All Wales Direct Payments Forum

Monday 11th June 2007

Media Resource Centre, Llandrindod Wells.

Agenda item

Action

Present

Jacqui James (Chair)– Bridgend

Sue Lloyd – Neath Port Talbot

Zoe Williams – Torfaen

Lizzie Hale – Vale of Glamorgan

Jenny Mckinlay – WAG

Phil Jones – Merthyr

Rhian Powell – Gwynedd

Nick Thurlow-Brown – Powys

John Carter – WAG

Diana Wallace – Monmouthshire

Eli Jones –Newport

Arwel Wyn Owen –Angelsey

David Jervis – Blaenau Gwent

Lizzie Hale – Vale of Glamorgan

Jo Taylor –Flintshire

Phil Jones –Merthyr

Paul Bee -Pembrokeshire

Apologies

Terry Hacking - Vale of Glamorgan

Vicki Davies – Swansea

Christian Beech – RCT

Morag Firth – Swansea

Sue O’Grady – Powys

Alys M Jones – Gwynedd

Kim Conroy –Ceredigion

Alison Thomas

Steve Vaughan

Matters Arising

Minute taking – Rota for taking minutes has been drafted and circulated.

Minutes of Last Meeting

2.1

Reading of Minutes –Continued

The minutes of the last meeting held on 12th March 2007 were read with the following points being raised.

SSIA Website

No feedback has been received from Terry yet. There were no reports of problems accessing the site.

Overview Group

See item 7

See item 5

Direct Payment Questionnaire and Survey

Agenda Items

Direct Payment Questionnaire

Terry, Zoe and Christian cancelled meeting to discuss process as only 6 questionnaires received.

Issues raised:

-LA s needed a central data collection point.

-Clarity needed regarding when a DP is recorded. (Some LA s do not record a DP if finance departments have not processed them.) It was pointed out that as the data is retrospective it is easier to identify figures for the past year.

-All stakeholders need to be aware of the information needed and the role they play in providing data. (Newport and Blaenau Gwent have asked for compliance with the questionnaire monitoring requirements in a new support provider contract.)

-Children’s and adult services have separate systems.

-Duplication of process where there is more than 1 district within a county eg Powys.

- difficulty in collating data where parent and child have a DP each.

It was concluded that Local authorities who have a dedicated DP post find collation of the information easier because of networking and stronger liaison with stakeholders.

JC stated that only first 3 pages were mandatory for WAG. WAG can’t wait for data collection as performance management indicator. If operational issues are encountered with non mandatory part this needs to be discussed and addressed at AWDPF. As not part of WAG’s formal collation system. AWDPF needs to drive second part forward.

Christian to advise forum who has submitted Questionnaires.

Agenda wording and design of AWDPF questionnaire for Sept meeting.

4. Direct Payments Training –feedback.

Jacquie, Zoe and Sue Lloyd have worked on a presentation taken to the Social Care in Partnership consortium. Presentation was give to the group and comments received. A logo is needed and it was suggested that a logo for the AWDPF would be appropriate. The presentation can be adapted for different agencies.

It was agreed to include a section on the MCA.

The issues regarding assessing capacity were discussed. Issues re capacity need to be raised at the appropriate part of the process. JC was concerned about the language used and felt it needed to reflect the guidance more accurately. Generally the presentation is designed to raise awareness and presenters will answer questions stimulated by the presentation. There was a general discussion about the need to raise awareness amongst LA staff, particularly newly qualified Social Workers. Not all courses include training on DP’s. DP’s need to be strengthened operationally. Examples discussed:

-setting up an operational group to address all issues eg Neath and Port Talbot have set up a group.

-Team managers need to give DP’s priority.

-Systems must run smoothly once a DP has been identified.

–DP’s must be offered at the appropriate time in the assessment process. (when planning delivery of care)

JC said duty to offer DP’s is under scrutiny and ministers would raise concerns if they knew that LA s were failing in their duty. Failure to comply with duty to offer DP’s was recognised as a big issues across Wales and needed to be addressed both operationally and through commissioning. Different infrastructures in the decommissioning process are needed to support greater take up of Direct Payments. It was generally acknowledged that the higher the number of Direct Payments, the more cost effective support systems are.

Final draft to be presented to All Wales Forum in September.

AWDPF to consider how to sustain DP take up.

5.Overview Group

JC questioned whether there was a case to make to WAG for differential targets for take up of DP’s. Eg 10% of all Service users?

Kate Young needs to meet with the group. A replacement for Morag was requested.

The sub group –Morag Firth and Kate Young –have met once to look at initial performance indicators and a draft has been produced.

JC concluded that a case needs to be made for targets as WAG currently does not have a position on this. Classic target regimes are based on reward and penalty schemes.

It was noted that targets do not measure effort in trying to develop DPs.

