Swansea publishes plans to outsource social services

The City and County of Swansea has drawn up plans to outsource its adult social services department, with hopes that a 'social enterprise' will take over services.

It has published a document to gauge interest in among firms in running all these services from April 2012.

Liberal Democrat cabinet member for social services Nick Tregoning said he hoped the service would be taken on by a social enterprise but the Labour opposition has attacked the idea as being privatisation.

Cllr Tregoning told BBC Wales that saving money was a factor but not “the main driving factor” in developing the proposals.

“We're interested in pursing a social enterprise model which will benefit the staff, benefit the clients and, yes, will provide better value for money,” he said.

“As part of that, we are obliged under EU rules to ensure that we have carried out due diligence and looked at every possible aspect of this. We're not the only authority that's going down this route.”

A business case is expected to go to the cabinet in the New Year.