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Health and Social Care Bill

I recognise how important it is that service users, especially those who self-fund and arrange their care themselves, have reliable, comparative information on the services that are available to them to enable them to make informed choices. This is especially important for vulnerable people who are making decisions that will have a long-term impact on their future. Clause 45 allows for periodic reviews of individual regulated activities. In particular, we intend to use regulations under the clause to continue the assessment system that CSCI has recently introduced for social care providers—its ““quality ratings””—so that there is no break in the process of the transfer over to the Care Quality Commission. Indeed, until the new registration system is up and running in 2010, the ratings will continue under the current arrangements. The reasoning behind determining in regulations whether the commission is required to publish a report of its review or to assess the performance and publish reports of its assessment is important. In some cases, it may be enough to simply make the report of the review available—for instance, where we want the commission to review only the activity that an independent sector provider is carrying out for the NHS. In these cases, the level of provision may not warrant any kind of judgment on the overall level of quality as the results of the review will speak for themselves. However, in relation to social care, as I have already said, we intend to make regulations which will allow the continuation of CSCI’s quality ratings. I hope that by placing this on the public record, the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, will be reassured that the provisions allow for quality ratings and that it is our intention to continue them.