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ITEMSP11(b)

SUPPORTING PEOPLE COMMISSIONING BODY – 16 DECEMBER 2005

Eligibility Criteria Consultation and our Response

This paper sets out how the Supporting People Team proposes to take forward the proposals to introduce a set of Eligibility Criteria which would provide a clear framework for making best use of the funds available for the programme in Oxfordshire.

It concludes the proposals approved for discussion in June by the Oxfordshire Supporting People Commissioning Body should be introduced but with the following amendments:

  • It should be made clearer the criteria will be applied using discretion, ensuring they support rather than obstruct the programme’s purpose of ensuring vulnerable people maintain or recover their independence
  • The number of hours of housing-related support need to be defined more clearly
  • A clear distinction should be drawn between staff hours spent in direct contact with service users and other related activities such as staff training, staff travel time in the course of work, etc
  • The bands set out in the original proposals are not appropriate for all services in the programme
  • Different bands need to be produced for some client-groups which are more appropriate to the range of hours required to support service users effectively now and in the future
  • Oxfordshire should not generally make activities completely ineligible to be funded from the Supporting People programme locally where these are not ineligible under the national rules of the programme
  • The 10% limit to be used on the proportion of staff time spent on activities described as "ancillary" to housing-related support should be increased
  • The proposals need to be amended to show Oxfordshire’s approach to two aspects of housing-related support –
    • How support delivered on a group, rather than 1:1 basis, will be treated in calculating hours of staff support received by individual service users
    • How night cover will be treated in calculating hours of support and levels of funding

Background

The Oxfordshire Supporting People Commissioning Body approved a draft set of eligibility criteria at its meeting on 29th June 2005 and agreed the Supporting People Team would arrange for these to be the subject of widespread public discussion before a revised set might be put to their meeting in December 2005.

During the months of July, August and September the Supporting People Team:

  • Published the proposals on the Internet on the Oxfordshire local area of the Government’s Supporting People knowledge web (www.spkweb.org) together with a response form for convenience – comments were encouraged in any format
  • Attended two meetings of the Oxfordshire Supporting People Providers Forum where the eligibility criteria were discussed with service providers
  • Organised an Oxfordshire Supporting People Inclusive Forum where the criteria were introduced, then discussed in workshops, and members of the Supporting People Team took detailed notes of all comments made by service users and carers, service providers, and advocacy organisations

The Supporting People Team asked people to let us have comments on the proposals by Friday 14th October 2005. A table is being produced showing:

  • All the comments received – in summary in some cases
  • Who made the comment
  • Whether we accept the comment or not – Yes or No
  • More generally how we respond to the comment

The Supporting People Team presented papers to the November meeting of the Core Strategy Group showing all comments received and who made them.

The Core Strategy Group agreed the Supporting People Team should circulate as soon as possible after the meeting its response to the comments.

The main groups of comments received are described below together with our responses.

Principles Broadly Supported or Not

The Supporting People Team encouraged people to tell us broadly how they felt about aspects of the proposals as well as to give us detailed comments about the proposals.

From analysis of the general comments it is clear respondents felt:

  • It is helpful to have a set of eligibility criteria
  • It is helpful to have a table showing the sort of activities the programme aims to fund
  • It is helpful for people to have an idea what is meant by the terms "low", "medium" and "high" in relation to housing-related support
  • Services should not generally receive funding above the level of £360 per person per week

It is also clear respondents disagreed with using the same definitions of "low", "medium" and "high" in relation to all client-groups

Finally, it is clear there was no consensus on two aspects of the proposals:

  • Respondents were not convinced 12 hours per person per week was an appropriate upper level for the hours of housing-related support per person per week to be funded from the programme in Oxfordshire – nor were they clear how this figure was to be calculated
  • Respondents did not believe the limit of £360 per person per week should be applied rigidly – or indeed other aspects of the proposals

Comments on the Detail of the Proposals

Respondents made many detailed comments on the proposals which have been very helpful and we are grateful for the time and trouble many people have devoted to this.

Night Cover

In the original proposals the Supporting People Team acknowledged there was likely to be a need to modify the proposals in relation to bandings to deal with services where staff are employed to work during the hours most service users are asleep.

We acknowledged such arrangements were often essential to effective delivery of housing-related support, but we also acknowledged these arrangements might seriously distort calculation of direct contact time with service users and numbers of hours of housing-related support delivered per person per week.

During the discussions, many comments were made agreeing these arrangements did not fit well with the original proposals but no suggestions were made as to how the proposals could be amended.

We therefore propose to set our own adjustments to take account of these arrangements and ask service providers to comment on these within a very tight timescale.

Hours

The Supporting People Team became aware during the discussions on the proposals of weaknesses. In particular, it was not clear how the number of hours of housing-related support per person per week were to be calculated.

We propose to make the proposals as simple as possible. Service providers are currently required to report quarterly on the number of hours of support they have delivered and on the number of service users they have supported.

We therefore propose to:

  • Use the same definition of support hours which the Government has laid down must be used in these quarterly performance reports.
  • Set a ratio we believe appropriate for the balance between the number of hours which staff should generally spend in direct contact with service users compared with the total number of support hours for which they are employed
  • Ask service providers to comment within a very tight timescale on the balance to be set as no specific suggestions on this were made in the course of discussions of the original proposals
  • Express the number of hours of contact with support staff which a service user might expect on average each week so no distinction is made between 1:1 contact and group work as we recognise some kinds of support can be delivered effectively to more than one person at a time
  • Require service providers in the course of contract monitoring to give us figures for:
    • The balance between the number of hours which their staff have spent in direct contact with service users compared with the total number of support hours for which they have been employed
    • The number of hours of contact with support staff which service users have experienced on average each week
  • Not to require all service providers to record either of these last two items continuously but to expect all service providers to show some evidence for their figures

Bandings

We propose in the light of what has been said to put forward different bandings for different client-groups and to invite comment on these within a very tight timescale.

Learning from other Supporting People partnerships

Our original proposals were based on similar exercises carried out by Supporting People teams – in particular, the Staffordshire and Wiltshire eligibility criteria.

Respondents were concerned we should base our own proposals firmly on experiences elsewhere. We have reviewed our own proposals and have been impressed in particular by the Lincolnshire criteria which deal more effectively than most others with the distinction between housing-related support and aspects of accommodation and housing management which should be funded from gross rent rather than the Supporting People programme.

We have therefore amended our own proposals to make use of our Lincolnshire colleagues work and are happy to acknowledge our debt to them.

Flexibility

Many respondents wished to see the criteria applied flexibly and with discretion. We believe the proposals need to be amended to make clear this is – and indeed was always – our intention.

However some respondents wished to see no restriction at all on the purposes for which Supporting People funding could be used. The legal requirements of the programme mean we cannot possibly accept this.

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