Independent inspectors from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) have judged Adult Social Care Services at St Helens Borough Council as Good.
The report, released today, Thursday 8 May, focuses on the praise from people using the services and those who provide services found that staff were “compassionate and caring”.
Cllr Andy Bowden, Cabinet Member for Integrated Health and Social Care, said: “This judgement is a recognition of the incredible work that goes towards supporting some of our most vulnerable residents in the borough and is a testament to the partnership working with both services and residents to make a difference every day. Reading the report, it is clear the people using these services really value the support they get as the inspectors spent time with these people to understand how they value the services.”
The report says: “People told us the Local Authority understood the care and support needs of the local communities and worked closely with partners to provide services to meet those needs. People said they appreciated the Local Authority’s work towards coproduction and improved engagement with communities and people with lived experience.
“Senior leaders in St Helens were committed to supporting Adult Social Care, in recognition of the wider determinants leading to the need for interventions, services and support. People said the Contact Cares Service (the front-door function for access to all St Helens Adult Social Care Services) was easy to access and provided information and advice as well as urgent support when needed.
The CQC also commended the approach of the local authority working closely with NHS Cheshire and Mersey ICB to support a place-based approach to integrated commissioning across health and social care. It said that because the Executive Director for People (Adults, Children’s, and Public Health) is also the NHS Place Director, this enabled integration, governance, and commissioning arrangements, as well as integrated decision making.
St Helens Council is one of the first in the region to undergo the new assessment process and is the first to be given the ‘Good’ rating for its services. This is the latest in a long line of independent reviews praising the council following on from the Ofsted Good judgement for children’s services in 2023 which was judged to be ‘Good’ and the Corporate Peer Challenge, published last month, that recognised the council had transformed itself over the last five years.
The ‘Good’ rating for Adult Social Care, together with the ‘Good’ rating for Children’s Services, means St Helens is the only Local Authority within the Liverpool City Region to currently hold a Good rating in both services.
Cllr Bowden added: “There is always room for further improvement, and we will continue to focus on developing our services and we note inspectors recognised a small number of development areas which we will focus on.
“Adult Social Care takes up the largest proportion of the council’s spend, at £132 million a year, so this is a great endorsement that your Council Tax is providing vital services that are good and valued by our residents.
“We continue to see an ever-increasing aging population, and younger adults with complex needs which presents new challenges as we see the number of people with complex needs also grow. To meet these challenges, we continue to look at innovative ways to support the needs, through projects like our award-winning tech-enabled care.”
The CQC Inspection Report is available to read on the CQCs website.
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