NOTE OF THE MEETING OF THE FREE PERSONAL AND NURSING CARE SUB-GROUP ON ACCESS AND ENTITLEMENT TO SERVICES, THURSDAY 16 APRIL 2009

Attendees

Laura Bannerman, ADSW, Dundee City Council, (Chair)

Jane Arroll, Joint Improvement Team, Scottish Government

Gillian Barclay, Older People’s Unit, Scottish Government

Mike Brown, ADSW, City of Edinburgh Council

Ron Culley, COSLA

Shaun Eales, Free Personal Care, Scottish Government

Peter Knight, Joint Improvement Team, Scottish Government

Neil Rennick, Older People’s Unit, Scottish Government

Jenny Stevenson, Free Personal Care, Scottish Government

Welcome and Apologies

1.Laura welcomed everyone to the meeting. Apologies had been received fromKenny Hannaway, Scottish Government Legal Directorate and Jim Pearson, Community Care Providers Scotland.

National Eligibility Framework Draft Guidance

2.At the last meeting of the Group it was agreed to reconvene and continue to review the guidance from paragraph 7 onwards.

3.There was detailed discussion around the ordering of paragraphs 7.1 to 7.10, which also took in the flowchart and tables. Neil commented that having received an endorsement from COSLA, ADSW, Ministers and the Legal Issues Group on the draft to date he would be uncomfortable if there were too many amendments within this section. However, in summary the following points were agreed:

  • the flowchart should be earlier in this section and should be inserted after paragraph 7.2
  • the second tier of the diagram should be deleted and each category should include a narrative to describe the timelines.
  • there should be a ‘no risk’ category added following the assessment stage
  • ‘no further action’ and ‘advice and information provided’ boxes should be included after the initial screening stage.
  • The Single Shared Assessment (SSA) should be referred to as SSA/Community Care Assessment.

Mike offered to restructure the diagram taking on board the points discussed.Action: Mike

4.Under the section on Definition of Risk Factors the Group agreed that each of the boxes in the table must include a description of the risks and that there should be no blank boxes. The Group agreed a form of words for each which Neil would include in the next version of the draft. It was also noted that during the consultation period “pen pictures”for each criteria would be considered which would assist councils in interpreting the broad descriptions for each of the criteria. A reference to this would be inserted into the guidance advising that these would be included when the final guidance was issued. A line should also be included to say that as well as local authorities ensuring that arrangements for accessing care services are lawful they should have been the subject of an equality impact assessment.

5.It was felt that the opening and closing sentences in the Section on the Review of Eligibility Criteria were already stated elsewhere in the draft therefore these should be deleted. The reference to the English FACS system should be moved into the section on the Wider Policy Context.

6.The section on Moderate and Low Risks should be moved further up the draft and would follow on from the risks table.

7.Under the paragraph Managing Waiting Times it was agreed that there should be an opening sentence explaining that this section sets out requirements for the operation of a standard national waiting time for the delivery of personal and nursing care services. The bullet point on definition of “delivery of service” and monitoring should be split into two clear points and the monitoring point underlined.

8.It was agreed that paragraph 10 on Funding was no longer necessary as the £40 million additional funding to local authorities was covered in the section on Delivery context – Sutherland Review.

9.There should be an additional section titled Review at the end of the guidance to advise that Scottish Government and COSLA would jointly review responses from Chief Social Work Officers, confirming the compatibility of their local arrangements with the guidance, and monitoring of information on the operation of the eligibility criteria and waiting times information as it became available.

10.The Group revisited the first half of the draft and suggested various minor changes to the document that would be included in the next version of the draft.

Covering Draft Letter to Local Authorities

11.There was discussion around the timeframe for consultation. Several members voiced concern that local authorities would not have sufficient time to meet the current implementation date of 1 October. It was noted that any delay on implementation would not be well received by Ministers however it was agreed that in order fora reasonable amount of time to consult and complete the Committee reporting process, Chief Social Work Officers would be asked to confirm by 1 December 2009 that their local arrangements were compatible with the finalised guidance.

12.The Group agreed that responses to the consultation should be returned in early July and that a reminder letter could be sent mid consultation to highlight to Councils the need for replies to be sent within the closing date for comments. Consultation responses would be sent to members as they arrived. Action: Jenny

13.COSLA leaders would be asked to approve the draft guidance ahead of consultation at its next meeting on 18 May. Action: Ron. Approval would also be sought from Ministers. Action: Gillian

14.It was agreed that the covering letter should be sent to Directors of Social Work and Chief Social Work Officers and copied to Directors of Finance, Directors of Housing and Chief Executives of NHS Health Boards. The letter should also highlight the work likely to be required by councils to meet implementation requirements such as adapting systems, staff training, public information and reporting to elected members.

Date of next meeting

12.The next meeting would be arranged for late July and would focus on the responses to the consultation. Action: Jenny

Secretariat

June 2009