 Welcome to the new Adult Social Care Newsletter providing staff with one source of information relating to adult care management, social care provision and commissioning.
If you are a manager please ensure these details are read and understood by your team members.
If you know of any staff who are not receiving the newsletter, please let us know.
Information for all staff – Social Work traineeship opportunity
We are offering a number of opportunities for enthusiastic and highly motivated social care staff already employed within Adult / People Services, to undertake a Social Work qualification linked to the Open University. For more information click here, and also review the FAQ’s
  Planning for Agency Care – Hourly rates are changing
Indicative hourly rates are used by Care Managers for planning when standard brokerage is to be used. They help determine how an estimated budget could be spent and to check who needs to authorise a “My Plan” in accordance with Scheme of Delegation. New My Plan Guidance details revised rates of:
Daytime home care hourly rate: £14.55 (updated from £14.00)
Night time hourly costs (waking): £14.55 (updated from £14.00)
Night time care hourly costs (sleep in): £7.38 (updated from £7.00)
These new rates reflect increases in provider contractual rates for 2014/15
When planning please use these new values with immediate effect.
Supervision, Appraisal, and Workforce Planning
Guidance with regard to supervision and appraisal is presented in a new format to support easy access for Adult Care Management and Safeguarding Teams. The workforce strategy and implementation plan is also available, and will be updated as plans develop for implementation of the Care Bill in Devon.
Service Review Update – Day Services and Residential Care
Key decisions on the future of day services and residential care across Devon are set to be delayed to allow an extraordinary meeting of the Full Council to debate consultation findings and re-examine the potential impact of proposed changes.
The extraordinary meeting will take place on Wednesday 14 May 2014. When the results are available they will be published on the Tough Choices website pages for day services and residential care.
Service Review Update – Meals
All views have been carefully considered and a decision has now been reached about the future of community meals in Devon. Please go to the website for the full consultation findings report.
It has been agreed that the County's meals contract with Apetito will stop on the 30th June 2014 and that the County will cease current subsidies for hot meals.
Reviews are commencing with each of the current service users to ensure that alternative arrangements are in place for 1st July 2014. These are being led by Care Direct Plus.
If you are currently case managing a service user with a hot or frozen meal service or have any further questions then please contact Emma Bewes, Operational Lead
For further information relating to the project please contact Hannah Hurrell (Project Manager)
Framework Agreement for Community Based Support and Personal Care
The current Community Based Support and Personal Care Framework Agreement commenced in April 2012. The market has been advised that a new set of arrangements will be procured to take effect from April 2015. Work is underway, with commissioning partners, to design the new arrangements which will be tendered in late summer of 2014. For more details click here
Workforce Development Update
Course information:
PPAC1 for 2104/15 is about to begin. Make sure you book on soon to guarantee a venue close to your work place.
Excellence in Social Care for this financial year will begin in the summer. Please find below links to the online booking system. The groupings have changed slightly this year. ART workers and ALL CCW’s no matter what service user group you support are together, and ALL social workers are together. Please book early to ensure you can get to a venue in your area.
Record Keeping and Court Skills for Social Workers. This is the final year we will be providing this course in its current format. If you are in a Social Work post and have not done this yet, please book onto one of the three dates available. There will be no more sessions once these dates are full.
Induction courses for new staff to Devon or new to a role – Click to book on
Registered Social Workers don’t forget – Your registration will need to be renewed between September and November of this year. Visit the HCPC website for further information regarding portfolio requirements.
And in other news …
- Administrative Support for all Care Management courses will now be provided by Bridget Hill. Please contact her for any issues with booking or other administrative concerns.
- Three Occupational Therapists from the Practice Educators Consortium are presenting their work at the College of Occupational Therapy Annual Conference in June of this year. Look out for information in Insider about their experiences!
TRIM Training and Online Support Pages
Work is currently underway to move TRIM Training to an e-learning module. It is planned for the TRIM e-learning to be available to Adult Social Care staff around mid summer. The TRIM e-learning will replace the current TRIM Practitioner and TRIM Admin & Property courses that are currently delivered by the Business Systems Training team. If anyone has any particular requirements for the e-learning or thinks that certain aspects should be emphasised please let Steve Howkins (Corporate Information Manager) know ASAP.
In addition the ACS TRIM online support pages will be completely updated, remodelled and renamed. If anyone has any particular requirements that could be included in the ACS TRIM page please let Steve Howkins (Corporate Information Manager) know ASAP.
