The Care Quality Commission
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Kirklees Shared Lives

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

Civic Centre 3, High Street, Huddersfield, HD1 2TG (01484) 221000

Provided and run by:
Kirklees Metropolitan Council

Important: This service was previously registered at a different address - see old profile

All Inspections

During an assessment under our new approach

Dates of Assessment: 3 August to 20 August 2026. We visited the office on 3 August 2026 and visited some people's homes on 5 August 2026. The service is a shared lives scheme. A shared lives scheme recruit, train and support self-employed shared lives carers who offer accommodation and support arrangements for people within their own family homes. This includes long term placements, short breaks and respite care.The service was registered to support people with a range of needs, including people with a learning disability and autistic people, who formed the majority of people using the service at the time of our assessment.

Not everyone who used the service received personal care. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. This is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. At the time of our inspection, the service were supporting 15 people who received personal care.

Kirklees Shared Lives is a service which provides highly personalised, relationship-based care that enabled people to live fulfilling lives and achieve outcomes that were important to them. People benefited from living within family environments where they were treated with kindness, compassion and respect. Carers knew people exceptionally well and demonstrated a detailed understanding of their individual needs, preferences, aspirations and life histories.

The provider was particularly strong in assessing people's needs and matching them with carers who could meet their individual requirements and support them to achieve their goals. Matching arrangements were carefully planned and considered people's wishes, relationships, interests and long-term aspirations. This helped people develop meaningful relationships and experience a genuine sense of belonging within their Shared Lives households and communities.

People were supported to develop confidence, independence and life skills. We saw examples of people achieving significant outcomes, including securing employment, learning to travel independently, pursuing career ambitions, maintaining important relationships and progressing towards more independent living arrangements. Carers worked effectively with families, healthcare professionals and other agencies to ensure people received coordinated support and positive outcomes.

There was a strong culture of compassion, inclusion and commitment to improving people's lives. Carers spoke passionately about the people they supported and demonstrated a genuine commitment to helping them achieve their aspirations. Leaders had also introduced a number of improvements to strengthen assessment processes, matching arrangements and support for carers.
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.
We found the provider was meeting the principles of Right support, right care, right culture. For example, they ensured people were able to make informed choices, promoted independence and were actively involved in the local community. Care was person-centred and tailored to people’s individual needs.
However, improvements were required in relation to medicines management and governance. Medicines were not always administered in line with prescribing instructions and medicines records were not always accurate or complete. We also found gaps in medicines-related documentation. Governance and auditing processes had not identified these issues, and oversight of specialist medicines training and competency assessments was not always effective.

The provider took immediate action in response to our findings and there was no evidence of harm to people. Further work is needed to strengthen medicines management, quality assurance systems and oversight arrangements.

17 January 2018

During a routine inspection

This inspection took place on 17 January 2018 and was announced. We contacted the shared lives carers on 19 and 22 January 2018. The service had previously been inspected on 9 August 2016 under its former name Highfields. At the time of our last inspection the service had moved locations to this address and was in the process of registering the new location. The service changed its name at the same time from Highfields to Kirklees Shared Lives. At the last inspection the service had been rated good and there were no breaches in the legal requirements.

Kirklees Shared Lives is a shared lives placement service, which recruits and supports paid carers to provide family based placements for adults with learning disabilities within the carer's home. Placements can be long-term with the adult living with the carer as part of their family, or as respite care which can range from a few hours a week, overnight or longer stays. On some occasions the service can provide an emergency service offering placements to people who find themselves in a crisis situation. At the time of our inspection there were 95 people referred to the scheme and there were 39 shared lives carers providing long term support and 40 providing short term breaks. Office based staff consisted of the registered manager, two and a half social work posts, two senior shared lives officers and two shared lives officer posts.

There was a registered manager in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

Staff and shared lives carers had received training in how to keep people safe. They understood how to ensure people were safeguarded against abuse and they knew the procedure to follow to report any incidents.

Risks had been assessed and reduced to the lowest level possible. Where appropriate positive risk assessments were in place to support people to develop new skills.

There had been very few accidents and incidents. The registered manager had analysed these to ensure the likelihood of future incidents were reduced.

People are supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff support them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service support this practice. The service met the requirements of the Mental Capacity Act and ensured people's mental capacity to consent was assessed in line with best practice. Decisions were made in people’s best interests as required.

Staff received regular training to ensure they developed skills and knowledge to perform their role and received regular on-going supervision and an appraisal to support their development. New staff and shared lives carers completed the Care Certificate which included observations in their role.

The relatives of people using the service all told us the service was excellent and were happy with the care and support provided to their relative. The shared lives carers we spoke with during our inspection all spoke passionately about the value of the service supporting people in a family environment which ensured they had this human right preserved. They spoke to us with warmth and affection about the people they cared for and considered them as part of their family.

The service had a complaints policy in place although there had not been any complaints. Shared lives carers knew how to complain but they told us they had not needed to use the policy.

Staff told us they were supported in their role. They spoke of a positive culture, where they were supported with training and development. They influenced the delivery of the service by contributing to the team plan.

Regular meetings were held at the service for staff and the team held engagement events with shared lives carers to keep them involved with developments.

The service was undergoing a review at the time of the inspection in line with national shared lives guidance and a report was due in relation to shaping the service going forwards.