Chamber and committees

Are there are elements in the bill that provide opportunities to address existing inequalities and to improve accessibility? Jackie Irvine might be able to pick up on that.

As I understand it, there will be changes to children’s services, depending on where those services sit now—whether the structure in place is an IJB or a lead organisation—and regardless of whether those are included in the national care service. Are you saying that, on balance, including children’s services would be more positive than not doing so?

Thank you, Mr Feeley, for all your work so far and your on-going work.

I have heard some criticism that the bill is not sufficiently focused on prevention and early intervention. There is not much mention of that in the bill or in the memorandum. Is that an issue, or is that part of the human rights-based approach to the bill? Is there something else that we should do to put prevention and intervention more at the centre of the framework bill?

Human rights are absolutely at the centre of the bill and the approach to the delivery of social care. For some people, those rights often seem to be at odds with the constraints that are imposed by finite resources. Is that always true? Is that your experience, or does investment in that approach mean that people do not reach the point of crisis? You said that the shift in focus to prevention and early intervention really strengthened the human rights-based approach to social care. Informal community initiatives also often mean that small issues do not grow into much bigger issues because that support is provided locally.

We have discussed ethical commissioning and procurement. Could the review’s recommendations in that regard be met within the current model? Why did you not consider alternatives such as public-social partnerships and alliancing? Is such a radical redesign of social care commissioning absolutely necessary?

Will the bill as introduced create the conditions for innovation? Are co-design and co-production well enough and broadly enough understood across health and social care?

That was really great—what you said was dead helpful. The point about protections for chief social work officers was well made, although I note that it could apply to heads of service as well, and not just at the very top level.

My question picks up on Gillian Mackay’s points. In my constituency, Enable Scotland uses SDS and delivers personal assistants. The approach is about focusing on the individual and what matters to them, and it involves taking a wellbeing approach and a preventative approach, rather than picking from a choice of services that happen to be available. I am really interested in that approach. You mentioned the costs that are associated with it, but Enable has said that, actually, most of the time, it does not cost more, which is interesting. What recommendations would you like us to make in our report to ensure that that issue is front and centre in the bill and that we have it covered?

I noted that COSLA’s submission talked about the bill failing to

“address the difficult issue set out in the Independent Review of Adult Social Care, that of profit within the sector.”

Its submission also said that

“Private sector provision ... accounts for 76 per cent of care home provision.”

So, it is really about profiteering rather than reinvestment. Should reform of non-residential and residential care funding be included in the national care service bill?

My question is for Patricia Cassidy. What co-design is already under way with social work and social care staff? Is that presenting opportunities for social workers, for example, to better apply their expertise?

Yes, thank you, convener.