FOI Request 2173 - Social Care Office

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FOI Responses

FOI Requests in 2010

Written by FOI Lead

Case Number	2173
Request Date	10/09/2010

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Details of the Request

Details of the seniority of the NHS employees working in the Surrey Countil Council Social Care Office at ASPH between 1988 & 2010.

Including numbers, job descriptions, grades & salaries. A copy of the Service Level Agreement, or equivalent, that detailed the arrangement in relation to the povision of NHS funded employees to the SCCSC Team.

Details of the key skills & competences that the Trust working in SCCSC team need to possess. Please provide job evaluation or other reviews.

Documentation showing how the Trust assesssed the role of the NHS saff working in the SCCSC Team & how they identified functions being carried out that they did not consider part of the role & how this was communicated to sraff.

Documentation showing how the Trust assessed the role of the NHS staff working in the SCCSC Team were instructed to carry out duites by the Surrey managers and that the Trust did not consider to be a requirement of their role.

Completion Date

02/11/2010

Details of the Response

Thank you for your request to Ashford and St. Peter’s Hospitals NHS Trust regarding Surrey Council Council Social Care Team at the Trust.

Details of the seniority of the NHS employees working in the Surrey County Council Social Care office at St Peter’s and Ashford hospitals between 1988 and 2010. By seniority I mean length of service with the NHS and also length of service within the Surrey county council Social Care offices.

Post 1:	1 Jan 1997 - 20 June 2004 Grade 3 (Old Whitley grade)
Post 2:	1 Mar 2004 - 1 Oct 2004 Grade 4 (Old Whitley grade) and 1 Oct 2004 – present = Band 4 AfC
Post 3:	13 Oct 1985 - 1 Oct 2004 Grade 4 (Old Whitley grade) and 1 Oct 2004 – 20 Jan 2009 = Band 4 AfC.

Details of NHS employees working in the Surrey County council Social Care office at St Peter’s and Ashford hospitals between 1988 and 2010, to include numbers, job descriptions, grade and salaries. Please note, I am not asking for names or other personal information.

As above (the Job Description for Post 2 and 3 is the same). The Job Description for post 1 is not available. Please note the information dates from 1997 only.
A copy of the Service Level Agreement, or equivalent, that detailed the arrangement in relation to the provosion of NHS funded employees to the Surrey County Councl Social Care Team.

No documentation could be located.

The arrangement with Surrey is a longstanding one and there are no paper records.
Details of the key skills and competences that the Trust requires its staff working in the Surrey Social Car Team offices to possess.

The Job Description, Person Specification and the original Job Evaluation documentation are attached.
Documentation showing how the Turst assessed the role of the NHS staff working in the Surrey County Council Social Care Team and how they identified functions being carried out that they did not consider part of the role and how this was communicated to the NHS staff and Surrey County Council.

No documentation exists. The trust was not aware of any functions being carried out that were not part of the role.
Documentation detailing the procedure to be followed if the NHS staff working for Surrey County Council were instructed to carry out duties by the Surrey managers that the Trust did not consider to be a requirement of their role and how this was communicated to the NHS staff and Surrey County Council.

No documentation exists. The trust was not aware of any functions being carried out that were not part of the role.

Details of the number of car parking spaces available to staff at each hospital site.

Surrey currently hold 66 car parking passes. There are no allocated spaces.

St Peter’s Allocated number	629
Unallocated (parked on site but not in a designated space i.e. central site)	397
Total	1026

Ashford hospital	236
Unallocated	54
Total	290

Total on both sites

1316

Details of the number of people from the Surrey County Council Social Care Teams that had car parking passes, the number of passes held and the number of applications and renewals made between 2001 and 2005.

We have 35 parking permits issued to Social Services staff and 31 to Social Care Team staff. As Social Services rarely let us know when staff leave their department the chances are high that a significant proportion of these are not being used. The system used does not hold data on how many applications or rewards have been made.
Details of the length of the corridor in the West Wing of Ashford Hospital leading to the Surrey County Council Social Care office.

The building no longer exists. Drawings show that the corridor was approximately 19m long but do not show which areas were occupied by Social Services.
Details of the number of time between 2001 and 2005 pest control visits were made to the Surrey Council Council Social Care Tean offices at each hospital between 2001 and 2005. Please also provide documentation detailing the action taken by the NHS line managers in relation to the health and safety of the NHS staff in these offices once the matter had been reported to the NHS.

There are no records of any pest control requests or visits.
Copies of the health and safety at work risk assessment completed by the NHS in relation to NHS Staff working in the Surrey county Council Social Care offices at both hospitals, between 2001 and 2005, specifying the risks, possible impact and control measures put in place. Please also provide copies of the regular reviews of this assessment.

There are no records of risk assessment carried out by Health and Safety.

Any records held in Occupational health are confidential and have not been sought as consent is required from named individuals.
A copy of documentation demonstrating how the NHS managers carried out their health and safety obligations to the NHS employees working in the Surrey County Council Social Care Teams. What steps did the NHS line manager take to ensure a safe working environment, particularly in relation to stress management? How was this assured and how was the assurance documented.

No health and Safety documentation has been found, however, staff in the department had access to all of the Trusts support services, including Occupational Health, Human Resources and Health and Safety including training.

Follow-up Response: Clarification

Thank you for your request to Ashford and St. Peter’s Hospitals NHS Trust for further clarification of our response to your original request.

No documentation has been located in relation to the provision of staff or services between Ashford and St Peters NHS Hospitals and Surrey Count Council. In relation to the duties and roles of NHS employees, NHS employees supporting Surrey Council Staff had job descriptions and terms and conditions of service in line with other NHS staff.
Since 2004 job roles have been assessed using the Agenda for Change job evaluation scheme. A copy of the relevant job description has been provided.

Prior to the introduction of Agenda for Change, job descriptions were in existence which had also been previously agreed by the job holder, Surrey County Council and the NHS Trust in line with Whitley Terms and Conditions of service.

All administrative staff, including employees supporting Surrey County Council, had computer access to the Trust’s policies and procedures, including policies on Health and Safety, Occupational Health and Human Resources, specifically, Whistle Blowing (raising staff concerns) and Dignity at Work (formerly Bullying and Harassment) policies.

In relation to ‘being tasked inappropriately’ employees duties were determined by job descriptions agreed with the employee. Where new duties were introduced it was open to both the individual and the line manager to request for the job description to be re-evaluated. If the new duties altered the level of responsibility of the role a new grade would be agreed. There is no documentation relating any re-grading requests.
The Trust has extensive policies available on the Trust intranet, which is accessible to NHS staff supporting Surrey County Council. In addition, these staff also had access to Trust Human Resources, Occupational Health, Health and Safety and more recently the Employee Assistance Programme. Policies on Whistle Blowing (raising staff concerns) and Dignity at Work (formerly Bullying and Harassment) are made available to all staff.
There are no records of risk assessments carried out by Health and Safety. Any records held in Occupational Health are confidential and have not been sought as consent is required.

All staff on NHS Terms and conditions of service, including those working under the umbrella of Social Services, have full access to all the Trust’s Health, Safety and Wellbeing infrastructure.

The Trust also has an expectation that the health and safety of NHS staff working in the Surrey County Council Social Care Team would be protected by Surrey County Council when discharging its duties under section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.