Part of 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:38 pm on 21 November 2018.
I think, Janet, that there are a number of things that we can do. In fact, when Sarah Rochira left post back in June, I think it was, we stood here in the Senedd and we made that commitment to actually making rights real for older people and we laid out a number of the ways in which we would do that. You’re right in saying this is not simply to do with the care setting: it’s every setting that a person will be in—in their own home, close to home, in a care setting—that makes them have a good quality of life and shows that their rights are respected.
So, some of the practical things that we said: our legislative framework there is underpinned by the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2016. We said that we would, with the new commissioner, Heléna Herklots, co-produce practical guidance that demonstrates how to make those UN principles real for older people. We would take some of our initial work and focus it on the commissioning of services for older people, on safeguarding in all environments and on advocacy, because these are areas we need to get right if we’re going to support all older people to have voice and control over their health and social care in whatever setting.
But we’re also going to do things within the care home setting as well. So, we will update the 2009 guidance—it’s been too long since we’ve looked at that—in terms of how we escalate concerns about care within care homes. We will take advice from the NHS centre for equality and human rights on how to embed human rights into NHS practice. We will, with Care Inspectorate Wales, build a narrative of human rights into care home inspection reports, in light of the earlier question, and many other aspects. One thing we said we would do with the new commissioner is to ask her to chair a working group for us on making those rights real, because it isn't simply about passing legislation, it's about making them bite.