Adult Social Care Strategy 2024-2029

Introduction

We share the #SocialCareFuture vision to enable us all:

To live in the place we call home, with the people and things we love, in communities where we look out for each other, doing the things that matter to us.

This strategy for Adult Social Care at Southampton City Council sets out what we want to achieve by working as a team with partners, residents and communities across the city over the next 5 years.

The challenges facing organisations that provide social care have never been greater. Nationally and locally demand for services is increasing at a faster rate than capacity to meet it and much focus is given to the systemic strain across Health and Social Care. A seismic shift is required to change the narrative and approach to the way we, as a society, better support all our residents to live the lives they want to live and enable each of us to fulfil our gifts and potential. This strategy recognises that we all have a responsibility to make choices that maximise our prospects of living as healthily and independently for as long as possible, seeking and using the support available in our communities. It sets out what we want to achieve and how we will address the challenges. It includes the voices of our staff, partners and residents and how we are and will continue to work together to build a sustainable and bright future.

Key facts

• Southampton is home to fewer people aged 65+ compared to similar authorities however, the number of requests for support per 100,000 population is 24% higher
• Southampton has a larger percentage of people in Nursing Care than the comparator group average
• The percentage of re-quests resulting in no services is far higher in Southampton indicating that a significant proportion of needs presenting at our front door would be best met by other services
• Southampton City Council Adult Social Care faces 23.5% increase in costs by 2040
• Based on 2021-22 benchmarking demand in Southampton is 3x higher than average for 18-64 and 50% higher than average for 65+
• The average cost of a long term care placement is 8% higher than our statistical neigh-bours
• Expenditure on providing long term support for people with learning difficulties and mental health is higher than the comparator group average for people aged 18-64 and 65+
• The average cost of residential care is high-er than the group aver-age
• Between 2022 and 2029, the 65+ population is set to increase by 18.7%, or 7,070 people, with the 75+ population set to increase by 20.2%, or 3,824 people
• The average cost of nursing care provision is 55% higher than the average for our statistical neighbours

What do we want to achieve and why is this important?

1. A high-quality service that is easy for people to navigate, developing our pathways and processes will lead to people’s experience of social care being accessible and supportive, rather than confusing and difficult. Making safeguarding personal will support people to be safe and well.
2. An excellent early intervention offer, supporting people to live good lives, preventing or delaying the need for specialist services. Enabling people to make informed choices around their wellbeing.
3. A confident and competent workforce, ensuring that people receive the right support, in the right place, at the right time. We want well supported and healthy workforce who enjoy the work they do and use their skills and knowledge to support people well.
4. A fair, sustainable and flexible service for the residents in Southampton, ensuring resources are shared with equality and equity, enabling people to maintain control and exercise choice.

Our challenges

Nationally, people are living longer which is positive, but we are also seeing that many people are now living with poorer physical and mental health which means there is a greater need for support from Social Care as well as health services. This means that demand for adult social care support is rising significantly.

• Social care for Adults in the UK is means-tested, it is not free for everyone like health care. The remaining costs are covered by the Council. This means that the Council funds required to meet the growing needs are rising.
• There is less public funding available. The drive to reduce the national deficit (often called ‘austerity’) has meant the funds available to local authorities has reduced, with 10% less available in 21/22 than in 09/10. This means that less money is available to the Council to cover the cost of providing services.
• The cost-of-living crisis means that the running costs of services including heating, food and staffing are all Increasing. The cost-of-living crisis also means that people have less money to support themselves to live healthily.
• Legacy of the pandemic has resulted in growing waiting lists for appointments and procedures. People’s health and wellbeing is decreasing while they wait for treatment. Delayed intervention is leading to higher needs.
• Demand across health and social care means that people are spending longer in hospital. This often means that they are more frail and less independent when they return home or to onward care in a nursing or residential setting.
• According to Skills for Care’s Social Care Workforce Data 22/23 , nationally in Adults Social Care there is a job vacancy rate of 9.9% and in Southampton this rises to 10.3% where we also have a 28.3% turnover rate for staff. This can bring challenges in providing enough capacity to meet demand and continuity of care.

What our residents say

Our residents tell us that they:

• "Want issues to be resolved or to access the right information at first contact and not be passed be-tween teams."
• "Want us to prioritise prevention and early intervention to avoid needs growing where this can be avoided."
• "Expect our services to be high-quality."
• "Want a coordinated approach and good information sharing between health and social care."
• "Expect charging to be accurate and transparent."
• "Want us to be person-centred in all that we do."
• "Want our communication to be proactive, clear and timely."
• "Want us to protect and promote their independence."
• "Need access to good information and resources about support and services available."
• "Want to be listened to and for their needs to be understood."

