The quality of social care provided by Southwark Council has fallen from ‘excellent’ to ‘adequate’ in just a year, according to an inspection report published by Care Quality Commission (CQC) today. The CQC, which is the independent health and social care regulator, also said that the council’s prospects for improvement were ‘uncertain’.

Southwark received an ‘excellent’ rating for social care services from the CQC’s predecessor the Commission for Social Care Inspection in 2007/08. But the Lib Dem/Tory executive has forced through a series of changes to the service over the past year including withdrawing social care for those with moderate needs, hiking meals on wheels prices by almost 50% and scrapping on-site wardens for sheltered accommodation.

No council in the country was assessed as being below ‘adequate’ last year, which means that Southwark’s care services are now amongst the worst in the country.

Southwark Labour’s spokesperson for health and adult care, Cllr Dora Dixon-Fyle said:

“Over the last two years the Lib Dems have made big changes to services for vulnerable and older people in this borough, all of which they said wouldn’t affect how good those services are. But it’s obviously going to have a negative impact when those changes include taking away social care for 900 people, putting up the price of meals on wheels by almost 50%, closing the Evalina Coyle day centre and scrapping on-site wardens for sheltered housing.

“Labour has opposed these changes whenever we thought that they would damage the quality of support for the most vulnerable people in our community, but our concerns have been ignored.

“Southwark’s social care services used to be one of the best in the country, but the Lib Dems have ploughed through wrecking changes with no real plan that have taken them to amongst the worst in just a year, with little hope of improvement. They need to set out urgently how they’re going to improve services, otherwise the quality of these vital services could deteriorate even more.”

The report says:

“I’ve tried the call centre – have you? I won’t again". Page 20

“safeguarding of adults in Southwark was adequate”

“capacity to improve in Southwark was uncertain”

“We raised specific matters in around half the cases we saw” page 14

“Out of hours services appeared increasingly stretched.” Page 7

“One older person we met was referred for review after over two years without one” page 19

“Practical plans were not yet in place to offer the prospect of sustainable delivery of the council’s vision and strategy” page 8

Notes:

1. The CQC assesses the council’s performance in seven areas, including improving care services users’ health, quality of life and ensuring people are treated with dignity and respect. There are only four grades for the quality of council support in these areas: Excellent; Well (i.e Good); Adequate and Poor.

2. The seven areas that councils are inspected on are:  Improving health and well-being; Improving quality of life; Making a positive contribution; Increasing choice and control; Freedom from discrimination and harassment; Achieving economic well-being; and Maintaining dignity and respect.

3. The CQC was established in 2009 and inspects health and social care services in England. www.cqc.org.UK

4. In 2008 the former inspectorate (the Commission for Social Care Inspection) assessed Southwark services as Excellent and Good in all areas. See: www.cqc.org.uk/_db/_documents/CouncilReport2008_Southwark.pdf