Equality Act Information Summary January 2014

Transcription

1 Equality Act Information Summary January

2 Equality Act Information Summary January 2014 Contents Page Equality Act 2010 explained 3 Key Messages for CCGs from Summary of Information for Our work with Communities 7 Our staff 9 Complaints by people who use services 12 Resources 14 CCG Website (links) 14 2

3 Equality Act 2010 Wolverhampton Clinical Commissioning Group, as a public body, must comply with the Public Sector Equality Duties set out at s.149 of the Equality Act We are required to have due regard for the need to: Eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment, victimisation and other conduct prohibited by the Act. Advance equality of opportunity between people of different groups or protected characteristics Foster good relations between people from different groups The protected characteristics referred to in section 149 indicates the groups of people who are specifically offered protection by the Act. Before the Equality Act, NHS Trusts already had to demonstrate that they were treating people of different races, people with disabilities, and men and women fairly and equally. The Act has added extra groups of people to the equality duty: People of different ages younger and older people Lesbian, gay and bi-sexual people People who are in the process of transitioning from one gender to another People with a religion or belief, or people without a religion or belief Women having a baby and just after they have had a baby People who are in a civil partnership or are married. These general duties are supported by specific duties which require public bodies to publish relevant, proportionate information demonstrating their compliance with the Act; and to set themselves specific, measurable equality objectives. The Specific Duties require the CCG to: Publish information to show our compliance at least annually from 31 st January Set and publish equality objectives, at least every four years. Our equality objectives were published as part of our Equality Strategy and Action Plan in October 2013 and can be found at this link The Health and Social Care Act 2012 has made significant changes to the structures of decision-making in the NHS. Clinical Commissioning Groups (or CCGs) are now the lead commissioners for health in each local area, taking over from Primary Care Trusts from April Equality considerations are central to the NHS vision of providing a personal, fair and diverse health service. Equality Information published in January 2013 by the Black Country Cluster of Primary Care Trusts included key messages for CCGs which we have used in developing our equality strategy. 3

4 Key messages for CCGs from Develop your leadership If the equalities agenda is driven from the top, it has more chance in becoming part of the fabric of the organisation and consistently applied by all staff. Adopting equality champions or named leads on Governing bodies and Local Commissioning Groups will help give the organisation this impetus. Wolverhampton CCG has included actions to progress this work in its equality and diversity action plan for Resolve the gaps in equality data and consistency of information There are, still, gaps in the equality data collected about by the provider organisations we commission to deliver health services. This can be for a number of reasons: The ability to record equality data is in place but in practice, it is not collected. Data is collected (for example equality monitoring information) but not analysed or interpreted, and not on a regular basis to provide useful baseline and trend information which can be used by commissioners and providers to plan service improvements. Low response rates from the public to equality questionnaires or surveys, or equality monitoring forms. This might suggest that the reason for collecting the data needs to be explained, and promoted among target audiences. Different equality groups (or protected characteristics) are described differently in different forms eg ethnicity categories, or religious belief categories can vary significantly. It is worth auditing the data collection mechanisms to see if they are consistent with each other, and with relevant local partners (eg local authority Public Health teams and social care departments; Wolverhampton Healthwatch) to allow for comparative analysis. Wolverhampton CCG has included actions to improve data in its equality and diversity action plan for and begun the work to emphasise the requirements on provider organisations to collect good quality equality information from patients; and to reassure patients about the reasons why this is being collected, how it will be stored, and how it will be used. 4

5 3. Develop Primary Care understanding Primary Care development is the responsibility of NHS England, but Wolverhampton CCG has an interest in the development needs of constituent Practices in our area. There is a need to up-skill primary care staff and GPs to enable them to plan for and respond appropriately to meet the needs of their diverse populations. Changing local populations, including the needs of new migrant communities, mean that local communities are becoming more diverse, offering considerable challenges to NHS provision. For example: How, in practice, does someone whose first language is not English access interpreting services? What is the experience like in their shoes? Wolverhampton CCG will be including actions in its action plan to work with GP Practices on equality and diversity issues. 4. Use contractual levers with providers NHS Trust providers are also bound by the duties in the Equality Act 2010 and so must also demonstrate compliance with s.149 (the public sector equality duties). This compliance can also form part of the contract and performance management relationships that CCGs have with their providers. CCGs should actively monitor their provider performance in relation to Equality and Diversity. Wolverhampton CCG will build in robust contractual requirements in new contracts with providers from April Be involved in partnership work on the causes of the causes...serious health inequalities do not arise by chance, and they cannot be attributed simply to genetic makeup, bad, unhealthy behaviour, or difficulties in access to medical care, important as those factors may be. Social and economic differences in health status reflect, and are caused by, social and economic inequalities in society. Marmot M Fair Society Healthy Lives 2010 (The Marmot Review) Marmot s concern is with the social determinants of health or the causes of the causes of health inequalities those fundamental social and economic conditions which have been shown to have an impact on how healthy a person will be during the course of their life. This includes the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age. It includes an individual s education and employment opportunities in life and their earning potential; it can include belonging to a minority group (including many people who have a protected characteristic ) or being socially 5

