Chamber and committees

I will pick up on the point about independent advocacy; I suppose that family advocacy would go alongside that. Alison Leitch said something earlier that really struck me: that everyone can make decisions about our loved ones, except us. That was very striking to hear.

Kainde Manji talked about success being about achieving outcomes that matter to people and their families. What provisions need to be in the bill that could be linked to monitoring and evaluation?

Keeping in mind what Clare Gallagher has said, we are now going to talk about an integrated and accessible electronic social care and health record. The fact that that is a bit of a mouthful might in itself be something that we need to think about. I am also very aware of the complexities around access to such a record and its location and ownership.

My first question is for Karen Sheridan. What are the main benefits of having an electronic social care and health record? I am also interested in how we would make it accessible for people with learning disabilities or literacy issues and people whose first language is not English. Clare Gallagher might want to comment on that as well.

I think that the whole point of having an integrated and accessible record is that all the information is in the one place, but I appreciate that point.

That leads me on to my next question, which is for Hannah Tweed. Should social care users have ownership of and access to a single integrated electronic care record? If they should, how could that work effectively on the ground in practical terms?

I would like to pick up on that. When we visited Granite Care Consortium, the providers themselves were stepping care up and down without having to reference back, which I think Rachel Cackett mentioned earlier, and we saw how important that had been. In the final report, there was also evidence of a reduced number of hospital admissions during the Covid pandemic.

I appreciate that there are criticisms and concerns about moving to a national care service but, assuming that it will happen, are there positives that we can take from what you are doing in Aberdeen? Many such approaches could be implemented in the current system but are not, which seems to be where the real problem is. What are the biggest lessons that we can take away from what is currently happening in Aberdeen, as regards a national care service coming into effect and ensuring that other areas are picking up on those strengths?

My question is a follow-up to Emma Harper’s. Nick Price, what difference has having a co-ordinating role—as opposed to competing with each other—made to providers and to those who receive care from you?

I go back to what the Granite Care Consortium did in Aberdeen. There has been a real shift in power. The health and social care partnership essentially handed over a budget. The providers were at the table, and they were able to work collaboratively to provide seamless care and to shift things to each other if things did not quite fit.

I keep hearing, “We don’t want to lose all the good work we’ve done.” I say to Geri McCormick that I totally appreciate that. A lot of great work has come out of the IJBs, but we still hear that voices are not being heard. Providers feel that they are not heard and that they need to be at the table. Surely having providers at the table, and not just as people who can speak to the IJB, is really what care boards are all about. There is a difference between engagement and listening, co-designing and continuing to be part of the process all the way through.

I am worried about the idea that we would lose lots of good work. Surely there would be the people around the table who are already there as well as the providers and people with lived experience, so that people would move forward together in a growing, collaborative process.

What difference has it made to the people who receive care?

To pick up on what Rachel Cackett said, how much involvement is there now from community planning partnerships and people with lived experience on local improvement plans? How much are they involved in the IJBs at the moment?

Fanchea—I hope that I am pronouncing your name properly—it is helpful that your submission sets out three clear priorities for the bill to discover and deliver on: empowering individuals to have more choice, clear leadership and support for using digital service design, and the inclusion of representation by housing organisations. Looking at the digital aspect, you spoke about a much greater and more explicit join-up between digital health and care strategies and focused intentions for investment. What would that look like? What recommendations would you like to see in the committee’s report?