Care Services: Elderly People

Baroness Pitkeathley Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, we need to focus on a mixture of things. As my noble friend rightly says, we need to look at workforce numbers and capacity. We need to look at minimum training standards, which I have referred to, and we need to look at quality. We are doing that by targeting for the first time personal assistants and their employers with greater support and learning through the Workforce Development Fund, which will help with recruitment and retention. We need better leadership because high-quality leadership is essential for the delivery of all the proposals in the care and support White Paper, and we are setting up a new leadership forum to bring together expertise. I should add that we need better intelligence on the ground as well, and that we shall see from the local Healthwatch organisations when they are established.

[Baroness Pitkeathley]

My Lords, the Minister has pointed out that the employer, the provider, is responsible for the recruitment and training of care workers, and I am sure he will confirm that that applies whether they work in the private, the public or, indeed, the voluntary sector. In view of some of the scandals that there have been involving care workers, does he agree that we need to encourage value-based recruitment so that people are recruited not only for their technical skills, which can be provided through training, but for their compassion and empathy?

[Earl Howe]

Yes, I firmly agree with that. It bears upon the point that I alluded to very briefly, which is that the risk assessment process should not just be a tick-box exercise. It should assess the suitability of the individual and their own characteristics, the environment in which they will be working, the kind of people for whom they will be working and whether they have the right skills and characteristics as the people required to do that job.