Common Weal investigates the impact of Covid-19 in Scottish Care homes and finds that the warnings about the weaknesses in pandemic preparation were repeatedly ignored with the result of causing “The single greatest failure in devolved government since the creation of the Scottish Parliament”

Nick Kempe investigates the Care Inspectorate’s attempts to assess the ongoing response in Scottish care homes to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Whilst some care homes have improved, Kempe raises serious concerns about the quality of data being gathered and the “slow and seemingly random way” in which care homes are being reassessed. He raises particular concern that five months on from the onset of the pandemic in Scotland, staff in care homes are still not being properly trained in infection control.

In this Manifesto, released ahead of the Scottish Government’s Independent Review of Adult Social Care the group lays out the principles of care that should be met by any proposed blueprint for Care reform and will be followed up in due course with a comprehensive blueprint for an NCS that would meet these principles and align with the values of Common Weal.