Last week the Health and Care (Staffing) (Scotland) Bill was passed unanimously in Parliament. Scottish Care gave evidence in Parliament has been successfully lobbying on behalf of our members to ensure that the Bill in its final stage is fit for our sector.

National Director Karen Hedge said:

We are confident that the Guiding Principles of the Bill, set with the purpose of ensuring the delivery of safe and high-quality services and ensuring the best care outcomes for those who access care and support is supportive of the very ethos of the independent care sector.

 

Whilst the legislation in itself will not solve the very real recruitment and retention challenges that the sector is currently facing, it will indirectly contribute to national workforce planning.

 

Most significantly, under section 7A, this will be through the requirement of Scottish Ministers to annually issue Parliament with a report on how the duties imposed by the Bill are being enacted. This includes the duties on those who provide, plan and secure care services, creating an official record by which to measure the impact of the Bill on staffing levels.

 

Critically the report must include steps that Ministers have taken to ensure that “funding is available to any person who provides a care service in order to assist in the discharge of those duties”.

 

The Bill as a whole sets duties upon “any person who provides a care service” in that they must have regard to any guidance which Ministers decide to issue, and additionally, if it is decided to pursue the development of a set of Staffing tools for the sector.

 

The development of tools would be led by the Care Inspectorate but must involve the sector to ensure that they support provision rather than limit it. Any tools should consider both quantitative and qualitative information, to include professional judgement and as such compliments existing work which Scottish Care has been involved in with regards to a capability tool to support the National Care Home Contract. In addition, there is real opportunity if the staffing method were developed to support the recognition and value of interdisciplinary working.

 

Scottish Care will continue to represent our members in the development of any staffing method or tools and in the development of any guidance which Scottish Ministers may issue.

NHS Education for Scotland’s Grief & Bereavement team produces a quarterly e-Newsletter aimed at health and social care professionals in Scotland.

Please click this link to sign up for this e-Newsletter. 

NHS Education for Scotland (NES) is planning to relaunch a revised Psychological Interventions in Response to Stress & Distress in Dementia event on 26th June in Stirling. Organisers say the event is aimed at those already trained as stress and distress trainers with an operational/strategic remit.

Please see the details in the flyer below, including a link to the application form for those interested in attending.

The Scottish Government and COSLA are looking for your views to help predict and address recruitment and retention challenges in the Social Care sector.

They are undertaking extensive fieldwork and a series of on-line surveys are central to this. There is a survey for employers to complete and it is available by clicking on this link: Employer survey

It should take about 15 minutes to complete, and is completely confidential.

The information gathered in this survey will inform the National Health and Social Care Workforce Plan and marketing recruitment campaigns for the Social Care and Early Learning and Childcare sectors.

There is also a survey for Social Care and ELC employees. This will gather the views of employees on what encouraged them to join the sector, what motivates them to stay and what their future intentions are. If you work in Social Care or ELC, or if you are an employer who can circulate the following link to your employees, please follow – or share -this link: Employee survey

This survey is completely confidential, and should only take about 10 minutes to complete.

The findings from all the research will help ensure that Social Care and ELC employers have the workforce they need going forward.

The surveys will close at 5pm on 17^th May

Today (28 March 2019), Scottish Care launched a new report at a Workforce Matters event in Glasgow.

The report, titled ‘Qualifying Care: An Exploration of Social Care Registration Qualifications in Scotland’, is based on survey data collected from Scottish Care member services across adult social care (care homes, care at home & housing support services) in early 2019.

It explores different aspects and stages of achieving registrable qualifications (largely SVQs), as required as part of SSSC registration of the workforce, as well as post-registration training and learning (PRTL) requirements.

The report finds:

• More than half of all front line workers are yet to begin their qualifications
• There is a diverse approach to how qualifications are funded and provided across the country, but there is an accessibility issue in terms of funding for older workers
• 20% of care homes and 18% of home care services have had to suspend employees due to not achieving qualifications in the allocated time
• Nearly a third of home care and a quarter of care home services have experienced staff leaving employment and citing SVQ requirements as a reason

You can follow the event and discussions on the report on Twitter at #qualifyingcare

To read the report, click here.