Members Meeting March 2022

All members meeting 

Tuesday 22 March 2022 7pm via ZOOM

Present: Alison Scouller (Chair), Linda Lewis, Tony Beddow (TB), Brian Gibbons (BG),  David Smith, Mike Bird. Adrian Sharratt (ASH), Judith Roberts, Tom Brooks, Judith Wardle, Sean Thompson, Elaine Ellen, David Coleman, Donna Hutton

Apologies: Uta Clay, Bob Clay, Ruth Sharratt, Anthony Wedlake, Sue Thomas, Pip Ford, Kathrin Thomas,

Speaker: Kelly Andrews GMB Regional officer for Social Care ‘Wales needs a National Care Service but what does it look like?’

Chair welcomed everyone to the meeting and introduced the speaker.

Kelly introduced herself and gave an overview of what unions have achieved during the pandemic. The pandemic has seen social care pushed to the forefront but the size of social care in Wales is underestimated. The unions represented workforce on fair work forum, covering many issues. On the construction of social care service, it will remain under local government, but more services need to be brought back ‘in house’. Services need to be provided through the medium of Welsh and English. The membership of the ‘task and finish’ group is very mixed, it should not replicate the social care Wales but use recommendations of social care forum. The report needs to be produced by the end of April 2022 which is an onerous task. 

This was followed by questions and comments from the floor. Answering the questions, Kelly agreed that it is challenging to get 22 local authorities to deliver equal and equitable care. There are on voluntary agreements at present in the discussions on integration of health and social care. Whichever social care model is used it needs to focus on the individual and what is best for them. One model will not fit all. Without UK government, Welsh government will not be able to achieve this as whatever needs to change comes with a big price tag. As well as the Expert Panel group looking at this, there are lots of different/separate groups looking at all aspects of social care/adult services/child services.

  1. Notes of last meeting January 2022 accepted with one spelling error. No matters arising
  2. Treasurer’s report – £675 in account. Bank charging a monthly fee, there are some affiliation fees but no other outgoings. Looking at changing banks. BG reported that SHA UK will be presenting SFI at next central council meeting.
  3. Cymru matters – Welsh Labour Conference – Alison Scouller was unable to attend and SHAC motion not prioritised. ASH attended and distributed Health and Care Bill leaflets. ASH reported back re conference.  Further discussion on distributing leaflets in areas across Wales, and press publicity. Plans for SHAC to produce banners for North and South Wales.
  4. UK matters – SHA UK AGM is being held on Sunday 20th February 2022 Alison Scouller and Linda Lewis are SHAC Nation delegates and Brian Gibbons, and Tony Beddow are central council delegates. SHAC motion re constitution discussed but not passed. Referred to group reviewing constitution. There are more new branches set up in UK. SHA UK website to be updated. There are teething problems with the new membership data system. The information regarding the 7k spend was not included on the agenda.
  5. Future meetings – Next all member meeting in May, date to be confirmed but likely to be either 12th or 19th. Speaker will be Victoria Winkler from the Bevan Foundation. On July 19th the speaker will be Sean Thompson from SERA.
  6. AOB – none

Meeting closed at 8.27pm