Cornwall Partners in Care News

Cornwall Partners in Care hold weekly briefings with Cornwall Council and Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation trust. These meetings involve Jonathan Price (Joint Director Adult Care and Health for Cornwall Council and NHS Kernow) and Phil Confue (Chief Executive of Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation trust), as well as David Smith (CPIC Chairman) and representatives from the CPIC Committee.

Daily update - 19th March 2021
Jonathon, Val and Derek met with Mary, Phil and myself to discuss the following;

1/ Jonathon stated that the additional funding as announced by Mat Hancock would not provide a significant increase for Social Care in Cornwall. He stated that there was recognition of the cost pressures as recently outlined by CPIC and it was hoped that Government grants would finance some of this, although timescales surrounding this support were uncertain. Phil stated that there would be an update within the next 2 weeks on ongoing Covid costs, and Jonathon agreed to review alongside the "normal" ongoing cost pressures.

2/ Jonathon confirmed that block contract arrangements were likely to continue until at least the end of the first quarter of the new financial year. Mary stated that not all block contract providers were aware that they had to submit their new contract application by the end of March, and it was agreed that individual letters be sent to these Providers to make them aware of this deadline. Some practical issues with the onboarding process were highlighted, and Jonathon agreed to ask Kate to prepare a simple video version of the guidance.

3/ Peter Lister attended for this item to summarise steps to address a backlog of assessments and reviews. It was noted that 2 companies had been employed to provide a Social Worker resource to work with Area Teams to address the backlog, although it was noted that funding for this task might not be available into the next financial year. Provider Led Reviews could be an option for the future once processes had been streamlined and reviewed.

4/ It was noted that discussion forums to consider future Integrated Care System arrangements were scheduled this month to give interested parties the opportunity to comment.

5/ Mary suggested that there was a need to have some IT support to track the status of Lateral Flow Tests, which were becoming a significant workload burden, especially now that visitors required testing. It was agreed that Mary and Val raise this issue at the next Testing Cell Meeting.

6/ Derek outlined discussions at the last Care at Home Steering Group Meeting, including process change opportunities to streamline the brokerage system.

7/ Phil outlined concerns regarding SWAST attitudes towards Providers, and the ease with which they submit spurious safeguarding alerts. Jonathon agreed to raise this issue with Karen Kay, and to report back at the next