects align with Departmental objectives? [NB: if and where they exist]
• Whether or not there are clear lines of accountability for each project?
• The ongoing sustainability of projects.

3. Provide the GPRP with a report and any amendments by the date agreed.