Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the performance of the children and families department in Somerset County Council.

Ofsted inspected Somerset County Council's arrangements for the protection of children between 24 June 2013 and 3 July 2013 and published their findings on 5 August 2013. Ofsted judged the authority's performance as ‘inadequate'.

My officials met with representatives of Somerset County Council on 20 August 2013 to discuss the Ofsted judgement, the Department's proposed course of action and the Council's immediate plans for improvement.

I wrote to the leader of Somerset County Council, John Osman, on 13 September 2013 to underline my concern at the Ofsted judgement of performance and set out my intention to issue the council with an Improvement Notice.

I issued a 12-month Improvement Notice to Somerset County Council on 22 November 2013, requiring the council to institute an improvement board headed by an independent chair to drive improvement and hold partners to account. The improvement board has sat monthly since October 2013 and I am represented at each Board by my officials.

I plan to visit Somerset County Council to assess improvements for myself. My officials will also undertake a review of progress in June 2014 and report findings to me. I will then assess progress against the Improvement Notice and Ofsted recommendations and decide whether to intervene further.