The Supporting People Programme - Communities and Local Government Committee Contents


Memorandum from Hyde Group (SPP 37)

1.0  INTRODUCTION

  1.1  The Hyde Group (Hyde) welcomed the introduction of Supporting People (SP) and its evolution. We believe it has been an extremely successful programme in extending high quality, outcome focussed, preventative support services to a far greater number of vulnerable people.

  1.2  However, our submission highlights a number of concerns in its delivery. These are as follows:

    1.2.1The uneasy role of sheltered housing in the Supporting People programme;

    1.2.2The disincentives for landlords of supported housing to continue to manage or develop new schemes;

    1.2.3The continued attempts by commissioners to drive down costs;

    1.2.4And the wasteful procurement methods chosen by most local authorities.

2.0  SUMMARY

  2.1  Supporting People has been a very effective programme in extending the reach of support services to a wider group of vulnerable people; in raising the quality of support services; in empowering customers; in evidencing the efficacy of services and in saving public money by investing in preventative work

  2.2  It has however failed to address the differing support needs of older people and to spread funding equably between those elders living in specialist sheltered accommodation and in the wider community.

  2.3  Supporting People has discouraged the development of new capital supported provision as it has increased the risk for developing housing associations and acts as a disincentive to their commitment to existing capital provision.

  2.4  We have concerns about the continued efforts by some commissioners to drive down costs as we think this will affect the quality of services and our ability to innovate

  2.5  Hyde sees itself as having a strong partnership with local authorities and feedback supports this view.

  2.6  We think it inevitable that some preventative services will be lost as a result of the removal of the ring fence and have already seen evidence to this effect, but are focussing on the new opportunities for joint funded services

  2.7  As a major provider, we are producing more efficient and cost effective services but the bureaucracy attached to the procurement methods chosen by most of our partner local authorities is significant and costly.

3.0  KEEPING PEOPLE THAT NEED SERVICES AT THE HEART OF THE PROGRAMME

  3.1  The commissioning of both large scale and smaller, specialist floating support services, funded by SP, has enabled support services to be spread to a far wider number of vulnerable people living in the community, regardless of tenure. Providing services to people beyond those living in specialist supported and sheltered accommodation remains one of the triumphs of the Supporting People programme.

  3.2  It is, however, worth noting that most local authority's budget for older people is focussed on those living in specific sheltered accommodation. This means that there are numbers of people living in designated sheltered accommodation who neither want nor need support services, whilst there are many others, both in designated accommodation and in the community, who need much higher levels of support. We feel strongly that this is a poor use of scarce resources, and would welcome the re-opening of the debate about the role of sheltered housing and ensuring those that those older people who most need support receive it.

  3.3  We believe there is still a lack of clarity about the role of sheltered housing. Traditionally, tenants moved into sheltered schemes because they needed the accommodation and valued the security of what was usually a resident "warden". They did not necessarily need support. As a large provider of sheltered housing, we are now under pressure from tenants and external activists who are initiating legal action to force providers to retain the traditional "warden" role, preferably residential. However, as noted above, not all tenants need or want this service and Supporting People funding is insufficient to fund this service. Our 40 sheltered housing schemes all run at a deficit on support funding.

  3.4  One of the great successes of Supporting People is its focus on keeping service users at the heart of the programme. Through use of the Quality Assessment Framework and review programme, service users are far more engaged in and consulted on the services they receive. This has resulted in a step change in expectations of customer involvement and control which will also facilitate the use of Individual Budgets. It has also radically lifted standards of support throughout the sector.

  3.5  The growth of Home Improvement Agencies, funded partly by SP, has been able to allow services to reach a far greater number of older & disabled people living in the community. Hyde has agencies throughout Kent, Hampshire and in Sussex and we know from customer feedback that these services are greatly valued. In particular, the work carried out by handy people fitting aids and adaptations make an enormous difference to older and disabled peoples' lives.

  3.6  We have been able to evidence the efficacy of our housing related support through the development of a bespoke database. This enables us to analyse and report on the progress that our service users make in key areas.

  3.7  Supporting People has been extremely effective in funding preventative services that significantly reduce the need for more expensive and intensive interventions. It has allowed the commissioning of large scale floating support services throughout the country which providers like Hyde can run with significant savings to the Supporting People pot. There remains the need to address the issue of how Individual Budgets will work within the context of large-scale block contracts that have enabled significant cost savings to be made.

  3.8  Some work has been done to address the unequal spread of support provision throughout the country, particularly of accommodation based services, although far more work is needed on this. However, there are extreme disincentives for housing associations to continue to develop new schemes where they are needed.

  3.9  There is no guarantee that the developing landlord will secure the contract for support, which is contracted separately. Developing large new supported or sheltered capital schemes is increasingly seen by housing associations as too risky without the guarantee of the revenue funding stream. The support provider commissioned to deliver the service in our building which we have had no part in appointing could be sub-standard, which impacts both on our tenants' satisfaction and has a knock-on effect on our housing management performance. The service could be decommissioned leaving vulnerable tenants without support.

