Dudley Council’s efforts in transforming services for children and young people, have been shortlisted for a national award.

Dudley Council is one of six local authorities to be shortlisted in the Workplace Transformation category for The MJ Achievement awards 2019.

The award submission focuses on the success of the Dudley Centre for Professional Practice (DCPP), which was introduced following an Ofsted inspection and inadequate rating three years ago. Since then, the authority’s children’s services department has been on an improvement journey, which has been recognised by Ofsted inspectors in subsequent monitoring visits.

DCPP has been at the heart of services and brought about significant changes to the workforce through auditing, coaching, system development and training in order to best meet the needs of children, young people and their families.

During an 11 day inspection towards the end of last year, Ofsted inspectors rated services as ‘good’ in two of three categories, with the overall result being ‘requires improvement to be good.’ This was hailed as a “significant achievement” in a letter received by Yvette Stanley, the national director for social care at Ofsted. Martin Samuels, strategic director for people at Dudley Council, said:

"Three years ago we couldn’t have dreamed of being nominated for an award of this nature. Our services were judged inadequate and we had a huge mountain to climb to transform the way we worked.

"But now, three years on, to be in a position where we are competing with peers across the country is testament to the work of all involved in driving our commitment to change services for the better and ensure children and young people in the borough have positive outcomes.”

A team from Dudley Council will attend a session later this month to present Dudley’s nomination before the winner is announced.