Care England calls for more transparency from CQC

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has revised its ‘registering the right support’ guidance in an attempt to make it clearer for providers who support autistic people and/or people with a learning disability.

A spokesman for CQC said, following feedback from service users, the guidance has been updated to ensure it has a stronger focus on outcomes for people, including the quality of life people are able to experience and the care they receive.

However, Care England warns that CQC’s failure to share the evidence on which the guidance was based may make it harder for care providers to understand why certain decisions around their services are being made.

Now called Right support, Right Care, Right Culture, the guidance, outlines three key factors that CQC expects providers to consider if they are, or want to care for autistic people and/or people with a learning disability:

Right support:
The model of care and setting should maximise people’s choice, control and independence

Right care:
Care should be person-centred and promote people’s dignity, privacy and human rights

Right culture:
The ethos, values, attitudes and behaviours of leaders and care staff should ensure people using services lead confident, inclusive and empowered lives

A spokesman for Care England said CQC published a revised draft of the guidance, titled Registering the Right Support, on their participation platform Citizen Lab on 31 January 2020.

In Care England’s consultation response in January, it sought to highlight several key themes which it felt the draft guidance did not adequately address, including the size of services, commissioning, use of case studies and how CQC applies the policy.

The spokesman said Care England has reiterated these issues through further stakeholder meetings with CQC in advance of the final publication of their revised guidance.

This consultation followed a scoping review which took place between March 2019 and August 2019. The Care England spokesman said the guidance has been re-worked and renamed ‘Right Support, Right Care, Right Culture’ however, CQC’s policy on regulating and checking on providers that support autistic people and people with a learning disability has not changed.

Professor Martin Green OBE, chief executive of Care England, is calling for more transparency from the CQC.

‘Although we welcome the redrafted guidance, more could be done to demonstrate the importance of evidence in the revised approach.

‘Care providers need to know that decisions made around the regulation of their services are evidence-based.

‘We implore CQC to adopt a greater degree of transparency with the sector as to their own approach.

‘This will foster a dynamic process whereby providers are fully able to understand the basis upon which decisions regarding services are made.’

Kate Terroni, chief inspector of Adult Social Care, said the guidance makes clear that safeguarding people’s human rights must be at the heart of all care provided.

‘Autistic people and people with a learning disability are as entitled to live an ordinary life as any other citizen.

‘We expect health and social care providers to ensure autistic people and people with a learning disability have the choices, dignity, independence and good access to local communities that many people take for granted.

‘Our revised guidance makes clear that safeguarding people’s human rights must be at the heart of all care provided for autistic people and/or people with a learning disability.

‘We will only register and give a positive rating, to those services that  can demonstrate high quality, person-centred care.’

A spokesman for CQC said the watchdog will be using this guidance in their assessments and judgements and that providers are encouraged to directly discuss their proposals or development ideas before submitting an application or making changes to services.

This can help providers make an informed decision about whether plans are likely to comply with this guidance.

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