ADASS Regional Leads - Care Quality Commission - Winter Regulatory Approach

Dear colleague,

Our regulatory approach for adult social care in winter

I know very well that the current challenges in adult social care are apparent even before considering the heightened demand associated with winter. We know from our recent State of Care report that social care providers in England continue to face challenges recruiting and retaining staff while dealing with ongoing capacity issues and the impact of the cost-of-living crisis.

Problems with people’s access to health and social care in England remains a fundamental problem, particularly for people with protected equality characteristics. Along the health and care journey and despite the efforts of front-line workers, people are struggling to get the care they need when they need it. Record numbers of people are waiting for planned health care and treatment, and in the community, people are facing ongoing struggles with getting GP and dental appointments. As a result, some people are using urgent and emergency care services as the first point of contact and insufficient capacity in adult social care is continuing to contribute to people living independently in the community.

The winter period will inevitably exacerbate these challenges further, with the focus often on emergency departments and discharge into social care. However, we know there is a much wider capacity problem across the whole health and care system. This requires co-ordination of changes and improvements with all system partners to keep people safe and provide the best quality care possible. I know that, with this in mind, you will have developed a winter plan within your local system with priorities and dependencies on local adult social care provision.

As the independent regulator, we want to work with you to support your winter plans and understand priorities and areas of concern, to keep people safe and ensure they receive the best quality care possible. While our focus is always on making sure people who use health and social care receive the safe, joined-up care they need and deserve, we also want to help you and other local system partners direct efforts where they are needed most.

Over the coming months, we will focus our activity in adult social care where we can protect the vulnerable from poor care and help increase capacity. This means continuing to prioritise our visits to providers when we have information that indicates there is a risk of poor care or harm to people and acting on concerns from the public and stakeholders about access to services across the health and care system.

Alongside this, we will continue to develop our new regulatory approach and plan for its roll out.

If you have any concerns or proposals about capacity in your local area, please do contact me to share further information so that we can apply priorities to our acitivty in your area. I am keen to work with you to understand how we can support your plans, priorities and unblock any dependencies over this challenging winter period.

We have also updated providers on our wider regulatory approach over winter, which you can find on our website.

Best wishes,

James Bullion

Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care and Integrated Care