GSCC response to the consultation on the framework for the registration of health and adult social care providers.
About the General Social Care Council (GSCC)
The General Social Care Council is the social care workforce regulator for England. The GSCC is a Non Departmental Public Body established in October 2001 under the Care Standards Act 2000. It is sponsored by the Department of Health (DH) but also works closely with the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) in delivering the children’s and young people's care agenda.
The GSCC works to improve the quality of social care services for the benefit of people who use services through regulation of the workforce and through its contribution to social work education. It has three main functions:
- it issues and distributes codes of practice for social care workers and their employers;
- it maintains the register of social care workers; and
- it regulates social work education and training.
The GSCC exists to promote the highest standards of social care in England by:
- acting as a guardian of standards in social care practice and as a champion of a committed workforce;
- requiring the highest standards of conduct from social care workers and compliance with the GSCC codes of practice;
- promoting the highest standards of training for social care workers;
- always keeping the best interests of people who use services and the wider public at the heart of the organisation;
The GSCC currently registers almost 100,000 social workers and social work students. The government has asked the GSCC to register the entire social care workforce overtime. The next group to join the register will be homecare workers, followed by people working in residential care settings.
Summary of key points made by the GSCC in the consultation response:
- All providers regulated by the new Care Quality Commission (CQC) should be required to employ only registered health and social care workers to deliver health care and personal care. This will provide people who use services with the assurance that all care workers can be held to account for their conduct.
- Registered social care providers should be required to comply with the GSCC code of practice for employers issued under S.62 of the Care Standards Act and that this should be enforced by the new regulator. Inter alia, this code sets out requirements on employers to support workers in accessing training opportunities and ensuring the safety of workers. The inspection methodology of the CQC should give due weight to the GSCC Codes of Pratice for Employers.
- The CQC should regulate day care centres.
- The Government needs to set out more clearly its intentions around the regulation of domiciliary care employment agencies. The GSCC is concerned about reliance on the Employment Agencies Standards Inspectorate to regulate employment agencies supplying social workers, care workers and nurses.
- More attention should be paid to the regulation of children’s social care services and to which regulator (either CQC or OFSTED) is best placed to guarantee high standards in these areas.
- In instances where ‘a worker is found to have become unsuitable’ the GSCC would like the Department to set out clearly in regulations that a referral should be made to the workforce regulator.