GOOD progress is being made addressing recommendations to improve children's services in Blackburn with Darwen, a council boss has said.

Department director Linda Clegg updated members of the council's People Overview and Scrutiny Committee on an action plan which was drawn up following last year's inspection.

The children's services department was inspected by Ofsted last year and found to be good on the whole.

Despite that, some concerns were identified and the council was required to put a plan together to improve the situation.

Inspectors found the experiences and progress of children who need help and protection from the council required improvement.

At the meeting Ms Clegg said steps had been taken to meet Ofsted's recommendations.

She said: "At the end of the inspection they came back to us and reported virtually what we told them on the first day.

"I think it's fair to say there were no surprises in what they told us, which is good."

In response to recommendations that the council should ensure children's plans contain clear actions, timescales and outcomes, the plan format has been simplified and changes were recently implemented.

This is an interim solution, with a fundamental review of plans to be undertaken later in the year.

The department was also asked to  improve the quality and timeliness of pre-proceedings work, particularly in relation to chronic neglect.

Since the action plan was put together, the neglect strategy has been launched and shared with the Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB), which has developed a multi-agency action plan.

The department was tasked with ensuring that supervision for all staff is both regular and reflective, and promotes high-quality social work practice.

But personal supervisions are either not being completed or recorded by managers.

This has not been helped by the lack of a single recording system by which managers can effectively monitor their compliance with the supervision policy.

Progress against the action plan is being monitored externally through meetings between Ofsted and Ms Clegg, as well as through any other Ofsted inspections that take place in the future.