THE Greenfields secure children’s home would have been closed down if it was in the UK due to the severity of failings uncovered by an inspection last week, the children’s commissioner has claimed.
Deborah McMillan said the lack of alternative facilities in a small island was the only reason that the centre was still operating after the Jersey Care Commission issued an improvement notice following the unannounced visit.
The JCC identified seven regulation breaches due to shortcomings in several areas including the health and safety of residents and facilities made available to them.
Issues around staffing levels, employee training, quality of leadership, the condition of the building and the ‘statement of purpose’, which outlines the objectives of the organisation, were also raised in the commission’s report.
On Monday, just days after the damning report was released, director of safeguarding and care in children’s social care Mark Owers resigned.
The JEP has asked the government whether this was in relation to Greenfields, whether Mr Owers was working a notice period and whether he had received a pay-off but had not received a response at the time of going to print.
Mrs McMillan said that such failings would ‘undoubtedly’ have led to the closure of a similar UK-based facility.
‘If we were in England and Ofsted had inspected a setting like Greenfields, they would have had the power to close it down,’ she said.
‘What would happen in that situation is the children would have to be moved to another premises. The closed premises would lose its registration and it would have to work quite hard to get it back.
‘The problem on this small island is that that power doesn’t exist for the Jersey Care Commission. Even if it did, what would you do here? Where would those children go?
‘That’s the dilemma. It also seems to perhaps be the reason why the government don’t act. What can anybody do?’
The improvement notice was the second issued within four months by the commission, and has again cast the spotlight on standards of child care in Jersey, within five years of the Independent Jersey Care Inquiry publishing its report on decades of abuse within the care system.
Both Mrs McMillan and Carly Glover, chief executive of advocacy group Jersey Cares, said that greater accountability was needed to ensure improvements in Jersey’s childcare services.
The commissioner said that she hoped recently introduced legislation would help achieve this by setting out responsible parties.
Mrs McMillan said: ‘A month ago, the new Children and Young People’s Law was adopted and this is with the Privy Council.
‘We hope that that will come into force either late this year or 2023. The really important bit about this legislation is it puts in law that accountability, which up until now has been missing.
‘It actually names key partners who have a duty to safeguard the welfare of children, including the chief executive of the government and the chief officer of the police. It also brings the role of corporate parenting into law.’
Mrs Glover said that she believed the long-awaited introduction of public sector ombudsman was needed to ensure accountability.
‘This government has committed to having a public ombudsman in place. The States agreed to this in principle in 2018 and the care inquiry advised in 2019 that this be progressed “without delay”,’ she said.
‘We invite the government to provide an update on this. For the lives of children and families to improve, there is a need for robust and independent scrutiny and structures of accountability.
‘Currently, we rely heavily on the government holding itself to account. In doing so, we demonstrate we have failed to learn from the Independent Care Inquiry.’
