Service users may be placed at risk under inspection plans
community care, 05-08-2005 
Older people's groups have warned that proposals to radically cut the inspection burden on good care providers may leave users at risk, writes Mithran Samuel. 

Age Concern and Help the Aged said Commission for Social Care Inspection plans to comprehensively inspect top providers as little as once every three years could leave problems unexposed. 

Stephen Lowe, social care policy adviser at Age Concern, said: "It seems quite risky to think about leaving services for two to three years." 

CSCI has said good providers will still be subject to "random" and "themed" inspections on elements of their services, which it claimed would stop them getting complacent. 

But Lowe added: "Random or themed inspections may not be enough. They would be too narrow to catch potential problems." 

Annie Stevenson, senior policy adviser at Help the Aged, backed the principle of CSCI's reforms - to make inspection proportionate to risk - but said leaving services for three years was too long. 

She said: "From a user's point of view and a relative's point of view they would feel more confident if there was no sense of dilution and watering down [of inspection]. Good providers can miss important things." 

Both questioned the potential of the market to promote quality in care services in the absence of inspection, saying users lacked the consumer power to influence providers. 

Stevenson added: "It's a false market. Older people are powerless as consumers." 

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