Details

11.Jun.2010

The chair of the Charity Commission has questioned the ability of the voluntary and charity sector to fill all the gaps left by cuts to public services.

Speaking at a conference in London called Leading charities through a time of change, Dame Suzi Leather said: “Many of us feel instinctively that the sector is living through a period of unprecedented reform, upheaval and opportunity.”

But she warned that the “bigger picture does include some unsettling scenes. It is certainly a time marked by apparent contradictions.”

The sector is already beginning to feel the pinch from cuts and the way of life for charities will have to change “along with everyone else’s”, the Charity Commission chief said.

Research by the NCVO, unveiled in April, showed that 33,000 charities rely on local government funding for more than half their income.

“Many of the charities that depend on public grants are also seeing greater than ever demands on their services,” Dame Suzi said. To add to this, charities that rely on investment income are seeing yields decline.

However, she added that the Commission’s own as yet unpublished research continued to show that public trust in charities is high.

Dame Suzi said that to meet forthcoming challenges, charities need to collaborate more (possibly, but not necessarily through formal mergers), think first of the users of their services and make more effective use of technology and social networking.

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude told the conference that there needed to be a radical shift in the relationship between citizens in the state as part of a ‘Big Society’ approach.

He promised that local communities would have greater ownership of local problems, but also more power to change them. Public services would be answerable to those who use them.

The minister insisted that integrated local services would unlock the potential of communities and frontline workers to design and deliver a genuinely joined up approach.

Maude told delegates: “Government needs to make it easier, not harder for your organisations if we are to share ownership of our greatest challenges, and harness everyone’s energies in meeting them.”

The government had set itself three priorities in relation to the third sector, he added, which were to:

• Make it easier for the sector to work with the state. “We will work energetically to open up services to enable organisations of all sizes to compete on a level playing field with the statutory and private sectors,” he promised.
• Make it easier to set up and run a charity, social enterprise or voluntary organisation. The minister said: “We will start work straight away identifying unnecessary red tape, making the state less intrusive wherever we can, and work to reduce the burdens which get in the way of volunteering or giving.”
• Get more resources into the sector. “This is not about more and more government spending….it is about ensuring that the sector can access a better share of public spending on acceptable terms, but also about ensuring a diverse range of income streams to support its independence from government,” Maude added.

The government would progress the creation of a “Big Society” bank, using money from dormant accounts to invest in social goals, and campaign to make volunteering and philanthropic giving the norm.

The minister said: “We are not looking to hand over our social problems to you and walk away, but to play our part in a broad partnership for change.”

Details

10.Jun.2010

The Care Quality Commission has launched a consultation on its enforcement policy, which is being changed to reflect the watchdog’s new powers.

The CQC said: “We have revised our enforcement policy because some of our enforcement powers are different to those we anticipated when we published our first policy in March 2009.”

The revised policy involves changes to the Commission’s warning notice arrangements, and adds “compliance actions” and “improvement actions” to its list of possible regulatory responses.

However, the Commission said its basic approach and the principles it will follow when responding to failure to comply with essential standards remains unchanged from its existing policy.

The consultation runs until 31 August 2010, with the CQC hoping to publish its final enforcement policy on 1 October 2010.

Details

02.Jun.2010

The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that local authorities are not in breach of human rights law when closing care homes unless there is clear evidence that residents' lives would be endangered by relocating them. The court also found that that councils are entitled to balance the financial implications of their actions against the human rights of residents when assessing whether to close care homes and compulsorily move their residents.

The claim against Wolverhampton City Council, led by Hossacks Solicitors on behalf of a 106-year-old care home resident, had argued that forcing elderly residents to move on the closure of a care home breached their 'right to life' under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

The claim also alleged that the stress and distress of compulsorily relocating care home residents was a violation of Article 3 (the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) and that by breaking up deep relationships formed between residents and staff, transferring residents was a breach of article 8 (the right to private and family life).

Finally, the claimants contended that the lack of appeal procedure was a breach of article 6 (right to a fair trial) and that the applicant was being discriminated against as a disabled person, in contravention of article 14 (the prohibition of discrimination).

The claimant, Louisa Watts, had been a resident for five years at the council-owned Underhill House in Bushbury, which was identified for closure by the council in 2008. Following a consultation process, the council's report into the home found that the cost of beds at Underhill House was 50% higher than beds in the independent care home sector, and that replacing council-run homes by commissioning places in the independent sector was the best way for the council for to deal with its dwindling resources for adult social care.

In rejecting the claim in respect of Article 2, the judges noted that while there was a positive obligation on the authorities to take preventive operational measures to protect an individual whose life is at risk, “...for the Court to find a violation of the positive obligation to protect life, it must be established that the authorities knew or ought to have known at the time of the existence of a real and immediate risk to the life of an identified individual and that they failed to take measures within the scope of their powers which, judged reasonably, might have been expected to avoid that risk.”

Moreover, they said, “the scope of any positive obligation must be interpreted in a way which does not impose an impossible or disproportionate burden on the authorities, including in respect of the operational choices which must be made in terms of priorities and resources. Accordingly, not every claimed risk to life can entail for the authorities a Convention requirement to take operational measures to prevent that risk from materialising.”

