New care commission set fact-finding mission in first year

Work in
the first operational year of the National Care Standards
Commission (NCSC) will focus on finding out how people achieve
outcomes, not closing down homes, chairperson Anne Parker told
conference delegates last week.

Parker
said there were too many “unrealistic fears” in the care home
sector about the NCSC, which is due to come into force in April
2002 to inspect and regulate social care and private and voluntary
health care in England.

She said
that the NCSC had decided not to comment on the minimum standards
set by the government this year, but would make recommendations for
changes next year once they had gathered all the information.

“In year
one, we are going out there and finding out,” she said. “We have
standards and we will record standards. And we will be in
discussion about what the shortfalls are.”

Parker
said that, by gathering information from providers about outcomes
being achieved despite standards not being met, the NCSC would,
where appropriate, be able to feed new ideas into the second round
of standards.

Close
working with the commission’s counterparts in the rest of the UK,
plus with the General Social Care Council and its counterparts, the
Social Care Institute for Excellence, and training body Topss,
would be critical to its success, Parker said.

GSCC
interim chairperson Baroness Pitkeathley joined Parker in calls for
the sector to be patient with the new organisations during their
early stages, warning them not to expect change overnight.

The GSCC
officially came into being on 1 October, and will eventually be
responsible for registering the whole social care sector
workforce.