England's health and social care watchdog requires substantial overhaul and is currently inadequate, according to Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who has promised swift measures to regain public trust. Mr Streeting was reacting to an independent review into the Care Quality Commission (CQC), the body that monitors and inspects all health and adult social care providers. The review highlighted major internal deficiencies within the CQC that hinder its capability to detect substandard performance in hospitals, care homes, and GP practices. Report by Covellm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00What's wrong with the CQC?
00:02What we've seen is an utterly damning indictment on the regulator that's meant to safeguard
00:10patient standards and safety in health and in social care settings and whether it's
00:16one in five health and care providers not having received a rating or the fact that
00:21we've seen hospitals not being inspected for over a decade or unqualified inspectors
00:28and inexperienced inspectors being sent into health and care settings with little experience
00:32of the issues that they're confronted with. This is I think a stunning failure and speaks
00:39to the culture of a conspiracy of silence and brushing things under the carpet that
00:45we ended up with under the last government because if they were honest about the scale
00:48of the challenge they'd have to be held accountable for their own failures. We've published
00:54this in the interim report today because we've got to move quickly making sure the
00:58CQC has the right permanent leadership, making sure the public are informed in a very honest
01:05and transparent way about the failures and the lack of confidence we have in the ratings
01:09that the CQC has provided and also providing people with that reassurance that we're
01:13going to move quickly to turn the situation around.
01:16Is this about money and resources or is this about management?
01:21I think fundamentally the failure at the CQC has been a failure of culture and that culture
01:26was set right from the top by the previous government which was content to brush things
01:30under the carpet rather than be honest with people about the true extent of the scale
01:34of the challenge in both NHS and in social care. That's why we've got to have the
01:40right leadership in place and it's why we need to change the culture and practice within
01:44the organisation and there are some good people in the CQC, expert people who have
01:49come forward and given us the evidence, very courageously given us the evidence that we
01:53needed to turn the ship around. The reason we've published this interim report today
01:59is because this is urgent and I want to be honest with the public straight away and I
02:04also want to make sure that we get the right leadership in as a matter of urgency and the
02:09way we will do that is by being honest with potential candidates about the scale of the
02:12challenge but also reassure them that this isn't going to be a government that brushes
02:16things under the carpet and we will give them full support to deliver the radical reform
02:20that the CQC requires. Do you have any idea how long it's going to be before patients
02:24can trust what they are told about the health services they're using? One of the reasons
02:29I've published this interim report today is I think patients looking on the CQC website
02:35or families looking for a care provider should take the current ratings with a pinch of salt
02:40and one of the urgent things I've asked the CQC to do is to put more information alongside
02:45those ratings about how the rating came about so people can make informed choices as soon
02:49as possible. It is going to take time to turn the regulator and indeed our NHS and social
02:55care system around. In the meantime, honesty is the best policy and I want to reassure
03:00people that I'm working quickly to get the right leadership in place and that's why I've
03:05chosen to publish the interim report today before the full report is published after
03:10the summer. Just a few other issues then. On Monday we're expecting to hear from the
03:15Chancellor the full scale of the public sector financing challenges. You were warned before
03:21the election that you couldn't just come in and say oh look we've opened the books and
03:25it's worse than we thought. You knew how bad it would be didn't you? We knew ahead of the
03:29election that an incoming Labour government would face the worst economic inheritance
03:33since the Second World War because of the catastrophic mismanagement of the economy
03:37under the previous government. What we didn't anticipate was that having come in that we
03:43would see the degree to which the previous government spent taxpayers' money left, right
03:49and centre, splurging cash the government didn't have, presenting us with really difficult
03:54in-year choices too. The Chancellor will set out her position on Monday. I'm not going
04:00to pre-empt that but people can see with Rachel Reeves that she is someone who does
04:05not duck difficult decisions. There are hard choices ahead and she's going to be honest
04:09with the country about those choices, how she's handling them and she will have the
04:14support of the entire Cabinet as she does that because these aren't just Rachel Reeves
04:18difficult choices, these are our tough choices too and we're going to work together as a
04:22team to rebuild our economy, rebuild public services and also rebuild trust in politics.
04:28A couple of other hard choices that you're going to be facing soon. Is the government
04:33going to give time to an Assisted Dying Bill?
04:36I think Assisted Dying is a debate whose time has come and I welcome Charlie Faulconer bringing
04:41the debate forward in the House of Lords. This will be a free vote. MPs and peers will
04:46be free to vote however they like and this is a difficult debate because it involves
04:51really big moral and ethical choices as well as really practical considerations about how
04:56Assisted Dying could work in practice and that's why it's so important that Parliament
05:00has the time and the space to debate those issues and the Prime Minister set out before
05:05the general election that he would give that time for this debate which I think needs to
05:10not just be our debate in Parliament but needs to be a wide-ranging public debate too.
05:14At some point soon you're going to have to make a decision on whether to ban the use
05:18of puberty blockers in this country. What are you minded to do? What's your current position?
05:24It is so important to me that trans people receive access to high quality health care
05:30that meets their needs and that when it comes to young people in particular who have issues
05:35with their gender identity that they receive really good quality and evidence-based care.
05:41The CAS review which was a really wide-ranging expert review led by one of our country's
05:46leading paediatricians said that the prescription of puberty blockers, there wasn't enough
05:52evidence about the long-term impact of the use of these drugs for this purpose and that
05:58we needed more evidence and that's why a clinical trial is going to be stood up and why I think
06:02it is right, especially when it concerns health care for children, that we tread cautiously.
06:09That's what I'm doing. I will always follow the evidence. I will always put patients and
06:14patient safety first and I will resist political pressure actually on either side of these
06:20arguments and be guided by the evidence because I think that's what the public would expect
06:24of me and that's the right thing to do.
06:26Just a couple more issues on petrol pricing. Do you think people, does the government think
06:30people are being ripped off for petrol?
06:33Speaking as a motorist myself, I want to know that when I go to the pump I'm paying a fair
06:37price and that where there are savings to be made because of market conditions changing,
06:44I want those savings to be passed on to all of us at the pump. What the CMA have published
06:49is concerning and the Energy Secretary will be reviewing the CMA's report and recommendations
06:56and will be coming forward with his response shortly.
06:59And finally, would the government support the London Mayor in bidding for the Olympics
07:04to come to London in 2040?
07:06I love the Olympics and when the Olympics and Paralympics came to London it was probably
07:11one of my happiest times. As a Londoner, I can't speak for the Culture and Sports Secretary
07:18who probably won't games in Wigan but more seriously, let's just really remember we've got
07:25a very difficult backdrop in our country at the moment, both in terms of the economy and
07:29the state of the public finances with tough choices to be made.
07:32So this is not something that we are seriously looking at. We have got commitments to host
07:37a wide range of competitions. We will do that well, we always do as a country but in terms
07:42of taking on new commitments, we've just got to, in a very sober way, before we get carried away
07:47by the Paris Olympics spirit, just bear in mind that here at home we've got difficult,
07:52tough choices to make around the public finances and the economy and that's got to drive our decisions.