Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what system of monitoring his Department has for local authorities which repeatedly commission providers rated by the Care Quality Commission as requiring improvement.
Answered by Alistair Burt
Commissioning social care is a matter for local authorities as they are best placed to understand the needs of local people and communities, and how best to meet them. The Care Quality Commission ratings should inform their commissioning decisions; these ratings are available to the public. Local authorities are accountable to their local population through democratically elected members.
The Department has developed statutory guidance to support local authorities to meet their duties for market shaping set out in the Care Act 2014, including commissioning. The Department has also worked with the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services, the Local Government Association and other partners to develop a framework of commissioning standards which will help local authorities improve their commissioning practices.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of NHS hospitals in coordinating with private or third sector care providers to optimise results for patients.
Answered by Ben Gummer
We would encourage working between all providers of health and care, to maximise safe and effective care for all patients.
Decisions about whether to use non-NHS capacity are generally made at local level, as part of the operational management of capacity and demand.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment his Department has made of the integrated health and social care system in Northern Ireland in formulating policy on how to better integrate health and social care.
Answered by Alistair Burt
The Department regularly reviews international evidence in relation to integrated health and social care services. While Northern Ireland has had a structurally integrated health and social care system since 1973, and in more recent years has undergone a restructure in an effort to deliver more coordinated and integrated care, academic evaluation of integration in Northern Ireland has been relatively limited to date. Nonetheless, officials continue to monitor new publications on this subject.
It is important to note that while there is a growing body of evidence from around the world about what works with regard to integration, no country has successfully delivered integration on a universal scale. Moreover, due to fundamental differences in the design of different health and care systems it is not straightforward to apply lessons learnt elsewhere to the English system.
More generally, the Government recently reemphasised its ambition to integrate health and social care across England by 2020, and will continue to monitor international evidence as policy is formulated with respect to this programme.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what formal guidance exists on the role of social care providers in helping to formulate discharge procedures within NHS hospitals.
Answered by Alistair Burt
The Care Act 2014 requires the National Health Service to notify local authorities whenever a hospital patient is likely to have care and support needs once they are discharged from hospital. This requirement was part of the wide ranging consultation on the draft regulations and guidance for implementation of the Act. The Care and Support Statutory Guidance sets out these procedures in more detail; they are designed to ensure that local authorities and the NHS work together to ensure that people have the correct support on leaving hospital.
In addition, NHS England’s guidance on Monthly Delayed Transfer of Care Situation Reports highlights the importance of the role of the multi-disciplinary team, including social workers, in determining patients’ on-going health and social care needs once they leave hospital.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence also recently published its guideline on transition between hospital inpatient settings and community or care homes for adults with social care needs. It aims to improve people’s experience of admission to, and discharge from, hospital by better coordination of health and social care services.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what meetings he has had with homecare providers to discuss how to improve recruitment and retention rates in the care sector.
Answered by Alistair Burt
I have responsibility for adult social care. I regularly meet with homecare providers to discuss a range of topics including improving recruitment and retention rates in the care sector.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 29 October 2015 to Question 12813, what assessment he has made of the accessibility, clarity and ease of comparison of the care home ratings referred to; and if he will encourage the Care Quality Commission to develop a ratings table to increase transparency of that data.
Answered by Alistair Burt
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and adult social acre in England. The CQC publishes the results of its new inspections regime including ratings on its website to help people choose care.
The CQC website provides a search facility for the services registered with it, including care homes. It is possible to search by name of provider or post code area. The results may be viewed as a list or on an interactive map and may also be downloaded on a spreadsheet. In this way, the CQC provides flexible access to the most up to date information of the sectors it inspects.
The Department expects the CQC to consider how it presents information to the public to ensure it is provided in a transparent and meaningful way and to keep its presentation of information under review.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what information the Care Quality Commission holds on the quality of care in care homes.
Answered by Ben Gummer
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and adult social care in England.
As at 12 October 2015, the CQC has published 8,318 ratings for adult social care providers since it began inspecting this sector using its new inspection regime on 1 October 2014. Of these, 42 providers have been rated ‘outstanding’, 4,889 as ‘good’, 2,889 as ‘requires improvement’ and 558 as inadequate.
The CQC’s State of Care Report 2014-15, published on 15 October 2015, describes what it has found in its care home inspection programme.
Asked by: Charlotte Leslie (Conservative - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether his Department has had discussions with medical organisations on the implications of the recent European Court of Justice ruling against Ireland on the Working Time Directive.
Answered by Ben Gummer
The Department has commissioned Health Education England to take forward the recommendations of the task group led by Professor Sir Norman Williams into the impact of the European Working Time Directive on the training of junior doctors.
Health Education England has set up a specific working group to take this work forward, with membership including the Royal College of Surgeons and other stakeholders. The group is taking forward work on all the taskforce recommendations. This includes looking at the categorisation of training time and will consider the impact of the recent European Court of Justice ruling on Ireland. Health Education England will deliver an interim report to the Department in due course.