New regime to tackle failing care announced by the Government

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) will create a new expert led inspection regime to tackle failing care homes and home care services, following the success of the CQC’s new style of inspection of 11 hospitals placed in special measures last year.

The new special measures regime, announced by Secretary of State Jeremy Hunt, will set out the clear expectations the CQC has for care homes and home care services and provide a timescale which failing services will have to improve by to avoid being placed into special measures.

Mr Hunt said care homes put in special measures will be given six months to improve services or action could be taken to shut the care service down.

He said: “There are thousands of care homes and homecare services providing excellent care and this new ratings system will allow people and their families to make clear choices. But there are still too many care homes that I wouldn’t be happy to see my own parents or grandparents in.

“We have shown the special measures process works and care turn around poor-performing hospitals and we can do the same for adult social care.”

Andrea Sutcliffe, the Care Quality Commission’s chief inspector of Adult Social Care, said: “In people’s homes and care homes across the country, we know that dedicated staff are delivering fantastic care for people. Sadly, this is not always the case and we know that some services are continuing to fail the people they serve.

“I am clear that abuse, neglect and poor care will not be tolerated. We need to shine a spotlight on this poor practice and make sure that services improve. If they do not, they will have to face the consequences.”

Hospital’s success

The announcement has come at the same time as chief inspector of hospitals, Professor Mike Richards, said putting 11 hospital trusts in special measures led to significant improvements to services. Following a review by Professor Bruce Keogh which found major failings in 11 hospital trusts, all were placed in special measures a year ago, however the new way of inspecting hospitals carried out by larger and better trained inspection teams has seen five trusts come out of special measures.

Professor Richards said: “We have seen significant improvements in almost all of the 11 trusts that were put into special measures, with exceptional progress in two trusts and very good progress in a further three. The hard work by trust staff that has underpinned this progress should be recognised. Special measures bring a new focus on quality improvement in trusts which have previously struggled to provide high quality care.

"Through CQC's new inspection process we were able to identify good and in some instances outstanding practice, but also areas which require improvement. In some cases we still observed inadequate practice. These areas now need the most urgent attention.”

Special measure regime

Due to start in April 2015, the special measures system for care services will be designed through a partnership between the CQC and professionals from the adult social care sector.

Ms Sutcliffe continued: “I welcome the opportunity to work with service providers, commissioners and most importantly people using services, their carers and families to develop a special measures regime which will call time on poor care.

“People’s confidence in adult social care services has been knocked by shocking examples of poor care. I want to restore confidence by celebrating the good work we do see while also tackling persistent poor performance.

“Together, we can make sure these services are the best they can be for the benefit of everyone who needs them.”

Improving care services

A new ratings regime will be launched for the 25,000 care home and home care services in England in October 2014, which aims to ‘shine a light on poor care to drive up standards.’

The introduction of the rating and inspection regime has been backed by many people form the social care sector and Mario Ambrosi, head of corporate affairs for care charity Anchor said: “Any measure that encourages consistently high standards of care for older people is welcome news. There are many excellent care homes and services operating in the UK and good quality care in older age is a right to which we are all entitled.”

Beth Britton, freelance campaigner, consultant, writer and blogger said: “I look forward to working with Andrea, her team and colleagues from across the care sector in the co-production of the new special measures regime.

“People who use social care services and their families need to know that if a provider is failing in their duty of care that there is a system in place to halt that neglect and change the culture, and do so in a timely, but sensitive, manner.”

Professor Martin Green, chief executive of Care England, also welcomed the new measures and said: “It is our hope that this regime will give new clarity and consistency in how failing services will be challenged to improve, and clearly define the process and timescales on when they will be removed from the market.”

Sheila Scott from the National Care Association added: “We at National Care Association hope that this will be an arrangement that is rarely used but as an organisation that represents responsible care providers, we believe that in certain circumstances, special measures will focus attention on rapid improvement.”

The United Kingdom Homecare Association (UKHCA) has also expressed support for the Secretary of State for Health’s proposals.

Colin Angel, UKHCA policy and campaigns director said: “Combined with CQC’s forthcoming rating system of social care organisations, the regulator will be equipped with the range of measures which will recognise the high quality of the majority of social care providers.”