Develop a high-quality service that is easy for people to navigate

• We have redesigned our service to provide the right support, sooner and to reduce the number of times it’s necessary to pass work between staff members.
• We are trialling a new a system in some of our service areas to help us be more proactive in our support of people using our services and their carers.
• We will be implementing our revised ‘Quality Assurance Framework’ to ensure the work we do is of high quality. We will look for themes and opportunities to improve through audits and reviews. We will actively seek feedback from those who use our services to help us embed continuous improvement.
• We will continually review our supplier contracts to ensure that performance is monitored and well-managed and services reflect value for money. We will continue to encourage our providers to take up the workforce training available to them to maintain or improve CQC ratings.
• We will embed innovative technology in our practice to give our residents more choice and to protect and promote their independence.
• We will improve support for unpaid carers by implementing the Carers Strategy
• We will create a Co-production Strategy with our residents, staff and partners to ensure our improvement journey and all that we do is coproduced. People will be at the heart of all we do. We will strengthen the voice and influence of those with lived experience in shaping the future of our services.

Build an excellent early intervention offer

• We have developed our Advice and Information and Guidance webpages and developed city wide training to partners and providers on how to use these so that everyone is better informed about the services and options available.
• We have introduced online tools, including an online needs assessment to help point our residents to the right help and support more quickly. We have also provided access to EquipMe – a self-evaluation tool to
  identify the right tools and assistive technology to support everyone to live independently for longer.
• We have a wide range of great services in Southampton. We have created a new interactive Southampton Directory, listing these to help more people find and access them.
• We will implement our newly developed ‘Southampton Steps’. This is a framework to support staff to promote the independence of our residents prioritising prevention.
• We will continue to redesign how are services are accessed so that a larger number of our staff with a broader range of skill and information are available earlier to our residents and their carers.
• We will continue to train and support our staff who take the first calls from people to resolve questions and issues at the first point of contact.
• We will continue to work closely with our partners in Housing, Public Health Stronger Communities, Health and the Voluntary Sector helping to build community resilience.

Grow a confident and competent workforce

• We have created Cornerstone, a 3-year development programme incorporating a newly developed Assessed and Supported Year in Employment (ASYE). This additional support helps retain staff and supports Newly Qualified Social Worker's to develop their skills.
• We have invested in training Practice Educators, who are experienced social workers to support students and staff, ensuring we develop and support excellent practice across the service.
• We run a ‘Grow Your Own’ Social Work Apprenticeship to help us to recruit and retain the best staff and social workers.
• We will complete and implement a new Workforce Strategy, focussing on recruitment and retention whilst also building skills, developing practice, and developing our staff.
• We already work closely with our local universities; we will continue to develop these strategic relationships.
• We will develop a new Quality Assurance Service, and will be piloting a Practice Lead Role, who will be a more experienced social worker to help and support other social worker’s practice. They will help us deliver a robust training and development programme for all staff in Adult Social Care

Create a fair and sustainable service for the residents in Southampton

• We have reviewed the way we calculate and communicate our Charging Policy to make it more trans-parent, fairer for all residents and easier to understand.
• We use Practice Development Forum, a meeting with a range of attendees to challenge us to demon-strate best practice and the right outcomes for people.
• We have implemented a new system that supports and encourages value for money in the provider market.
• We will continue to redesign our service to more closely align teams who manage the market and commission service to practitioners so that we are proactively ensuring we provide services to best meet the needs of our city.
• We will improve the quality of service we provide to those who manage their care via a Direct Payment. We will ensure that a greater range of choice is available.
• By the introduction of our new learning and development programme we will ensure consistency in staff skills and capabilities helping to deliver a fair service.
• We will work with providers and people with lived experience to design and implement a new Inclusive Lives Programme.
• We will reduce the number out of area placements so that people can remain closer to home whilst also providing better value for money.

How we will measure ourselves

Our Adult Social Care Strategy is supported by a number of city wide strategies

• Adult carers strategy
• City Health & Care strategy
• Employment skills strategy
• Health & wellbeing strategy
• Homeless & rough sleeping strategy
• Homelessness prevention strategy
• Housing strategy
• Southampton City Council Corporate plan
• Tobacco, alcohol & drugs strategy