The following outcomes align to the organisations that deliver care and support, and their priorities to enable them to provide good quality care:

The development of a proactive approach to quality assurance will enable commissioning and quality teams to better support both existing and new registered managers through sharing information, signposting to training, and strengthening links with organisations such as Skills for Care. Workshops will provide opportunities for providers to share best practice across networks, fostering continuous improvement in care quality. By promoting stability within competitive market sectors, this approach will help providers shift their focus away from competition and towards workforce development and service delivery, ultimately supporting the consistent delivery of high-quality care.

Through our market engagement plan, we will ensure care providers are aware of the projected increases, which care needs this will impact, for example we are aware of increases complexity within dementia care. Working alongside this will be our recommissioned contracts, outlining the expectation of delivery and training of staff, to meet the required standard of care for the increased complexity we are seeing across all service types.

We have listened to comments made around past engagement over the previous market position statement and workstreams, providers felt that communication between the local authority and them did not lead to meaningful outcomes or responses. Recent activity, such as closer links with the Care Association and the engagement opportunity to input into the Market Position Statement are only the start of renewed progress from Wakefield Council to improve honest and transparent communication with the care market. Working better together, for the benefit of those we support.

The publication and subsequent conversations around the Market Position Statement will help providers to understand the current view of each service type across the care market. This statement will highlight what is working well, what areas need improvement and those that need development to meet unmet need or future demand. Through the engagement sessions during the lifetime of this statement, we hope to allow providers the opportunity to input, with impact, into future commissioning and quality decision making, alongside people with lived experience, for a true co-production approached to market shaping across Wakefield.