6 excluded from mainstream society. Inequalities in the social determinants of health act as barriers to addressing health disparities. Working in partnership with organisations well placed to understand these social determinants can help us to build an understanding of the impact on health services. Work with local authority Public Health teams, and social care departments to understand (for example) the impact of recent welfare reforms (including housing benefit changes); of cost improvement programmes on diverse groups (including the equality impact analyses of budget reductions); or of the withdrawal of jointly commissioned contracts can help inform commissioning strategies and advise risk mitigation plans. Similarly our work with the Voluntary and Community sector can help the CCG meet its requirements for consultation, involvement and engagement and - particularly with those organisations that work with protected characteristic groups - can offer important information about what is happening in communities now well before trends appear on quarterly reports. Wolverhampton CCG has indicated its commitment to reducing health inequalities and has specific actions in its equality and diversity action plan to work with partner organisations. 6. Use the NHS Equality Delivery System to guide your equality strategy The NHS Equality Delivery System is a tool designed to assist performance and quality assurance mechanism for NHS organisations. It enables organisations to make improvements for staff and for patients of the NHS. The EDS covers the 9 protected characteristics identified in the Equality Act 2010 and is intended to support the NHS to deliver on the duties encompassed in the Equality Act. Wolverhampton CCG has decided to make use of the EDS to look in detail at particular pathways. During we are concentrating on urgent care and the experiences of people from different protected characteristic groups. 6

7 Summary of information for 2013 Our work with communities The CCG, through its engagement structures has a comprehensive framework for engaging with patients and community representatives in a way that is systematic and meaningful. Through our Engagement Framework we routinely engage with a range of groups each quarter, the insights from which feed up to our Joint Engagement Assurance Group and ultimately the Governing Body. Each group (pictured on the next page in our Engagement Framework) receives plans and strategies to scrutinise, raising concerns and suggesting improvements. The groups also create an effective cascade, allowing us to share news and information across a range of established community communications structures. For information on how to get involved please visit the Talk to Us pages of the CCG s website which can be found here The CCG gathers patient experience information and reports these to the CCG s Quality and Safety team where further investigation is needed. The CCG has also undertaken a range of events and meetings to engage on specific areas in addition to the schedule engagement meetings that take place: CCG launch event (March 2013): this sought to validate the CCG s vision and mission. City Show (July 2013): the CCG engaged with visitors on their experiences of GP out-of-hours care, in addition to recruiting patient members and providing health promotion advice. Commissioning intentions and NHS call-to-action engagement (October 2013): we arranged three events across the city to seek insight into what quality and experience hallmarks they want to see in the services we will commission for the future. Urgent care engagement and consultation: a year of engagement activity, which sought to understand how local people use and perceive local services, has cumulated in a 12 week consultation on a proposal to change how the system works for the benefit of local people and services. Engagement is also taking place with the Wolverhampton Equality and Diversity Forum to enable effective collaboration, and effective scrutiny of the work undertaken by the CCG. 7

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9 Our Staff Wolverhampton CCG employs 74 people. Under the specific duties of the Equality Act 2010, public bodies employing less than 150 people are not required to publish information about their staff profile. However Wolverhampton CCG believes in the value of clear accountability and transparency and presents the information below in this spirit. Chart 1 Gender 30, 41% 44, 59% Wolverhampton CCG Female Wolverhampton CCG Male Chart 1 demonstrates that of the 74 employees within Wolverhampton CCG, 44 (59%) are female and 30 (41%) are male. This gender profile is similar to others across other similar sized CCGs and is reflective of the NHS as a whole. Chart Gender & Employment Category 5 Female 37 Wolverhampton 11 Male 19 Fixed Term Temp Non-Exec Director/Chair (inc GP reps) Permanent 9

10 Chart 2 demonstrates that there are more female permanent staff than men (nearly double) but broadly reflective of the gender profile described in Chart 1. However there are more significantly more men represented at Board level than women (more than double). Chart Gender & Employment Category Full Time Part Time Full Time Part Time Female Male Wolverhampton In Chart 3 75% of women are full time, and 25% are part time. For men, 87% are full time and 13% part time. there are more female permanent staff than men which is reflective of the gender make up. There are more female staff which work part time as compared to males. Chart 4 Wolves CCG by Gender & Pay Female Male Band Band 4 5 Band Band Band Band 8A 6 2 Band 8B 6 2 Band 8C 3 Band 8D 1 Band Board Member 7 12 Grand Total Chart 4 shows workforce by pay band and gender in actual headcount figures. Taking pay bands 3-7, these posts represent 52% of female employees and 33% of male employees. Bands 8a to Band 9 represent 32% of female employees and 27% of male employees. Board members are 16% of female employees and 40% of male employees. The table uses information from the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) and 10

