COUNCIL officers from Essex will spend 40 days working with Dorset County Council as part of a government scheme aimed at improving children’s social care.

Having been rated as ‘good’ by Ofsted, Essex County Council’s children’s services department has been chosen by the Department for Education to help improve performance in other local authorities through its Partners in Practice programme.

Later this month, its officers will temporarily join Dorset County Council as part of its mentoring work.

Dorset County Council was criticised by Ofsted for its work supporting children, deeming it to “require improvement to be good” following a 2016 inspection.

The education watchdog said that young people were not receiving a “consistently good enough service”.

It has now been partnered with Essex County Council, as one of 24 other local authorities over the next two years, to learn from its work which saw it improve from an ‘inadequate’ rating to ‘good’.

Cllr Steve Butler, cabinet member for safeguarding at Dorset County Council, said: “Protecting vulnerable children is a top priority for the county council and we’re committed to offering the best, and most responsive, support to children and their families as best we can.

“We’re working hard to improve the way we deliver children’s social care, which is why we wanted to join this programme.

“Essex County Council has a great track record and we’re looking forward to learning from their experiences and continuing developing our own practice here in Dorset.”

Since the 2016 inspection, Dorset County Council has introduced a new audit system and increased its children’s services budget by £1m to recruit more staff.

Essex-based officers will join the council at the end of the month before spending 40 non-consecutive days working with the authority.

In March the government awarded Essex County Council £2.1m to cover the costs of working with councils to improve their social work.

It is one of 15 organisations identified as being “among the strongest local authorities in the country” to be involved in the Partners in Practice scheme.