The ECHR also upheld Lord Justice Sedley's interpretation of the medical evidence (commissioned by the claimant's solicitor) submitted in an earlier judicial review application of the same case. This was interpreted to conclude that, if properly managed, there was not a quantifiable risk to life expectancy of transferring elderly residents between care homes.

The Court said that the claim under Article 3 should be considered under Article 8, which it also ruled to be inadmissible for the same reasons as Article 2, and that the measures taken by the council to minimise and monitor the effects of the transfer – which included efforts to keep friendship groups together - were sufficient.

The Article 6 claim was rejected on the grounds that the claimant could have sought judicial review proceedings before applying to the European Court of Human Rights, and had, in this case, done so.
Before taking the claim to the European Court of Human Rights, Louisa Watts' solicitors applied to the High Court for permission to launch a judicial review action in July 2009, but this was rejected on the grounds that the points raised under articles 2, 3 and 8 of the ECHR had already been considered in earlier cases, including R (Haggerty and others) v St Helens Council [2003] EWHC 803 (Admin), R (Wilson and others) v Coventry City Council [2008] EWHC 2300 (Admin), R (Rutter) v Stockton on Tees Borough Council [2008] EWHC 2651 (Admin) and R (Turner and others) v Southampton City Council [2009] EWCA Civ 1290.

The claimant's solicitors renewed their claim for a judicial review in September 2009, which was again refused. This was appealed in October 2009, but this too was turned down following an undertaking by Wolverhampton City Council to assess whether moving the applicant presented a risk of death or to health that such as assessment would take place in the context of section 47 of NHSCCA 1990 assessment.

The claim of discrimination under Article 14 of the ECHR was ruled inadmissible on the grounds that the application had not included details of alleged different treatment of people in a comparable situation.

Yvonne Hossack, Mrs Watts' solicitor, told the Daily Telegraph: "They're saying that human life has a monetary value. I think this will set a precedent as local authorities will know there's nowhere else residents can go, and it will wrongly give them the signal that what they're doing is OK but it's not. I would have hoped that the views of all the consultants that it is at least potentially harmful to move elderly people should have been enough."

A full copy of the judgement can be found by clicking here.

Details

28.May.2010

Derbyshire County Council and NHS Derbyshire County are considering creating joint posts where employees work for both organisations at the same time, the Derby Telegraph has reported.

The posts will be created when people leave their jobs, the local authority told the paper. The public sector bodies are also considering moving operations such as communications, printing and payroll into the same buildings.

Andrew Lewer, leader of the county council, insisted that there were “no plans for large-scale compulsory redundancies”, but confirmed some posts would be lost.

He added: “The county council overlaps in its work with the NHS to a considerable degree, particularly with regards to children’s health and well being and even more so in adult care.

“Similarities are also there in that NHS Derbyshire County is a very similar-sized organisation working in a similar area with a similar corporate structure. It makes sense for us to work more closely together.”

Lewer said the organisations would be looking to make sure that residents are not visited by a county council and NHS employee doing the same job.

The local authority is aiming to make savings worth £54m in four years. However, Lewer said the two organisations would no plans for a former merger in the way that Herefordshire NHS and Herefordshire County Council have implemented a shared chief executive and management team.

Details

20.May.2010

The Care Quality Commission is to scrap its system of star ratings for registered services.

The Commission said the current system would cease ahead of the new registration system and new standards that come into force on 1 October under the Health and Social Care Act 2008. This will bring NHS, independent healthcare and adult social care under the same system of regulation for the first time.

The watchdog added that it would work closely with the adult social care sector in formulating a new approach to comparing quality.

This will involve drawing on feedback on its recent consultation on assessments of quality, while a programme of work will be launched later this year to develop different options.

Key inspections due to take place before September will now be brought forward, with the CQC aiming by the end of June to have completed key inspections at all services that have not been inspected for three years.

The Commission will continue to conduct risk-based inspections where it receives information indicating concerns about safety. It will also carry out inspections where it needs further information to assess applications to register under the new registration system.

Cynthia Bower, the CQC’s chief executive, said: “From 1 October, we will have new standards and a new registration system, so it makes sense to develop a new way to compare quality across adult social care services.

“We want to work with the sector to develop a fair and transparent system. We are very open to different ideas and will be calling on people to tell us how they think it should work.”

The CQC said it would “work closely with the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services to provide it with information that informs decisions about commissioning”.

The Commission also plans to revamp its website to better present information about services.

Details

21.Apr.2010

North-east.

£25 - £35 per hour.

Large local authority in the North East are recruiting for a Adult Social Care & Mental Health solicitor on a locum basis.

The successful candidate will be required to work 3, 4 or 5 days per week and will benefit from a very competitive hourly rate. The client is very flexible with regards to days worked and ideally you will be available to start on short notice.

The vacancy has arisen due to cover in the interim whilst they recruit for someone to fill the role permanently. Securing this position would therefore stand you in very good stead should you wish to apply for the permanent post.

Click here for further details