Social care - Independent Review of Inspection, Scrutiny and Regulation: call for evidence analysis

Conclusion

In concluding this report, we have pulled together some of the key themes emerging across the call for evidence and stakeholder engagement events.

Overall, there is support for a person-centred approach to inspection, scrutiny, and regulation, albeit that some respondents would prefer a person-led approach where users of care and support services are more involved throughout.

There were requests for involvement of a wide range of organisations and individuals in the inspection, scrutiny, and regulation process. Not only does this include people receiving social care support and their families, but also the social care and support workforce and providers delivering social care support. When involving different types of people it is necessary to use a variety of different communication channels as well as offering advocacy services for any individuals who may find it difficult to represent themselves.

There is a desire for full involvement all aspects of the inspection, scrutiny, and regulation services, including the co-production of engagement tools, standard setting and the inspection process.

There were some calls for development of a single digital system / platform that would be accessible to all. There were some requests for a single data collection system so that the same data would be collected by all within the social care sector. There were also requests for a single source public website that would provide information to ensure people receiving social care support and their families have the information they need to be able to support their decisions about care and support services.

In general, respondents would like to see all services being subject to inspection, scrutiny, and regulation in order to ensure consistency in standards and high quality care provision.

At present, some of the social care and support workforce and providers of social care support find the inspection, scrutiny, and regulation process to be a challenging experience and there were various suggestions on how to resolve this issue. For example, bringing about a culture change so that inspection, scrutiny, and regulation is seen as an opportunity to reflect on challenges, successes and learning, and with a greater focus on the positives. This would help lead to continual improvement across all services.

It was felt that inspection reports need to be accessible to all potential users of social care support and there were some requests for easy read versions and / or summary sheets that highlight key points.

The issue of recruitment and retention within the social care and support workforce is clearly important and there were calls to ensure that providers of social care support provide access to high quality training, including opportunities for continuous professional development.

While views were split as to whether there should be a single regulator to inspect all services, there were low levels of agreement on having different regulators for inspection and improvement as the two areas are seen to be linked.