Richmond Council's children's services have recently been rated Outstanding by Ofsted, with inspectors praising staff for putting "children and young people at the centre of everything they do".

Previously, children's services were ranked Good following an inspection in 2022.

Chair of Richmond's Education and Children's Services Committee, Councillor Julia Cambridge, partly attributed the new rating to the Council's "stable" and "skilled" staff.

She told Nub News: "If you're going to work in an organisation which offers stability, training and career development, it really goes a long way to making you feel valued.

"And I think this report clearly reflects that staff do feel valued. They have been contributing in positive ways to make the working environment a high quality social place.

"Caseloads are managed carefully, ensuring that teams can maintain meaningful relationships with families and children."

Ofsted also highlighted Richmond's outstanding support for children in care, strong corporate parenting, and tailored aid.

The watchdog went as far as to say that the Council "puts children and young people at the centre of everything they do."

Cllr Cambridge added: "How we make sure that the voices of care experienced children and young people in the borough are heard, one of those outlets is through our corporate parenting panel, which has representatives and the chair of the Children in Care Council and at every level of the delivery of the service, their voices are embedded.

"Care leavers benefit from personal advisor support, and that's built into trusted relationships.

"The programme and the offer is co-designed with the young people with care experience, and their voices are very clearly embedded in that."

Children's services in Richmond are run by the non-profit organisation Achieving for Children (AfC), which Ofsted described as a "well-established" and "effective" partnership.

"We have absolute trust in the service delivery of Achieving for Children," said Cllr Cambridge.

"There is very strong governance between Richmond Council and AfC. I believe that ensures accountability and excellence in service delivery."

Despite Richmond being ranked among the best local authorities for children's services in the country, Cllr Cambridge believes there is always room for improvement.

She continued: "I think we can always be learning by peer support, mentoring, seeing what other boroughs are doing, are they delivering something which we can learn from?

"The usefulness of being inspected by Ofsted is that they point out areas which are doing good, but they would like to see some kind of development moving forward.

"One of them was around the out of hours service, that sort of first point of contact, and there were some useful learnings around that.

"They touched on cases of neglect and again, this is still ranked as good, but they looked at particular areas that potentially the service could look at improving.

"The work began in those two areas before the inspection."

Cllr Cambridge added: "I'm proud of the dedication and the passion and the investment of the teams who have been delivering this.

"But most of all, I'm delighted for the children, young people and families who have benefited, because children are at the heart of everything we do, and they're the beneficiaries of good service — and it's what they deserve."

To read Ofsted's recent report into Richmond Council's children's services, click here.