The discussion returned to difficulties in funding decommissioning. Ellis Williams has submitted a paper on WAG loan funding for LA s affected by decommissioning costs of restructuring for DPs.

Sue Lloyd to confirm if she is able to attend overview group – SubGroup following meeting with JJ and ZW.

Sub group to be reconvened, complete draft proposals and agree way forward, and report to Overview Group.

6.‘Safeguarding vulnerable groups act 2006’

Mike Burns will present new CRB process to Sept meeting. The enhanced CRB check will have wide reaching implications, putting adults on the same footing as children. The entire health force is affected. The responsibility will rest with the individual employee to show the CRB check to the employer. Implementation is to be staged over 2-3 years and includes new categories.

Agenda for Sept meeting.

7.Direct Payments Guide

Case studies have been requested to be appended to the guide, but none received yet.

AWDPF members to send case studies to Terry.

8.Capacity Crib sheet

PB informed the group that Pembrokeshire has piloted the MCA crib sheet guidance with CLDT for 6 months and was found to be very useful. It has been circulated to all teams and had positive feedback from team managers. Belinda Schweir has been asked to comment and advised it is the best guidance she has seen and it dovetails well with MCA guidance. CB reported that after initial disapproval RCT Legal dept has now approved.

LH, JJ, MF and VD were thanked for an excellent piece of work.

Jenny McKinlay has also circulated ‘MCA 2005; the assessment of capacity’ to AWPDF members.

MCA capacity ‘crib sheet’ to be placed on AWDPFwebsite.

AWDPF to share practice experience after introduction of MCA in Oct in light of new emerging case law.

9.DP Trusts and Healthcare

Discussion about the availability of DPs through healthcare. JC advised that there is no NHS legal provision which allows individuals to receive cash payments. Primary legislation would be needed to enable this to happen. WAG is currently looking at outcomes of individualised budgets in England. However it is possible for health and SS to work in close partnership and transfer funding. Section 194 or 6 NH act allows money to be transferred between LA s and Trusts, but this can only be called a Direct Payment if it complies with DP legislation and is delivered by SSs.

DP Trusts in cases where the individual lacks capacity: Chris Walls and Steve Vaghan have produced guidance ‘the ability to manage’ which would be useful for the group.

JJ discussed the use of Indirect Payments with 2 or 3 trustees using an agent. ZW has discussed this with TBC Legal who advised her to seek advice from the forum. JC reminded the group that Indirect Payments use different powers and that care needs to be taken to use correct language. The group agreed it was important to share information as more people use trusts. The Friendly Trust has been set up in Cardiff to help PWLDs to set up wills and can use the same process to set up a DP. It is set up using the same costing and separate recording processes.

Request presentation for Sept meeting.

10. AOB:

10.1 Feedback from Survey

10.2 DP misinformation

10.3Support scheme network meetings

10.4All Wales contract and Commissioning conference

10.5DP Agreements

10.6 NLIAH website editing

Flintshire, Gwynedd, CardiffSwansea and Pembrokeshire participated in the survey. Flintshire reported that there was insufficient information on the survey. Staff from Pembrokeshire reported that they found it difficult to engage and some found the questionnaire repetitive and that the telephone interviewer didn’t understand about DPs.

There was a discussion about misinformation about Direct Payment by staff in the voluntary sector, and self advocacy groups particularly to PWLDS which raised false expectations about DP entitlement and the assessment process. RCT reported that this was causing unnecessary stress to SUs. JC commented that 1 example can often be used as a norm. It was acknowledged that

uniformity of assessed need eligibility criteria is an issue.

Dates of network meetings have been sent to TH. Minutes and papers should be circulated to AWDPF.

EJ fed back to members that info from conference indicates that NVQ training does not currently meet the needs of DP PA s. Joanne Bettridge from SSIA is working on agreements between DPSUs and SS. 6 LA s are meeting collectively to commission support from 1 agency and will share good practice to streamline provision.

ZW is looking at 5 different agreements to reflect different needs: Carers, parents, equipment, respite and one off payments.

EJ convenes MCA implementation group for Newport and advised the AWDPF that no volunteers have been identified to manage/edit the NLIAH website. It was acknowledged that a full time post is needed to manage all the forums. JC stated that this was an issue for SSIA to look at.

Anne Collis to report on outcome.

AWDPF members to take turns to attend.

JC to inform the SS network that an invitation to their next meeting must be sent to Terry Hacking and Minutes of meetings sent to TH

AWDPF members to bring agreements to Sept meeting.

Agree pooling of docs for Dec meeting.

Agenda for further discussion.

Date of Next Meeting

10.00 a.m. Sept 3rd 2007 at the Media Resource Centre, Llandrindod Wells.

N.B - Web address for hosted Direct Payments web site.