NHS: Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, we on these Benches welcome both the Francis report and the Government’s Statement. In particular, we welcome the importance of openness, transparency and access to information to ensure that there is a change in culture. Can the Minister confirm that the new care certificate will be an NVQ qualification so that the public can be confident that staff have the right skills and training? We would also welcome registration and regulation for those staff in the way that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, referred to earlier. Can the Minister also confirm that when complaints and other items have to be published, it will not be as a few lines in an annual report but on the web, and that it will easily accessible by patients and the public?

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I very much agree with the spirit of my noble friend’s questions. Certainly as regards complaints, the public should have a clear view of the nature of the complaints that have been registered with a particular organisation. They should be able to have a sense of what those complaints relate to and what action the organisation has taken to address the matter in question.

On my noble friend’s first point, we are currently working through the question of the care certificate and will seek advice. It is important to arrive at an agreed formula that gives the maximum assurance, both to care assistants and to those they look after, that basic standards of training have been learnt and are being adhered to. It is important to define as closely as we can what we mean by that, and as soon as we have further details we will announce them.