During an assessment under our new approach
Date of Assessment: 27 February to 27 March 2025. The service is a supported living service providing support to people with a learning disability and autistic people, as well as those living with mental health and sensory needs.
The provider supported people to live in single and multiple shared houses across Gloucestershire. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. As part of this assessment, CQC visited 8 supported living houses where some people received personal care. We visited some of the supported living houses out of hours to ensure we gained an enriched assessment of how people lived their lives.
We assessed the service against ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ guidance to make judgements about whether the provider guaranteed people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices, independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted.
Right support: People’s care was centred on their support needs and wishes. People were given information in an accessible way to support choice and decision-making. Staff supported people to maximise their choice, control and independence. People’s risks had been assessed to meet their needs.
Right care: We observed friendly engagement between staff and people who used the service. Staff treated people with warmth, kindness and respect. Care was person-centred and promoted people’s dignity, privacy and human rights. Staff had been safely recruited. Most staff had received the provider’s mandatory and specialist training and supervisions to assist them to carry out their role and to understand and respond to people’s needs.
Right culture: There was a positive and open culture across the service. People and staff felt confident in raising any concerns and felt their views would be acted on. The service had 3 registered managers who shared the oversight and running of the service. The registered managers were supported by service managers who were responsible for the management of a small number of houses. The designated service manager and core staff team managed the day to day running of each house.
The management team led with confidence and by example which helped to embed the values of the provider. Policies and systems were in place to provide guidance to staff and to help monitor the quality of the service. Some of the provider’s auditing systems needed further development to ensure they were effective in identifying and addressing any shortfalls, especially around the safety of people’s houses. Managers were open to our feedback and were keen to further develop their quality monitoring systems. Leaders worked well in partnership with other professionals to deliver good outcomes. Legal and regulatory requirements were met.