DH plans "proportionate" regulation of health and social care professions

The government has announced plans to reform the regulatory framework governing the 1.4m people who work in the health and social care professions, in a bid to make it proportionate and effective.

Justifying the move, the government said the current system was “increasingly complex and expensive, and requires continual government intervention to keep it up to date”.

The Department of Health said any new regime should impose the least possible costs and complexity, while maintaining safety and confidence for patients, service users, carers and the wider public.

It insisted that the vast majority of those working in health and social care were “committed individuals with a strong sense of professionalism who aspire to deliver the highest standards”.

But the Department added that it was vital that swift action was taken – whether by employers or national regulatory bodies – where there was poor practice or behaviour that presented a risk to the public.

Under the DH’s Enabling Excellence proposals:

• Power will be devolved to the regulators, “while enhancing accountability and sustaining effective national safeguards where necessary”
• Growth and costs of the regulatory system will be constrained "at a time when health and social work professionals are facing pay constraints"
• A system of assured voluntary registration will be developed as a more proportionate approach to ensuring high standards in the workforce, and
• The regulatory structure will be simplified.

The government said that devolving powers to regulators would give them greater freedom to define their own processes without approval from the Privy Council or the Department of Health. At the moment every time the rules are changed – in relation to registration, investigation and complaints – the government has to get involved.

Voluntary assured registration meanwhile was “intended to improve standards and drive up the quality of care without imposing the costs of mandatory regulation”.

The Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence (CHRE) will be asked to set the standards for registers and accredit organisations meeting its standards. “That way, the public and employers would be able to easily identify whether a worker belongs to a register that sets robust standards for those registered,” the DH said.

The Department added that it intended to incentivise employers to use workers on voluntary registers. “In future, local authority commissioners could give preference to providers using workers on voluntary registers,” it suggested. “This could be taken into account in the ‘excellence rating’ that the CQC will shortly be consulting on.”

The government insisted that its abolition of the General Social Care Council was part of a wider programme of social care reform which would deliver a more independent model of regulation and strengthen the social work profession.

The CHRE is also to become more independent and self-funding.

Presenting Enabling Excellence to Parliament, Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: “Regulation of healthcare workers and social workers makes an important contribution to safeguarding the public, including vulnerable adults and children. But we need an approach to professional regulation that is proportionate and effective.

“The changes we are progressing through the Health and Social Care Bill will give greater independence to those who work in healthcare across the UK and social care in England, to their employers and to the professional regulatory bodies. This will be balanced by more effective accountability in how they exercise that freedom.”

The government has tasked the Law Commission with running the reform project. It is expected to report in 2014 with a view to new legislative proposals being consulted on before the end of the current Parliament.

Frances Patterson QC, Law Commissioner for Public Law, said: “The existing legislative landscape has developed piecemeal over the years, leaving the law fragmented, difficult to access and inefficient. The legal framework is an impediment to the freedom that the regulators need to improve their performance, cost effectiveness and service to the public, rather than an enhancement.”

Patterson added that the Law Commission would aim to modernise and simplify the law to create a single over-arching structure within which the regulators can work.

The Health Secretary also announced that herbal medicine practitioners would be regulated from April 2012.