Ambition on curriculum at staff’s new skills academy

A skills academy to develop social care leadership, management and commissioning is to be set up, care services minister Ivan Lewis announced last week.

It is envisaged that developing the skills of directors of adult social services will be the first priority for the academy, which will be called SocialCare21.

The idea is one of several recommendations to promote the standing and quality of the sector made by Commission for Social Care Inspection chair Denise Platt (pictured) in a Department of Health-commissioned report.

Platt said: “The service lacks confidence. As a result, it is timid in its vision and ambition for how adult social care can be delivered.”

Lewis also called on the Social Care Institute for Excellence to set up a system for disseminating best practice – its core purpose – by the end of the year.

Platt’s report stated that “quicker progress on dissemination of good practice” had been expected from Scie.

But the institute’s acting chief executive, Amanda Edwards, said that the sector had dramatically improved its knowledge of Scie’s work over the past two years. She added that organisations needed to improve their use of Scie’s information.

Lewis also announced the government was looking at setting up a social care journal similar to the Lancet.

Further information
Status of Social Care – a review 2007
Government response Status of Social Care report
Scie response to Status of Social Care report