Agenda item

Joint report

Further to minute 134 of the Cabinet, the Council considered a joint report of the Executive Director for People and the Executive Director for Resources, which set out arrangements for entering into a Partnership Agreement with Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group in order to implement the Better Care Fund proposals.

In June 2013, the Government announced the £3.9billion Better Care fund as part of its drive to integrate health and social care.  Plans were required to be submitted identifying a minimum of £3.8billion of pooled resources with an expectation larger sums would be pooled.  The value of the fund was now £5.3billion based on the plans submitted nationally.  The Better Care Fund was described as “a single pooled budget for health and social care services to work more closely together in local areas, based on a plan agreed between the NHS and Local Authorities”.

To ensure integration is delivered was delivered, the Better Care Fund required a pooling of resources delivered through a Section 75 agreement.  The report indicated that a Section 75 agreement was a partnership agreement whereby NHS organisations and local authorities contributed an agreed level of resource into a single pot (the pooled budget), which is then used to drive the integration and improvement of existing services.

Coventry’s Better Care Visio was “through integrated working, people would receive personalised support that enabled them to be as independent as possible for as long as possible”.  Health and Wellbeing Board approved Coventry’s original Better Care Plan and this was submitted in April 2014.  Subsequently, new requirements were announced and plans had to demonstrate how they would reduce emergency admissions to hospital, with a target set of 3.5%.  Coventry’s revised plan was resubmitted in September 2014 and was fully approved by NHS England on 22nd December 2014.

Coventry’s Better Care Fund Programme, known as Better Care Coventry, totalled £52m for 2015/16 and had four key areas of work, urgent care; short term support to maximise independence; long term care; and dementia, as well as other shared priorities such as support for the implementation of the Care Act 2014 and protecting adult social care services.

As NHS England required the Better Care Fund to be transferred into one or more pooled funds to enable the plan to be implemented, Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group and the City Council were required to enter into an agreement by 1st April 2015.  A ‘Partnership Agreement’ template appended to the report had been developed by Bevan Britain and provided by NHS England and the Local Government Association to support the local development and this was being used to develop the agreement for Coventry. 

The report submitted provided detail on the key elements of the Partnership Agreement, including the governance arrangements; hosting the pooled budget; scheme specification and risk sharing.

RESOLVED that the Council:

1.  Approve entering into a Partnership Agreement with Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group for Better Care Coventry.

2.  Approve that the City Council is the host for the pooled budget.

3.  Delegate authority to the Executive Directors, People and Resources, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Health and Adult Services and Cabinet Member for Strategic Finance and Resources to finalise the agreement with Coventry and Rugby Clinical Commissioning Group.

4.  Approve the proposed governance arrangements for the monitoring of the agreement and the pooled budget.