The Scottish Government has now decided to proceed with the Bill as originally drafted, despite many concerns expressed by stakeholders.
The most sensible option of scrapping the Bill altogether and starting again has been rejected. Whether it is even possible or not for the scale of revision required to create a final piece of legislation which is fit for purpose is possible via the proposed legislative process is beyond our expertise. It is not clear to us that it is even possible to make this legislation fit for purpose given the legislative approach taken by the Scottish Government.
For this reason we can only condemn the process so far and comment on the final outcome which Common Weal hopes to see for this legislation. We strongly supports care remaining the responsibility of local authorities, believe this will help reduce the set-up costs of a NCS and believe the Scottish Government’s agreement with COSLA is a step forward. We continue to have serious concerns about the proposed tripartite structure for the NCS. We don’t believe Care Boards should be based on the current Integrated Joint Board structure which has failed to improve how resources are used and overseen the collapse in care services. Instead, each Local Authority in Scotland should set up a local Care Board which would function as a committee of that authority. This would retain local democratic control and allow further devolution to local communities where care users, unpaid carers, staff, the third sector could become more involved.
We are very concerned, however, that the agreement on the need to change the proposed structure of the NCS and the implications this has for parliamentary processes will distract stakeholders from what we regard as other equally serious weaknesses in the NCS Bill. This briefing will therefore cover what we regard as the other main failings/gaps in the draft NCS Bill in the belief that these also deserve to be considered during the Stage 1 debate and must inform its outcome.