4.0  ENHANCING PARTNERSHIP WITH THE THIRD SECTOR

  4.1  "Independence and Opportunity" rightly identifies the critical role the third sector has played in setting up and delivering services for vulnerable people. The ability of the third sector to continue to play this role depends greatly on several factors; the first is the stance of the local authority in wishing to keep a diverse provider market. Although most express the rhetoric, we are aware that some of the commissioners with whom we work are less keen that others to put this into action. There is a tension that needs to be acknowledged between awarding a tender to a "safe pair of hands"—a larger provider with strong infrastructure which incurs a cost, and a small local provider without that infrastructure and overheads who can produce cheaper services.

  4.2  "Independence and Opportunity" states that there is an expectation that the commissioner should meet "the full costs and reasonable overheads" associated with the contract. In our experience, most commissioners meet this obligation; however, one or two choose to haggle over our overheads. In one case, this involved a forensic examination of our overheads item by item and expressions of willingness to pay for some items but not others. We have also noticed that a couple of our local authorities have requested a Performance Bond as a condition of tendering for new revenue business. We consider this a retrograde step; whilst it is common when developing new capital funded schemes, it shifts a further element of risk to the provider for revenue funded business and we think this is unacceptable.

  4.3  As noted earlier, commissioners and providers have been able to drive down costs of support services. For providers like Hyde, this has been possible through securing economies of scale on large contracts, in changing our terms and conditions for staff and through efficiencies including mobile working. However, there is a limit to how low costs can be driven and we are concerned that our service quality will be adversely affected if costs are reduced any further. We are proud of our ability to innovate and use the small margin we achieve on services to fund this. As margins are driven lower and lower, our ability to innovate for the benefit of our service users will disappear.

  4.4  Overall, we feel that, we play a full role in supporting the local authorities with whom we work and demonstrate initiative in working with local authorities on our services to innovate and produce better outcomes for our clients. A recent survey we commissioned from Campbell Tickell of our commissioners' views of Hyde's support services produced exceptionally positive responses: "Commissioners see Hyde as an innovative, problem solving and engaged provider."

5.0  DELIVERING IN THE NEW LOCAL GOVERNMENT LANDSCAPE

  5.1  The majority (fifteen) of the local authorities with whom we work have selected National Indicator 141 or 142 which relate to short and long term support services respectively. It is clear from their choice of other NIs that they are continuing to prioritise the major groups of vulnerable people; people with learning disabilities, mental ill health and so on.

  5.2  It is too soon to consider the effect of the loss of the ring fence for Supporting People. Providers' fears, that funding for preventative work will leach into social care budgets remain high. One of the south London boroughs with whom we work has already begun the process and is effectively bypassing their SP team. We are sure that this situation will be replicated elsewhere in time. On the other hand, we work with a number of "excellent" authorities who have already been released from the SP ring fence and these have continued to support and fund preventative services. As a large provider of support, we are aware which of the different authorities with whom we work are more able to protect their preventative services and are more willing to fight off attempts to raid the SP budget. Our own focus at Hyde is to explore the forthcoming opportunities in joint commissioned services to extend services away from the strict definitions of SP eligibility which can be restrictive in giving our service users what they need. We know from client feedback that more flexible services would be welcome.

6.0  INCREASING EFFICIENCY AND REDUCING BUREAUCRACY

  6.1   Hyde was successful in winning a large Supporting People funded floating support contract in Essex, one of the Value Improvement Projects. We have found it an excellent experience, marked by effective joint working and a genuine sense of partnership which achieves the best outcomes for service users.

  6.2   Hyde is committed to increased efficiency. We have achieved this is through the development of IT solutions to enable mobile working, with staff using blackberries and laptops to complete case notes for our support database. The database enables us to evidence outcomes for both our commissioners and for service users themselves, who can view the progress they are making in key areas.

  6.3   We believe that the bureaucracy in tendering for new business is too overbearing. Whilst an EU requirement, we are disappointed that our commissioners seem unwilling to consider the wider range of procurement methods when letting contracts. Our experience is that local authorities almost always "play safe" and employ a full tendering exercise even for contracts of small monetary value. In addition, where the local authority's Procurement department drive the exercise rather than Supporting People, the specification can be quite mystifying as they do not understand what they want to achieve. In some cases, this has resulted in so much bafflement by providers that the whole tender has been withdrawn, inevitably after a significant amount of aborted work has been carried out. At Hyde, we have had to increase our new business team from one to four.

  6.4   There are further areas where bureaucracy could be decreased; the first is in the accreditation exercise all providers of SP services must complete. The other is, following the development of the refreshed QAF, one of the local authorities with whom we work has declared it is going to stay with the old version. This will in effect mean that we and other providers are preparing for two different assessments. Both of these situations could be easily remedied by a directive from the CLG that local authorities use standard methodologies.

7.0  CONCLUSION

  7.1  Hyde welcomed the introduction of Supporting People and its evolution. We believe it has been an extremely successful programme in extending high quality, outcome focussed, preventative support services to a far greater number of vulnerable people. However, our submission highlights a number of concerns that we have in how the programme is delivered.

8.0  NOTES

  8.1  The Hyde Group is one of England's largest housing associations owning and managing more than 40,000 properties in London and the south east.

  8.2  Through a charitable subsidiary, in touch, Hyde has £11 million+ Supporting People funded contracts. This provides accommodation based, floating support and Home Improvement Agency services to over 5,000 people in a total of 18 administering authorities.

May 2009






 
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