You can find out more about the programme along with a link to the consultation information on our Future Proofing Programme page on this website.
Overview of the response
The consultation ran for 12 weeks from 20 December 2021 until 14 March 2022.
Over 6,500 people responded to the consultation, including people on all parts of the Register, along with others with an interest in our work.
We ran 13 online events during the consultation that 265 people attended and we also met with key stakeholders from the sector.
- 91% of responses were from registrants.
- 777 identified as employers or service providers.
- 243 identified as someone who acts for a person who uses social services.
- 39 responses from people who use social services.
- Most respondents agree with proposals.
You can read the analysis of the Register for the future responses here.
Areas for further analysis
While respondents agreed with most of the proposals, there were two key areas with less support as below.
Public facing Register information
We asked about showing more information on the searchable public Register on our website including:
- level of role
- whether a registrant has the qualification for their role
- whether there is a fitness to practise warning and/or condition (we currently publish this information on our website but it’s not linked to the public facing Register entry)
- whether a registrant holds a specialist qualification such as a mental health officer award or a practice teaching award.
Between 51-62% of responses from registrants, individuals, employers/service providers, service users, carers, organisations who represent people who use social services/carers and other organisations supported this proposal.
This contrasts with other proposals which had much higher support, for example, whether to reduce the number of Register parts, where 88% of respondents from these groups agreed. However, service user and carer respondents expressed higher levels of support for this proposal.
Most submissions from organisations represented on our Stakeholder Advisory Group (SAG) didn’t agree with this proposal. Their concerns focused on registrant privacy and the potential for inappropriate use of the information. None of the respondents agreed that the public Register should show fitness to practise warnings and conditions.
Adult social care qualifications
We asked questions in the consultation about whether:
- to set the qualification requirement for support workers in housing support services and care at home services at SCQF level 7
- we should introduce an additional Register part for practitioners at SCQF level 7 to allow employers to decide what level is most appropriate.
Between 59-66% of responses to this proposal from registrants, individuals, employers/service providers, service users, carers, organisations who represent people who use social services/carers and other organisations agreed.
Between 50-78% of housing support and care at home staff responding to this proposal agreed.
All respondents to questions about the adult social care qualifications from care at home and housing support Register parts agreed with the proposal to introduce a new Register part for practitioners at SCQF level 7. Although there was majority agreement with changes to the qualification level, it was not significantly over 50% for each category of housing support and care at home registrant.
Most responses from our SAG members did not agree with our proposals, setting out concerns relating to support workers in these settings gaining the necessary evidence to meet the SCQF 7 requirements, the financial impact on both workers paying for the qualification and potential issues for salary increases related to a higher level of qualification.
What happens next?
Over the summer we will run workshops with our SAG and other stakeholders to explore their views and to better understand their specific concerns about qualification levels and the information we present on the public Register to inform the proposals.
Once this work is complete, we aim to finalise the proposals to go to our Council for decision in November 2022.