Tag: Dorset Council

The press release issued by Dorset Council on 21 October 2022.

Examining how Dorset Council residents access adult social care could inform national changes to how care is provided, due to a unique partnership with the government.

The council was selected out of 15 local authorities which bid to work with the Department of Health and Social Care. The partnership with look at how residents currently get referred into the adult social care and how their experience could be improved.

What is discovered could be used to change the way people access social care in the future and create new ways of working for older people, people with a learning disability or mental health needs, across the country’s 151 local authorities. This could be in the form of better access via the internet to tweaking how assessments and reviews happen.

A team from the government department’s Digital Policy Unit will be working with the adult social care and digital teams until the New Year. The team will make recommendations at the end of the 12-week partnership.

As part of the fact-finding partnership, which includes asking questions of those who use the service, new models will be suggested and tested in a bid to find a solution for residents and the council.

The work is part of government charging reforms programme revealed in the People at the Heart of Care which, from October 2023, changes how much residents will pay towards their care and will introduce a cap on care charges.

As a result, how residents interact with local authorities will fundamentally change. All solutions are being considered which will allow each resident to track qualifying spend on care provision for adults aged over 18 years and hold this information in an individual care account.

Councillor Peter Wharf, cabinet member for Adult Social Care and Health, said innovative solutions were needed for residents now and in the future.

He said: “Dorset Council is leading the country’s response to the very difficult issue of adult social care.

“We are at the forefront of this early work around what, and how, changes can be made to the way people interact with council to get the best option for adult social care, for them.

“More solutions to adult social care are being found online independently by residents and families, and this could mean the resources at the council can be directed to residents who need it the most.

“This partnership is great for an ambitious council committed to embracing technology and smart ways of working which meet the aspirations for residents to be at the heart of their own care provision. We should be proud to be making this contribution for the benefit of residents and all local authorities.”

A Department of Health and Social Care team member, said: “After weeks of planning, we have launched our informal DHSC and Dorset Council adult social care partnership.

“Our aspiration is to go a bit beyond the limits of the traditional discovery. We would like to co-design a model that could be re-used across multiple local authorities. Perhaps, even applied to solve an important business problem.”

Dorset Council’s population has the highest percentage of over 65s and over 85s in the country, which creates huge challenges and pressure on resources. More than 40 per cent of the council’s total budget was spent on Adults Social Care in the 2022/23 financial year and is estimated to increase seven per cent each year.

The press release issued by Dorset Council on 27 September 2022.

Dorset Council has installed a host of energy saving measures at libraries across Dorset in a bid to cut down on carbon emissions and energy costs.

Over the past six months, the council has installed a wide range of energy efficiency and renewable energy measures at fifteen library sites in the council area.

The measures – that range from highly efficient LED lighting to advanced building management systems – form part of the council’s response to the climate and ecological emergency and are expected to save over £40,000 a year in electricity and gas costs and reduce annual energy use by more than 275,000 kilo-watt hours (which is over a quarter of the energy used last year across all 15 sites).

The work, which will make the libraries more energy efficient and reduce their reliance on fossil fuels, has been fully funded by the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme, a scheme set-up by the Government and delivered by Salix to reduce the emissions of publicly owned buildings across the UK.

One of the sites benefitting from the scheme is Gillingham library and museum, where solar panels have been installed and state-of-the-art upgrades made to its existing building management system. The solar panels installed on the library roof will provide zero-carbon electricity to the site, whilst the building management system makes sure the library’s heating is working as efficiently and effectively as possible with minimum energy wasted. Together, the measures installed at the North Dorset library are expected to save around 57,000 kilo-watt hours of energy each year and an impressive 13 tonnes of carbon emissions.

Addressing the energy efficiency of council-owned buildings is one of the key actions set out in the council’s Climate and Ecological Emergency Strategy. With around 30 per cent of the council’s emissions coming from its buildings, projects like this will play a vital role in helping Dorset Council reach its target of becoming a carbon-neutral council by 2040.

Cllr Ray Bryan, Dorset Council’s Portfolio Holder for Highways, Travel and Environment, said:

“I am delighted to see the steps taken to reduce the carbon footprint of our library service. Not only will these measures take us closer to our net-zero goal, but they will also help protect our libraries from the rapidly rising electricity and gas prices.

“Reducing running costs will help us continue to deliver the wide range of services through our libraries that are so important to so many across Dorset. And at the same time accelerate our shift away from fossil fuels towards a cleaner future.

“A huge well-done to the Assets and Property team of Dorset Council who have been pivotal in making this project happen, and to the programme board who have met regularly to secure its success.”

Efforts to cut energy use in Dorset libraries are part of a much wider programme of work by the council to reduce the carbon footprint of its buildings.