Report to Parliament shows a year of achievement
24 July 2007
CSCI has significantly increased the involvement of people who
use social care services in the design and delivery of social care
inspection, according to the Commission’s third annual report
published today.
The report demonstrates how CSCI has been developing its
inspection processes.
CSCI has recruited people who use social care services - CSCI
call them Experts By Experience - to participate in
inspections.
We are putting in place ways of assessing the performance of
councils, which put more emphasis on the quality of services they
commission.
And the Commission continues to strengthen its new approach to
transform the inspection of regulated services: Inspecting for
Better Lives, which emphasises listening to people who use
services.
Performance ratings, published for all 150 local councils in
England, showed steady improvement across the board and CSCI
completed 120 inspections of local council social services.
Inspectors made over 2,700 requirements on providers to improve
their services and responded to over 5,400 letters and emails
raising more than 13,700 concerns, complaints or allegations about
poor care services.
CSCI has also seen a big increase in interest in their
individual reports on services.
Around 1.5 million reports were downloaded from CSCI’s website
last year.
Announcing the publication of the Annual Report and Accounts
2006-2007 Our Chair, Dame Denise Platt, said:
"In all of our programmes throughout the year we maintained our
focus on improving outcomes for people who use social care.
"But we are also responding to the need for good information on
social care.
"Interest in our information is going up, and we are advocating
good information across social care to help people who are using
and choosing services.”
Chief Inspector, Paul Snell said:
"For the third year in succession, we completed our programmes
of assessing councils’ social care performance and of inspecting
regulated services.
"We have used our uniquely broad perspective of social care to
bring together a picture of the whole of social care, whether
commissioned or purchased by councils, or by individuals and
regardless of the nature of the provider – public, private or
voluntary."
2006-2007 was the last year when CSCI inspected children’s
services.
We have successfully handed this work on to the new Ofsted,
including hosting the Children’s Rights Director for England.
True to its vision and values, CSCI has used its Annual Report
to reflect the comments and concerns of real people who use social
care services.
This is a selection of what they said:
Person with a learning disability
"Some people with learning disabilities think that it’s part of
normal life if they are not allowed to have a cup of tea after 9pm
because the kitchen has been locked up."
Person using care services
"You spend your whole life fighting, pushing, cajoling to get
the services to do what you need."
Person using social care services
"CSCI needs to change the perception of service providers in
terms of who their customer is.
"Many providers seem to think that the council is the customer,
as they often pay the fees.
"But it’s not: people who use the service are the
customers."
Young person in care
"Don’t ask silly questions about cultural identity – ask does
racism affect you?"
Young person in care
"I want to be free of my past, better than my present and always
ambitious for my future!"
CSCI will report and comment on quality and issues in social
care in their annual publication to Parliament The State of Social
Care in England 2006-07 in January 2008.
Ends
Notes for editors
- CSCI’s Annual Report and Accounts was presented to Parliament
via the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on 24
July.
- CSCI is the single inspectorate for adult social care in
England, responsible for regulating and inspecting social care
providers –whether in the public or independent sector – and for
assessing the performance of local councils in delivering their
personal social services functions.
- The Commission’s primary aim is to improve social care by
putting the needs of people who use care services first.
- The Commission is chaired by Dame Denise Platt DBE and has five
Commissioners. The Chief Inspector is Paul Snell. CSCI staff work
across seven regions in England.
- Social care services for children are regulated and inspected
by the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and
Skills (Ofsted).