To receive the submitted report setting out achievement in relation to adult social care and outline of performance for last financial year and commitment to future service delivery.

Members considered the submitted report setting out the second Local Account for Adult Social Care.  The Local Account highlighted what had been achieved for local people in relation to adult social care, details of the multi agency approach to adult safeguarding, the level of performance for the last financial year and commitment to future service delivery.

It was proposed by Councillor Scouler and seconded by Councillor Lewis:

that, the Local Account in Appendix 1 of the submitted report, which sets out performance for 2012-13 and sets out intentions for the Annual Strategic Agreement for services for 2014-15, be approved and that the multi agency safeguarding report, set out in Appendix 2, to the submitted report, be approved.

On being put to the vote the motion was declared carried.

To consider the draft Local Account for adult social care in Torbay and make any comments to the Council.

The Board considered the Adult Social Care Local Account for 2012/2013 which provided a variety of qualitative and quantitative information framed around the key outcomes that the NHS and the Council agreed at the start of the year.

The purpose of the Local Account was to review the performance and achievements of the past 12 months and to set the context for the new financial year, helping to shape the debate and requirements of the next Annual Strategic Agreement between the Council and the Torbay and Southern Devon Health and Care NHS Trust (the Trust).

In considering the draft Local Account, the Board raised a number of specific comments (for example, in relation to qualifying the percentages quoted throughout the document).

The Board noted that throughout the year, it had focussed on how organisations were working together to reduce the demand for acute services especially in light of the growing ageing population in Torbay.  It was recognised that the Local Account also highlighted how the Trust was taking account of these issues.

The Board welcomed the openness and transparency with which the Trust operated especially when public confidence in the health and care sector is low.  It welcomed the initiatives which had been put in place to ensure that standards within Torbay continue to improve especially given the increasing pressures through increasing numbers of clients and reducing public sector finances.

The Health Scrutiny Board had previously considered the Quality Accounts from the local NHS Trusts with whom it worked.  This had enabled councillors to see how the priorities and work of each Trust are very much inter-dependent and, given the reducing availability of resources in the public sector, the Board would seek to ensure that all Trusts continue to work together to improve the health and care outcomes for the whole of the Torbay community.

Resolved:  that a commentary from the Health Scrutiny Board, based on the comments highlighted during the debate, be prepared for inclusion in the published version of the Local Account.