Duncan Clark appointed to new children's role at Medway Council after being forced to resign from Kingston Council
A former director of children’s services forced to
resign after a damning safeguarding report at Kingston Council has
been given a job by Medway Council.
Duncan Clark resigned in July after
a two-week inspection from Ofsted inspectors, classing child
safeguarding in the borough of Surrey as inadequate.
He is now been appointed interim
assistant director of children and adult services at Medway
Council.
Since the report, Kingston Council
social workers have had to review every child protection decision
they had made in the three months previous to the inspection, to
make sure no youngsters have been put in danger.
The Ofsted inspection report in
July classed the council’s safeguarding of children as
inadequate.
Inspectors found "serious failings
in child protection, particularly with regard to children and young
people who had already been identified as suffering, or at risk of
suffering, significant harm and who were subject to child
protection plans".
As a result, its director of
children’s services, Mr Clark resigned as council leaders in the
borough said they were bringing in a new director to improve
matters.
Mr Clark has been given a six-month
contract with Medway Council and he will work alongside the
recently appointed director of children’s and adult services,
Barbara Peacock.
Kingston Council’s chief executive,
Bruce McDonald, and council leader, Cllr Derek Osbourne, said in
July the department’s results were unacceptable.
Cllr Osbourne said the "final
responsibility" for the poor safeguarding report was with Mr
Clark.
He said: "He felt it was the right
decision for him to go, and we agreed. We were led to believe that
everything was fine in the department and clearly it wasn’t."
Mr Osbourne added: "Even though
what happened with Safeguarding was extraordinarily disappointing,
we can’t forget the good things Duncan did during his time
here."
Medway
council’s chief executive Neil Davies said: "When Duncan
interviewed for the post, he was fully open about his employment at
the Royal Borough of Kingston.
"He impressed us with his many
years of experience managing children’s services and his strong
track record of overseeing improvement and positive Ofsted
inspection judgements, including unannounced inspections of
children’s social care.
"We have every confidence in the skills and experience he will
bring to the post, supporting his director Barbara Peacock."
19/11/12
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