Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress he has made on dementia care in his plans for social care workforce reform; and if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of making dementia training mandatory for adult social care workers as a part of that reform.

Providers must provide sufficient numbers of suitably qualified, competent, skilled, and experienced staff to meet the needs of the people using the service. Staff must receive the support, training, professional development, supervision, and appraisals that are necessary for them to carry out their role.

We now have a national career framework for adult social car, the Care Workforce Pathway, which is linked to a number of existing competency frameworks, including the dementia training standards framework.

The Department has also launched a new Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate qualification which links to the outcomes in the Care Workforce Pathway. This contains the baseline knowledge required to provide quality care, and will make sure that those who are starting out their careers have an informed awareness of dementia.