Summary: Ms X complained the Council failed to meet the late Mr Y’s assessed eligible care needs or her needs as Mr Y’s carer.

Finding

The Ombudsman upheld the complaint and found fault causing injustice.

Recommendations

The Council has agreed, within three months of the date of this report, to:

• apologise to Ms X and to pay her £2,000 to acknowledge the increased strain she was placed under as Mr Y’s carer by the Council’s faults and to acknowledge the unpaid care she provided him that was part of his assessed eligible care needs;
• apologise to Ms X for failing to explain how the respite care cost was calculated; and
• refund Mr Y’s estate the expense of funding his own eligible care needs from April to June 2019 (estimated at around £4,000) on receipt of evidence of costs from Ms X.

In addition, within three months of the date of this report, the Council has agreed to:

• review its procedures to ensure carers are offered separate carers’ assessments and the outcome is recorded; and
• amend its current procedure to ensure it is clear that current needs should continue to be met when its funding panel defers or refuses decisions on recommended care packages.

We also recommended the Council review its commissioning arrangements to ensure it can meet basic care needs throughout the Council’s area in line with the requirements of the Care Act regarding market shaping and commissioning of adult care services. Since the matters covered by this complaint the Council says it has already:

• restructured its adult social services commissioning team. This included an integrated commissioning team jointly funded with Health;
• invested in reablement to enable people to return home to continue to live independently;
• increased its hourly rate paid to providers;
• put block contracts in place with providers so they can recruit staff knowing they have a guaranteed income; and
• introduced an interactive market intelligence tool ‘Norfolk Older People’s Care Homes Dashboard’, detailing current and future bed-based demand. This supports the Council and providers to better understand the care market and opportunities that exist within it; 
• provided recruitment training for providers and has secured funding to deliver a skills development programme for care home managers and business owners;
• introduced a new integrated Head of Quality role, jointly funded with health to bring quality improvement services of health and social care more closely together.

Ombudsman satisfied with Council's response: 5 August 2020

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