Delivering adult social care differently

On Tuesday the Health Social Care & Well Being Overview & Scrutiny Board met with the Cabinet Member for Social Services to question him on his report on alternative models of service delivery for adult social care.  The Cabinet Member was due to take a report to Cabinet on Thursday which sought approval from Cabinet to proceed with a full business to evaluate the benefits of creating a Local Authority Trading Company to deliver adult social care.  The Health Social Care & Well Being Overview & Scrutiny Board wanted to engage with the Cabinet Member prior to the report to Cabinet so that the Board’s views could be taken into account by the Cabinet.  You can find the Cabinet report here

The Board had some concerns which related to the procurement of legal advice, governance and oversight of an Local Authority Trading Company, financial risks and how staff would be affected by changes to the delivery of adult social services.  It was apparent however that these concerns could not be addressed fully until a full business case had been developed and the Board agreed to return to these at a suitable time.

The Board agreed that it would undertake some of its own research into Local Authority Trading Companies in other local authorities  and other elements of the project to assist it in its challenge and will set up  task and finish groups to achieve this.

The Board recommended that the Cabinet Member include the following recommendations in his Cabinet report:

• The Project Board, from May onwards, undergoes regular engagement with the Health Social Care & Well Being Overview & Scrutiny Board throughout the development of the full business case
• The full business case be subject to pre-decision scrutiny by the Board before it goes to Cabinet in August

At the Cabinet meeting yesterday the Chair and Vice-Chair of the Overview & scrutiny Board delivered their recommendations which were accepted by the Cabinet.