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The 1999 joint review of Haringey social services has been discredited. But was the review itself to blame, asks Frances Rickford, or was it merely misinterpreted?

It must have been difficult for some people to resist smirking last week as the joint reviews - so accustomed to asking the questions and making the judgements themselves - were being called to account by the Victoria Climbie‚ Inquiry.

The public lambasting which inquiry chairperson Lord Laming gave to his successor as chief social services inspector, Denise Platt, for delaying the submission of an internal review into the joint review report on Haringey Council set the scene for an examination, not only of Haringey's joint review, but also of the internal review and many of the beliefs and attitudes underlying both.

Laming's decision to reconvene phase one of the inquiry to consider the internal review meant the document became public for the first time - something probably not anticipated either by the authors or those who commissioned it.

Although the joint reviews and inspection processes are not within the inquiry's remit, inevitably the publication of the internal review and close questioning of civil servants whose professional culture is characterised by discretion and fudge has raised important questions about the joint review procedures generally.

Haringey's joint review was published in November 1999, three months before Victoria Climbie‚ died, although the field work was conducted eight months earlier by lead reviewer Dennis Simpson, formerly director of social services in Southwark, and Katherine Tyrrell.

The joint reviews body, the responsibility of the Social Services Inspectorate and the Audit Commission, press-released the report with the headline "people of Haringey generally well serviced by social services" - a conclusion reinforced by its fourth annual report, 'Promising Prospects'. In this, joint reviews director John Bolton, without consulting the Haringey reviewers, put Haringey in the top box marked "overall serving people well" and with "good prospects of sustaining improvement".

After the murder convictions of Climbie‚'s great aunt and her partner, and the detail that emerged during the trial about the circumstances of her death, questions were inevitably asked about how a local authority with such a high-performing social services department could have failed to protect Victoria.

Once the statutory inquiry had been announced, Platt and Audit Commission controller Andrew Foster commissioned Jenny Gray, of the SSI, and David Prince, director of operations at the Audit Commission, to carry out an internal review of the joint review. Neither had been involved in conducting any joint reviews. Prince claims no expertise in children's social services, but Gray is a respected member of the SSI and was responsible for drafting the Framework for Assessment of Children in Need.

The internal review's terms of reference were to look at: how the Haringey joint review's judgements were reached on the basis of the evidence it collected; the scope of the judgements reached in relation to the joint review methodology; any lessons to be learned in respect of the joint review team process; and any recommended actions arising.

Both authors emphasised repeatedly in their evidence to Laming that the focus of internal review was on the methodology of the Haringey joint review, not its judgements.

But hindsight is a great gift and, as counsel to the inquiry Neil Garnham suggested to Gray, the internal review comes close to second-guessing judgements. For example, it says the joint review team failed to "address the implications" of a growing number of children and families referrals for a service under pressure. In particular, it accuses the joint review team of failing to consider whether a strategy of tightening eligibility criteria for services was consistent with meeting statutory obligations to children under the Children Act 1989 - less a methodological point perhaps than a comment on the political and managerial consensus at the time that "targeting" services was indeed the appropriate way to manage scarce resources.

The original joint review is also criticised for failing to examine enough case files of children classified as in need, despite the team inspecting 35 files instead of the 30 specified by the joint review procedures at the time.

Prince says in his witness statement that the Haringey joint review was too focused on supporting management rather than giving a true picture to local councillors of how well the local authority was meeting its statutory responsibilities. "The joint review should have left the council with a clearer agenda that would have addressed the variable current performance within the trajectory of future potential."

Although there was a strong management team in place with a clear vision, they all left Haringey almost as soon as the joint review team were out of the door.

In his defence, Simpson argued that all the relevant information was in the original joint review. But he conceded that if he were writing it now he would place more emphasis on services and less on management, particularly in the summary which he said should have drawn more attention to the practice and service deficiencies in the rest of the report.

The joint reviews were in their third year at the time the fieldwork in Haringey was carried out, but at that time there was no template for reviews, no formats for collecting the vast volume of information that had to be collected, and no written criteria for judgements to be made.

According to Bolton, changes have been made since then. "We have done a lot of work," he says. "We've introduced criteria for making judgements, including a distinction between how services are now and what they are going towards. We have also strengthened the role of the assistant reviewer. We've introduced a common template and tool kit for reviewers and we now select the files we look at ourselves rather than leave the local authority to select them for us.

"We also have a stronger quality assurance system, with assistant review directors involved in all sections of the reviews. Criteria for judgements came on stream about a year after the Haringey fieldwork, and we now have more guidance notes for reviewers both on methodology and practice."

Bolton agrees the joint reviews have a problem in measuring unmet need at a local authority. For they have to review a social services department's performance in a way that takes account of all the people who do not have case files because they cannot get through the door or have not tried.

But the Joint Reviews body has always tried to see itself as a changing and learning organisation, says Bolton, and some aspects of the Haringey review were a function of the culture in the organisation at the time. Early on, they had been seen as rather distant and critical by local authorities, and then tried to create a more helpful, developmental role. Now they have pulled back again.

But however adaptive they can show themselves to be, joint reviews are doomed. There is to be no second round of joint reviews and, by this time next year, the last local authorities in the first round will be saying goodbye to their review teams, with publication of the final reports by next autumn.

By the end of 2004, the new inspectorate, the Commission for Social Care Inspection, is to come on stream incorporating the National Care Standards Commission, the SSI and the joint reviews body.

Bolton predicts that the new organisation's programme will be very different from the joint reviews, with local authorities getting different levels of inspection according to their perceived needs.

He also anticipates a greater role for bodies that help councils improve their performance, but that these will be separate from the inspection function.

But, with 111 reviews published and six years' experience, Bolton hopes some aspects of the joint reviews body will be retained. "We are not doing inspections of detailed services but we do provide an overview of the big picture which can show whether people are doing the right things and going in the right direction to meet people's needs."

The question now is whether those at the new CSCI will share Bolton's "big picture".