Children’s services boss quits Northants council
Charisse Monero has left the authority suddenly after just one year in post and opposition councillors say they want to know why.
By Sarah Ward
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The boss of children’s services in North Northamptonshire has suddenly quit.
Charisse Monero, who has been in charge since last June, has departed with councillors unclear as to the reason why she had decided to go.
Councillors were informed yesterday and this afternoon North Northamptonshire Council (NNC) today gave us the following statement:
“Our Executive Director of Children’s Services, Charisse Monero, has decided to leave the authority and the council wishes her all the best for the future.
“As this is a statutory role the council’s deputy Chief Executive, George Candler, will fulfil the position of Director of Children’s Services for the next few weeks, alongside his current role as Executive Director of Place and Economy.
“The authority has already started work on finding a replacement for a permanent Executive Director of Children’s Services and updates will be issued in due course.”
Charisse Monero, who previously worked in a London borough, was the third director of children’s services in four years of the authority. Cathi Hadley and Anne-Marie Dodds had gone before her.
The spend of the children’s services department is one of the largest in the department, as the day-to-day running of children’s services is managed by an independent trust, led by Colin Foster. Largely due to high costs of private companies looking after children in care, the budget has been exceeded every year since 2021. Following the Covid pandemic there has also been a huge increase in the numbers of children being put under Education Health Care Plans - in the North of the county alone this had risen to 5,000 children.
When she came into post Monero said she was concerned about the high numbers of children in elected home education and said the local authority was ‘not getting the basics right.’
The council has been led by Reform UK since May. Due to national statements, many officers in Reform led councils have been concerned about their job security. We tried to contact the new cabinet member for children’s services Cllr Elizabeth Wright, but have not been able to speak with her.
Opposition parties on NNC are concerned.
Cllr Wendy Brackenbury, who is the shadow portfolio holder for children’s service said would be sorry to see the officer go as she was ‘very vocal and fought for the rights of children.’
Leader of the Green Party, Cllr Fedorowycz said:
“Honestly, it’s really sad news to hear that Charisse has left, especially after only being with us for a short period - it will really set this council back. I was on her interview board and I saw that she had so much to give to our area and the children of North Northamptonshire.
“Sadly, it does highlight that there is certainly some discontent amongst officers and this was something we warned of when we raised our motion last week. We asked for officers and members of the public to be made to feel more supported, but instead Reform chose to bury their head in the sand about the impact of their actions. I do not want to see this, but I will not be surprised if more officers start leaving.”
The combination of very poor management of the finances and a dismal situation in Child Services going back a decade to include the old NCC is not helping. But the addition of Council control being handed over to a political Party that believes in minimum governance has led to chaos in the Council in general. The axe wielding leading political party are very slow in wielding said axe leading to further chaos and tension. I see no solution coming from them. Only more misery for the general public. So this is the Party of the people? What people I ask myself?
I cannot see from a cursory glance at the public records for Councillor Elizabeth Wright what specific skills and knowledge she has to oversee the portfolio she has been given.
Elizabeth Wright runs a company called Admin & More which offers virtual admin services to other businesses. Leaving aside the demands on a person's time that running a small business can take up, I note from the companies house records that said company has just taken a business loan secured on the assets of Admin & More.
This would suggest one of several things happening. The business is in trouble and needs financing to survive, or the business has plans for expansion/growth and needs funds to do so. Either way the owner of the business now has a significant new pressure from the lenders to perform.
How this person can now devote the necessary time to resolving the significant issues in Children's services at North Northants Council we can only guess.
My suspicion is that Reform UK have little depth of talent available to them, have promised speedy simple solutions in the way that populists do to court votes, but have no chance of actually delivering. My sympathy lies with the people of NNC, but you reap what you sow.
Companies House source at this link. https://tinyurl.com/A-MLtd