The output from the Transforming Community Equipment Services Project was posted on the Care Services Efficiency Delivery (CSED) website on 25 May. For something so potentially significant for the underpinning fabric of the UK’s social and health care systems; thousands of people employed by community equipment services; the equipment supply industry and millions of people who have care needs that can be supported by equipment, one wonders why it has not been considered significant enough to be headlined on CSIP’s website (CSED’s umbrella organisation), or featured in a press release by the Department of Health.

Now cast as Transforming Community Equipment and Wheelchair Services (TCEWS), it is not possible to determine what the implications are for specific types of equipment such as telecare, communication aids, equipment for people with sensory problems, or, indeed, wheelchairs. It’s all much too ‘high level’ for that.

On the subject of that acronym I think a more appropriate one might have been TraCES as – for good or ill – that is all there will be left of statutory community equipment provision if these proposals for a market driven approach are widely adopted. However, the potential winners are:
• The Disabled Living Foundation (DLF), the Foundation for Assistive Technology (FAST) and Ricability which could transform into properly funded information/accreditation organisations. This would be a great outcome.
• Equipment suppliers who will benefit from more sales and less recycling of equipment. eBay might do well too. (See also the ‘Tech bargains’ story below.)
• The new workforce of independent assessors.
• People who need equipment who can afford to contribute to the cost. But that’s everyone these days, of course.

The potential losers? Just about everyone else, but particularly councils who, until they find legal ways to limit their spending, will need to make massive provision to meet the funding commitments that will be made on their behalf by the independent assessors.

This is an important issue, so I’ve gone on at some length although Telecare Aware isn’t the place to dwell on these proposals. Download the four documents and comment to the TCEWS Programme Manager, lucia.fiveash@dh.gsi.gov.uk and go along to the events being organised. For readers with a sensitive disposition I should point out that the documents have not been well proof read. In particular, I note that after a year of working with one of the major stakeholders in this project, the British Healthcare Trades Association, someone was unable to get its name right!

Not telecare, but of interest to readers, the new version of the DLF’s online self assessment tool, SARA (Self Assessment, Rapid Access), includes a number of improvements based on user feedback. It is no longer necessary to register to use the service; there are more images; a more accessible design, and reports are generated more quickly.

Birmingham City and Croydon Council have also licensed SARA for their own use as part of the Department of Health’s pilot project to test and evaluate the concept of self assessment.

What was Chancellor Gordon Brown up to when he announced that the VAT rate on equipment to help older and disabled people live independently would reduce to 5%? New Soapbox item.

The DLF was early in the field of user support via the internet and now its clunky old site has been replaced with one that is easier for the public, professionals and businesses to navigate, and from which they can access the SARA self assessment system. Not particularly telecare, but a valuable all-round asset for disabled people and services supporting them. Click on the link on the right of this column to visit the DLF’s revamped website.

This may only touch on telecare in the UK, but this announcement will be of interest to many of our UK readers for other reasons.

The Government is expecting ‘third sector’ organisations to bring about the improvements for users that it thinks statutory services have failed to deliver.

Read the Cabinet Office press notice.

Recent independent report on state of community equipment services. (Go to ICES Report page)

Older and disabled people will be given the right to determine the way they live if Lord Ashley’s Private Member’s Bill becomes law. Under the Independent Living Bill no-one would be forced into residential care against their will. BBC news report.