11 includes Independent Board members. In practice, these members are not receiving a wage from the CCG, but receive reasonable expenses. To allow for efficiencies in payment of these expenses, they are included on ESR with establishment staff. Chart 5 Number of % % in Wolverhampton CCG Ethnic Origin Staff population A White - British C White - Any other White background CC White Welsh n/a G Mixed - Any other mixed background n/a H Asian or Asian British - Indian J Asian or Asian British - Pakistani LE Asian Sri Lankan M Black or Black British - Caribbean P Black or Black British - Any other Black background Undefined n/a Z Not Stated n/a Letter prefix relates to the category in the NHS Electronic Staff Record (ESR) * Population percentages taken from ONS Table QS211EW (2011 Census) Ethnic Group detailed.[office of National Statistics, online, January 2014] Chart 5 demonstrates a diverse workforce at Wolverhampton CCG which is near to representing the profile of the population we serve. Our employment representation of staff of Indian origin is particularly significant when compared to the local population, and with a noted under-representation of people of Black Caribbean origin (including people who would describe themselves as Black British). Chart 6 Age Profile Age Profile < Wolverhampton CCG 11

12 Wolverhampton CCG has not collated information relating to disability or religion and belief as part of the staff profile. Complaints by People who use services The section contains information about: Details of types and numbers, source and risk grading of complaints by locality; Details of types, numbers and source of PALS (Patient Advice and Liaison Service) contacts; Outcomes and lessons learnt as a result of investigating and managing the above. Wolverhampton CCG manages complaints, underpinned by policies & processes that enable feedback to be received from the public on the range of services the CCG is responsible for commissioning - examples are as follows:- Complaints Policy & in house management of complaints PALs Database Engagement Strategy & Framework comprising of a range of forums/events Regular reports are shared with the Quality & Safety Committee at monthly intervals confirming prevalence of complaints & emerging themes and the Joint Engagement Assurance Group meet at quarterly intervals to review feedback obtained from the public and outcomes of events that have taken place, as well as those planned in coming months. Wolverhampton Complaints are recorded on a register and tracked through to closure, monitored by the Quality& Safety Committee. The summary for the reporting period April December 2013 is:- Month Number of Types Complaints April 4 1 remains ongoing 3 closed May 2 2 closed June 4 4 closed July 5 1 remains ongoing 3 closed August 1 1 closed September 0 October 1 1 closed November 0 December 2 Ongoing 12

13 There has been one complaint from the 2012/13 period (inherited by the CCG) which has been referred to the Health Service Ombudsman in September 2013, and confirmation has now been received advising the CCG of their intention to carry out a formal investigation. Quality Matters Wolverhampton CCG has a well established system called Quality Matters that GPs utilise when raising concerns regarding the quality of services on behalf of patients. The figures comprise as follows: Acute Trust Mental Health April 5 0 May 5 1 June 10 0 July 4 1 August 5 0 September 10 1 October 10 1 November 3 2 December 4 0 The Quality Matters process allows GPs to submit informal concerns to the CCG s Quality team where the matter is anonymised and recorded before being allocated a priority rating and sent to the responsible trust for response. Concerns are then reviewed and taken further where necessary. Individual issues are fed back to the complainant by the Quality Team until both parties have reached agreed on an appropriate resolution. The lessons learned from investigation of the complaint are then shared through the Quality and Monitoring progress and other CCG meetings so that there is a wide understanding of what went wrong, and how future similar incidents may be avoided. A Monthly review of quality issues is carried out to identify themes and recurrence rates. This allows for further consideration of any related problems and further learning to be fed into the quality monitoring process. In December 2013 the CCG introduced a formal recording system for capturing queries raised from members of the public about health services (PALs queries) and these are now formally recorded. Before December, there were a number of queries being received through several points within the CCG and individual local records were maintained. The CCG has now improved this process and all contacts are now recorded centrally. 13

14 Resources CCG Website More information about Wolverhampton CCG, our values, key documents and details on how to get more involved can be found here Our patient prospectus, introducing the work of Wolverhampton CCG can be found here Equality Act 2010 For information about the requirements of the Equality Act: Equality Act Easy Read Guide A link to the website of the Equality and Human Rights Commission where guidance and case law related to the Equality Act can be viewed. EHRC - New Equality Act guidance For further information about the content of this document please contact: Steve Corton Senior Equality and Diversity Manager Central Midlands Commissioning Support Unit Tel: Mob: steve.corton@nhs.net Experience Counts January