Update 13th October 2023

We understand that the comms regarding the parent carer meeting video might not have been clear enough, causing some concerns. To clarify, what we meant by ‘Unfortunately, we did not receive consent from all participants and therefore we were unable to share the recording’ is that a number of people declined for the recording to be shared and therefore we could not share it with the inspectors, with attendees or publicly. Due to this we didn’t reach out to seek permission from all attendees who hadn’t formally given permission, as we knew by then that we couldn’t share the video due to the above. Apologies for any misunderstanding and I hope this clarifies things. If you have any further queries regarding the inspection, please do drop us an email at inspection@familyvoicesurrey.org.

 

Dear All,

Firstly, we really appreciate that communication hasn’t been as frequent as we’d like during this Inspection and we want to apologise for any delays.

The Inspection:

Firstly, as you will be aware, FVS have continued to communicate the inspectors, especially around hearing the parent carer voice directly. Following the meeting we held with parent carers on Tuesday we emailed them again to ask if we could have a meeting to enable the voices from that meeting to be heard by the inspectors directly. The following is taken from the response we received to that request.

“Dear Claire
Thank you for your email and for the time you are taking to work with and represent the voices of parents and carers in Surrey.
Seeking the views of children and young people with SEND and their families is a really important part of the inspection process. As I know you will appreciate, we have to follow the framework as it is published. This is so that all inspections are conducted consistently and fairly, whichever area is being inspected. It would not be fair to previously inspected, or to-be-inspected areas, if we applied a different methodology in this instance.
We developed the area SEND inspections framework and handbook after extensive consultation with a wide range of stakeholders, including representative parent groups, children and young people and their families, and sector representatives. We also carried out a public consultation on our proposals. All links related to that consultation, including an Equality Impact Assessment, can be found here.
In the assessment, we outline how the views of children and young people with SEND and their families are taken into account as part of evidence gathering overall.
While under the previous area SEND framework we did hold an open meeting with parents and carers like the one you describe, we do not do so under the current framework. We gather the views and experiences of parents, carers and children and young people through the inspection methodology I have previously discussed with you and as set out in the inspection handbook. The starting point for this is the survey, which has gathered responses from over 2,500 children, young people and their families in Surrey. We then follow up where appropriate to the key lines of enquiry, and this includes speaking with particular children and young people with SEND and their families.
We have offered our apologies for the confusion caused by the unclear wording on the video, and we have communicated individually with those parents/carers who contacted us. We have apologised to these parents and offered them the opportunity to email the inspection team with their views about provision for SEND in Surrey.
If it would be of use, I would be happy to arrange a 20-30 minute meeting with FVS, as the PCF representatives of the wider parents and carers in Surrey, to enable you to share any additional information about the experiences of children, young people and their families that they feel they didn’t feed into the survey as they thought they would meet us in person. For clarity, and the reasons outlined above, this would be with representatives of the PCF, not individual parents and carers. If this is something you would like me to arrange, please let me know.
I would be grateful if you could communicate the above to parents and carers. Please reassure them that we are following the inspection handbook as published and for consistency with other inspections, and that inspectors will continue to speak to parents and carers as we follow evidence lines through our inspection activities.
Thank you for your continued work with parents and carers, and for all you are doing to support the inspection process.”

Although disappointing, we immediately followed up on the opportunity to meet with the inspectors to share some of the stories we had heard during Tuesday’s Parent Carer meeting. Due to the timing of the emails, we didn’t get confirmation of this meeting until late Wednesday evening.

The meeting went ahead in the afternoon of the 28th September and we have attached the slides to give you some context – please let us know if you want anybody to elaborate on what was discussed during the last slide. We came away feeling like we had done as much as we could to present the parent carer. Presentation for Ofsted Inspection Quotes

Regarding the inspection, the closing meeting was on the afternoon of the 29th September and Claire, our CEO, was there representing the parent carer forum.

Sharing of the PC forum video:

We had said that we would share the recording of the parent carer meeting we held on Tuesday. As of yet we have not received consent from all participants and are therefore not allowed to with either the inspectors or the wider parent carer forum. Based on advice from our GDPR consultant our statement regarding sharing of the video is as follows:

“As a responsible organisation, we consider the protection of our members and their family’s personal data to be of the utmost importance. This sense of responsibility has led us to the conclusion that sharing the video recording without lawful basis required by the UK GDPR is not possible. We have reached out to all who took part but at this time we have not received consent from the participants to share the contents with you. We have taken advice to examine if there are any other routes to allow lawful sharing, but unfortunately, due to the nature of the content of the discussions being classed as special category personal data, and coupled with the fact that the data is in relation to vulnerable children and adults, this has not been possible. Should we obtain the required consent we will be happy to forward you a copy of the video recording”.

We are disappointed, as I’m sure you are, but we would like to say that the inspector requested the slides from yesterday’s meeting, and we emailed them over.

Additionally, we would like to say that the inspectors have asked us to share how grateful they are for every correspondence they have received, including the 2427 survey responses from parents and carers. Every single one of them has been read in great detail and will be used as part of the inspection process and decision making.

We are working our way through any unanswered questions from our parent carer forum discussion regarding the inspection. As you can imagine there where a few detailed questions and therefore some need several members of the team’s participation to answer them. We will send these out and publish them on our website as soon as possible and treating this as a priority.

Thank you for all of your input into this process. We anticipate that the inspection report will be issued in the next couple of months. We will share the findings with you as soon as they are available.