Shoreham Village School: after Ofsted

As is now widely known, Shoreham Village School was rated as requiring Special Measures by Ofsted in a report published last week. This followed an inspection soon after the start of term in September. After its previous inspection in 2010, the school had been rated Good, so this was a steep decline.

As can be seen from the report, Ofsted's criticisms were wide-ranging, though the school's Key Stage 1 and 2 results for 2013 had been encouraging.

I attended a meeting for parents at the school on Thursday evening, along with governors, KCC officers and the acting head teacher, Mrs Eileen Mumford of Kemsing School, who will now be working at Shoreham 3 days a week. There were many questions and concerns as to how this situation had arisen, but there was also considerable goodwill towards Mrs Mumford and the staff at the school, including those (such as the SENCO) from elsewhere in the local area who are assisting the school's recovery. Mrs Mumford's clear vision and commitment won a lot of support.

Both as local County Councillor for Darent Valley and as Cabinet Member for Education, I have a deep interest in seeing Shoreham achieve a rapid turnaround. We owe that to the children at the school, their families and the village. For Kent as a whole, we are seeing a positive trend in Ofsted inspection results, with more schools (now up to 70%) rated Good or Outstanding. Our rate of progress is now outstripping the national rate. However, while relatively small in number, there are still too many schools falling into a 'category of concern' - in plainer language, failing their Ofsted. KCC has a range of measures in hand to identify schools at risk of this, including boosting the local collaboration between schools that is now being brought to bear to support Shoreham.

The next stage for the school's recovery will be the development of an action plan, to be submitted to inspectors in the coming days. Longer term, the kind of local support (in which KCC has been closely involved) that has been given to the school offers a promising way to secure Shoreham's future.  

Have your say: KCC budget consultation

Kent County Council launched its consultation on the 2014-15 budget, and our plans for the coming years, at the end of last week.

The County Council has already delivered significant savings (£269m over the last three years). Over the next three years, further savings of £273m (out of an annual spend of £1.43bn) will be needed, reflecting further sharp reductions in government grant and growing pressures in areas such as social care.

The budget consultation page on the KCC website sets out more detail on the financial challenge and our proposals for tackling it. We are currently proposing a 1.99% increase in council tax (having frozen the council tax for three years), along with wide-ranging plans to transform the operation of the council.

The budget consultation page also has a two-question survey and a more detailed online tool that helps you choose how best to balance the KCC budget. I hope that as many Darent Valley residents as possible take part.

A Pioneer for better health care

Kent has taken an important step forward in working for an effective health and social care system, and I'm pleased to be part of it.

In addition to my role as Darent Valley's County Councillor, I am the KCC Cabinet Member for Education and Health Reform. The 'Health Reform' bit relates chiefly to chairing the Kent Health and Wellbeing Board. The Board is a creation of Andrew Lansley's 2012 Health and Social Care Act - a widely-accepted part of very controversial legislation. It brings together local government with the new GP leaders of the Kent NHS to plan better, more joined up services between health (the NHS), social care (local government) and public health (which has now moved to local government).

In the summer, the Department of Health asked local areas such as Kent, working through their Health and Wellbeing Boards, to apply for 'Pioneer' status in bringing health and social care closer together. More than 100 areas applied, and today the Department of Health has announced that Kent is one of just 14 chosen.

This is a terrific endorsement of the work being done in the County, and means that we will be able to accelerate our efforts with support from national government in tackling some of the hardest obstacles, such as how information is shared and how the different workforces of the NHS and social care are brought closer together.

Nationally, the government is forcing the pace of change, chiefly through a £3.8 billion 'Integration Transformation Fund' that also looks to accelerate progress. In Kent, we are likely to combine much of our work on the aims of the Fund with our new Pioneer status. They are both about the same thing: bringing services together so that they are more responsive to the needs of patients and, by building up community services as an alternative to unnecessary admissions to hospitals and care homes, ensuring that services stay affordable even as we face the pressures of an ageing population. To me, these are things well worth working for, and it is terrific that Kent is at the forefront of doing so.

You can find KCC's press release about Pioneer status here, and the Department of Health's press release here. If you are interested in the work of the Health and Wellbeing Board, you can find out more about it on KCC's website.