Update to TRIM Folder structure
To improve the usability of TRIM, a new folder named Adult Social Care - Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards has been added to TRIM and the CareFirst view of TRIM.
The Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (manual) and all DoLS forms when completed are located in this new folder.
The DoLS Manual and forms were previously located in the LEGAL folder.
New CareFirst Flag for Targeted Families Programme
A change will be made to the CareFirst system to create a new Key Classification on the front of each unique CareFirst record of individual family, or household members, of families / households who are eligible for the Targeted Family Support (TFS) programme. The change will go live in early May. For more information click here.
Mental Capacity Law Newsletter
The April edition of the Mental Capacity Law Newsletter is now available.
Community Care Law Journal and Support Planning – A critique
The most recent edition of the Community Care Law Journal is out now.
Another interesting read is this article, presenting a critical analysis of the current issues about support planning within Personal Budgets for disabled and older people.
Reading both these articles can contribute to your evidence informed practice and registration requirements.
 Keep recording Primary Client Group
Care Managers need to continue to record Primary Client Group for all new people until further notice. This applies when beginning both “My Assessment”, and the Safeguarding alert forms. The Department of Health has delayed implementation of planned changes to data reporting.
CareFirst Training
To avoid delay in staff receiving their CareFirst Training, managers should ensure that they book in advance. If a course has not been scheduled then the manager should complete the waiting list form via the ICT Self Service Portal so that the Business Systems Training team can prioritise and schedule the relevant courses.
For details of the courses available refer to the training catalogue.
Recording staff numbers for supervision or appraisal – Information for Team Managers
The DCC Staff Supervision database has been updated to include the facility to add the number of DCC staff you provide supervision or appraisals for.
All that is needed is the number of DCC staff. You do not have to enter names.
Instructions on how to do this along with the database location can be found in the attached Help document.
Please log in and update as soon as possible. Could you then review on a monthly basis and update as required.
Social Work Network
The next meeting of the Social Work Network is on Thursday 5th June in Exeter. The agenda includes a presentation on solution focused communication. To book a place click here.
 Devon County Council Voice Recognition System
Every person who is employed by DCC, or has an account to login to a Devon County Council computer, automatically has an entry in the ‘3000’ voice recognition phone system. This means that regardless of whether they use DCC-provided telephony or not, should a caller dial (01392 38)3000 and ask for them by name, the system will attempt to direct the call to that person. This will only be successful if that individual has logged into the system and directed their calls to the phone they are using.
In order to comply with being contactable, everyone should ensure the ‘3000’ system is updated so calls are directed to the appropriate mobile number, or a phone on the DCC-provided ‘38’ telephony system or any other location such as NHS provided telephony. Instructions on how to update the ‘3000’ system are available here (see section 3000 telephone system). This section also includes a listing of old and new IDs to access the system. If you do not know your new ID and are not on the listing, contact the ICT Helpdesk.
Remember new contacts by members of the public should always be directed to the Customer Service Centre numbers and not the ‘3000’ number as an initial contact.
 The winners are …
Congratulations to Byl Rice, Team Leader at Orchard Lea for winning the Stars Dignity in Care Award, and to the Beech House Care Home Team who have been recognised for their valuable contribution to the work of Devon County Council.
 Care Bill Project
The Care Bill is currently in its final stages between the House of Lords and House of Commons having had three readings and several amendments. It is expected to receive Royal Assent in May 2014. If the Care Bill is enacted then from April 2015 adult social care (ASC) will have a new legal framework putting the wellbeing of individuals at the heart of care and support services. The Bill will replace more than a dozen pieces of legislation with a single modern law and brings about many of the improvements to the care system described in the governments “Caring for our future white paper”.
The Care Bill sets out key proposals for reforming the way in which adult social care is funded. As a result much of the discussion and analysis of the Care Bill has been in relation to the proposed Care Cap, which limits the lifetime costs an individual has to pay for their care, and the accompanying infrastructure required to manage the cap. However, the Care Bill will also impact upon the duties and functions provided by adult social care services. Processes and practices will need to be reviewed to ensure that they are not only compliant with the new legislation but will enable us to deliver the changes required. DCC have established a Care Bill Implementation Project Board which held its first meeting at the end of April to take this important work forward. A programme of work is being developed and further details on this will be published soon.
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