Improving children's services to cost almost £2m

Cheshire East Council is taking on more staff after it children's services were rated inadequate

It will cost almost £2m to fund an improvement plan to bring children’s services at Cheshire East Council up to standard, according to a report.

The council's children's services were rated inadequate by Ofsted, which said too many young people were leaving local authority care without the correct help and support.

The council report said additional resources were needed for 18 months, but warned costs could be higher if it needed to use agency workers.

The improvement plan is expected to be met through existing budgets, the document stated.

The costs are anticipated to start in September, and the council wants to take on staff on a permanent basis to attract the best candidates.

"At the end of the 18-month period the staff will then be transferred to any existing vacancies within the directorate to avoid any risk of over-recruitment," the report for the council’s children and families committee said.

"If the service is not able to recruit to these posts and needs to utilise more expensive agency workers, then the service will need to consider how to mitigate any additional costs."

Another report detailing the funding and financial implications is expected to be available for a meeting of the committee on 8 July.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.