Scotland’s Parliament takes the Care Inspectorate on trust
Failing to hold Scotland’s social care regulator to account exposes care home residents to risk.
On 25 August, 2020, Scotland’s Parliament had an opportunity to hold the country’s social care regulator, the Care Inspectorate, to account when its then chief executive was called to give evidence to Parliament’s Health and Sport Committee at a meeting to consider the question: “How well is the Care Inspectorate fulfilling its statutory roles?”.
This was at a time when people in Scotland were losing confidence in the public administration of the country’s social care system – Scotland’s government, local Health and Social Care Partnerships (HSCPs) and the Care Inspectorate were perceived to have exposed residents and staff in care homes for older people to the risk of infection from Covid-19 by expecting care homes to admit from clinical settings people who had not been tested for the virus and, later, to have breached care homes’ first line of defence against the virus by requiring them to open their doors to the Care Inspectorate inspectors and local HSCP officials to, in effect, count the face masks.
BetterCareScotland’s data show that these inspections were poorly-targeted and, therefore, needlessly exposed residents and staff, including the Care Inspectorate and HSCPs’ own staff, to the risk of infection.
Against this backdrop, it is hard to imagine a more pressing time for Scotland’s Parliament to examine rigorously the role of the Care Inspectorate.
But the minutes of this meeting show that Scotland’s Parliament failed to represent the evidence solicited from care providers and industry groups who had, for compelling reasons, expressed the concern that Scotland’s social care regulator is failing to fulfil its statutory obligations. And, with Parliament having failed to hold the Care Inspectorate to account in committee, the chief executive of Scotland’s social care regulator informed the Care Inspectorate Board on 30 September 2020 that “the session went well”.
It had, of course, gone very badly indeed! That the Care Inspectorate chief executive failed to see this validates the concerns care providers had expressed.
Unlike Scotland’s Parliament, BetterCareScotland would not claim to have all of the answers to the issues in social care provision facing Scotland but we do have the questions that Scotland’s Parliament seemed unwilling or unable to ask. And, by making sense of publicly-available date and using statistical techniques we know where and how to find the evidence to support the awkward questions to which the public officials who administer and regulate Scotland’s social care system should be expected to provide answers.
The aim of the Health & Sport Committee meeting on 25 August, 2020 is clear: to determine “How well is the Care Inspectorate fulfilling its statutory roles?”
But, the transcript of the meeting shows that Scotland’s Parliament paid lip service to the question and failed to reflect the views of those who had responded to Parliament’s call for evidence and, so failed to challenge the regulator’s then chief executive. This is unfortunate since there are serious flaws in the Care Inspectorate’s operations that need to be addressed.
Knowing the questions that need to be asked helps to get at the facts. For example, that the Care Inspectorate lacks the economics, analytical, and technical expertise and risk management and compliance experience without which no professional regulator in any sector can function. And that, where a professional regulator uses its own resources and refines its data and processes to better identify and respond to the risks of a regulated entity, the Care Inspectorate claims to be “intelligence-led” which means it depends entirely on other people to flag issues of which it would otherwise be unaware. In essence, the Care Inspectorate has sub-contracted its responsibilities to outsiders.
With clear implications for people’s welfare and human rights!
To receive by email a copy of BetterCareScotland’s, February 2021 research paper for Scotland’s Parliament,
HOLDING SCOTLAND’S CARE INSPECTORATE TO ACCOUNT?
A critical evaluation of Parliament’s scrutiny of Scotland’s social care regulator!
please click here.
WHAT YOU CAN DO!
Join BetterCareScotland and campaign to see people in Scotland and their human rights treated with respect at their time of greatest need.
Join forces with us and support people being silenced by their local authority.
Help us to hold local authority chief executives and social care bosses for exposing vulnerable people to risk.
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” … Maya Angelou
Help to ensure that the vested interests and perverse incentive structures in Scotland’s social care system can be be designed out of the National Care Service so that the Scottish Government can deliver on its promise of good care outcomes, as standard, for all people in need of care in Scotland.
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