The Care Bill – learning and development programme

The Care Bill brings together existing care and support legislation into a single legal act with a new well-being principle at its heart. There are major implications for the learning and development needs of the social care workforce.

The learning and development programme

In advance of the Care Bill coming into effect in April 2015, Skills for Care, in partnership with the National Skills Academy for Social Care and The College of Social Work, has been asked by the Department of Health to help identify and plan for the learning and development needs of the social care workforce in England.

This involves developing a programme that will identify what learning and development is needed to enable those working in social care to comply with the Care Bill requirements. It will look at whether changes are needed to existing adult social care principles, standards and qualifications.

A plan detailing the learning and development needs of all roles will be produced.

Have your say

A national consultation exercise will be taking place from 3 March until 11 April 2014 to get people’s views on the plan – designed to identify which roles will be affected by the changes, together with a description of the skills and knowledge they will need to develop to deliver the requirements of the Care Bill successfully.

The online consultation will be live on the Skills for Care website at www.skillsforcare.org.uk/carebill.

What happens next?

Once finalised, the plan will be used to create free learning materials and resources for use across the sector, specifically aimed at delivering the skills needed to meet the Care Bill requirements.

They will be designed to be adaptable so they can be used by all care and support organisations and agencies in England in a variety of situations.

Train the trainer style workshops will be introduced to ensure those delivering this will have the knowledge, skills and resources needed to deliver consistent learning and development to a high standard. Delivery of this is expected to take place between October 2014 and April 2015.

For more information on the programme visit www.skillsforcare.org.uk/carebill.