RESOLVED that the minutes of the Adult Social Services Review Panel's meeting held on 17 July 2012 be signed as a correct record.

None

None

None

Kay Murray, Head of Professional Standards presented the report that set out the key aspects of the work of the Croydon Adult Safeguard Board over the last year.

Croydon has the largest population of the London boroughs at 360k, and the largest number of care and nursing homes. The safeguarding team is busy and the work is intensive, time consuming and deals with multiple partners. 2011 was the first time that care numbers had decreased but Kay was not certain this trend would continue and added that there could be an issue with the data that is being collected. The system had changed recently and future figures should be more accurate. She went on to speak about the Care Support team that is instrumental in undertaking prevention work in partnership with care providers.

Kay outlined the work being undertaken in hospitals regarding the onward admission of patients to care homes and the work being undertaken to track each case to see what issues arise and how these could be avoided in future.

Kay spoke about the annual report that contained a forward written by Jane Lawson the Independent Chair, Croydon Safeguarding Adults Board. She briefly described the different aspects of the report which had been circulated to Members.

The Chair of the Panel thanked Kay for the report and for the excellent work that her team do.

Members asked questions
What financial assistance comes from central government?
The previous funding had been aimed at children's safeguarding rather than adults and Croydon has had to set up their own structure
What is the membership of the safeguarding board?
This information would be circulated to Members.
 

The Panel RESOLVED to note the content of the Multi-Agency Annual Safeguarding Adults Board.  

Harsha Ganatra, Carers Commissioning Manager presented the report and made a short presentation. The report provided an update of the Carers Strategy (2008-11) and the revised 2011-16 Strategy is aligned with the Governments refresh of the National Carers Strategy, ‘Recognised, valued and supported: next steps for the Carers Strategy'. Stakeholders had been consulted on the revised Strategy and their responses had been incorporated in the new document.

Harsha explained that carers have different needs and some may not require that much assistance but needed to know that assistance was available. She went on to say that the Commissioning of Carers Services had been completed and signed off. Services are now being set up. This would include the Carers Hub which was a Croydon Council, Whitgift Foundation and partners' project and would provide support to carers including to young carers. A hub building had been identified in George Street and it is hoped this will be in operation shortly. This building will include, amongst other things, young carer's services, adult carers' services and carers training/ workshops/ support groups. A working group has been set up to look at new developments for carers due to the Care and Support Bill which was published this year. She spoke about the Croydon Virtual School that was a good achievement for Croydon. The Virtual School would be able to track the progress made by the young carers as they progressed through the school, but this was dependent on having integrated information and referral systems. As any issues were identified at an early stage carers needs could be assessed earlier.

Questions were asked virtual school membership and how long each person would be in ‘school', age of young carers and how these are identified through the system, young carers not in education and how these were identified.

The Panel RESOLVED to note the progress made on the new Croydon Carers Strategy 2011 -16: The next steps for carers in Croydon.
 

David Bell (Interim Managing Director Croydon Care Solutions Ltd ) gave a presentation on the progress made by Croydon Care Solution Ltd (the Local Authority Trading Company [LATC]) that was established in March 2011. The presentation covered areas of bespoke services to the authority, the procurement hub and proposed developments of service for Autistic clients and enablement facilities.

The company is now being used by Merton Council who joined the integrated procurement hub in February 2012 and Sutton Council joined at the beginning of October 2012. 

In response to questions he covered governance of the company with the authority as the shareholder and the company having its own banking and accounting systems. Croydon Care Solutions Ltd is the holding company, currently with two subsidiary companies Croydon Day Opportunities Ltd covering day to day services for clients in particular those with a learning disability and Croydon Equipment Solutions Ltd covering community equipment services and the DH sponsored integrated procurement hub.

Day Opportunities currently have over 200 clients, including 170 clients receiving day services daily. Support plans are put in place for each client covering clients' abilities and needs. He went on to talk about the activities that are organised for each group.

He spoke about two Day Opportunities future initiatives, the development of a bespoke autism service and the strategy to create an Enablement Suite at Cherry Orchard with 6 on-suite rooms having the latest equipment that will support an "experiential" centre for Transition clients and their parents; as well as enablement and respite programmes for all client groups.

Equipment Solutions delivered 25,000 items of equipment and services to over 8,000 Croydon households last year. Croydon is the lead borough for the integrated procurement hub with Equipment Solutions the delivery arm. Managing a full shared equipment service for Croydon, Merton and Sutton has required putting in place new systems and processes to sustain the integrated procurement hub.

The Chairman of the Panel thanked David Bell for his presentation and congratulated him and his colleagues on the progress that has been made.

Questions were asked by members covering the integrated procurement hub and it use by other boroughs, governance arrangements and ownership, enablement and re enablement and provision of equipment.

The Panel noted that potential future agenda items to be considered would be

30 January 2013
Direct payments/personalization progress report

24 April 2013
Update on the Carers Hub

Update from Croydon Care Solutions Ltd.

Update on the Virtual School

The Chair invited panel members to put forward any other topics they wish to see come to future meetings.

The Panel noted the next two meetings

30 January 2013
24 April 2013

Was moved and seconded and RESOLVED: that the Press and public be excluded from the remainder of the meeting on the grounds that it is likely, in view of the nature of the business to be transacted or proceedings to be conducted, that there will be disclosure of confidential or exempt information falling within paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972, as amended.

SUMMARY of proceedings of exempt part B proceedings
(Section 100C(2) LGA 1972 requires a summary to be provided without disclosing the exempt information where in consequence of exclusion of parts of the minutes which display exempt information the minutes of the meeting would not be intelligible as a record

The panel discussed the content of the report that looked at a case that had been previously investigated and what issues had been learnt. It was agreed that the purpose of the report was not to find blame but about to ensure that the lesson learnt would help prevent similar cases in the future.

RESOLVED to note the report.