Listed below are a range of courses we deliver on the Care Act. If you want more information on any course listed, please email: admin@edgetraining.org.uk and we will send you the full course outline with further details including costings. All courses are tailored to the specific needs of the staff group or service commissioning it. If you don’t see the exact course you need, please email us as we deliver numerous other bespoke courses on the Care Act.

To view our Care Act course guide click HERE

Introduction to the Care Act2014

This interactive training day is aimed at adult social care practitioners, managers and decision-makers and covers the key provisions of the Care Act, highlighting how the flexibilities and innovations in the Act should drive practice.

Participants should have some existing knowledge of adult social care assessments and service provision.

Care Act LegalUpdate

This interactive training day is aimed at adult social care practitioners, managers and decision-makers who already have a working knowledge of the Care Act and need a refresher. It focuses on recent case law and ombudsman’s decisions. Participants should have some existing knowledge of adult social care assessments and service provision.

The Care Act for AMHPs

The Care Act 2014 impacts significantly upon the way that local authorities assess care needs and arrange services, both for individuals ‘in need of care and support’ and for their carers. This course sets out the most important aspects of the Care Act for AMHPs and, through case studies and discussion, reviews the approach 

required of practitioners.

Rough Sleeper and PSIC / No Recourse to Public Funds course for council staff and outreach workers.

This one day course focuses on the lawful alternatives to the legally risky range of Front Door responses typically given to people with co-morbidities (mental health, physical disabilities or illness and substance misuse histories) when presented for assessment as homeless, threatened with homelessness, or NRPF and destitute and/or in breach of immigration control.

It looks at the law on identifying accommodation ‘plus’ needs for nationals and s117 Mental Health Act patients regardless of their immigration status. It supports an integrated and co-operative Housing and Care response.

The Care Act for Mental Health Practitioners

This full day practice-based course for Mental Health Practitioners reviews the provisions of the Care Act as relevant to mental health service users.  The Care Act 2014 impacts significantly upon the way that local authorities assess care needs and arrange services, both for individuals ‘in need of care and support’ and for their carers. This course sets out the most important aspects of the Care Act for Mental Health Practitioners. It provides an update on case law, with specific relevance to mental health. The course  includes the interface between the Care Act and law relevant to mental health through case studies and discussion.

Specialist Care Act courses:

We run a range of specialist courses on the Care Act to a range of staff in the Local Authority, Integrated Care System staff and NHS more widely. These courses can be full days or in some cases half days and put together to run as full days - see below for details.

The following courses assume basic awareness of the scope of the Care Act 2014 and the Care and Support Guidance

Prevention, Reduction and Re-ablement - strengths-based community steering

This half day course looks at pausing Care Act assessments whilst focusing on prevention, reduction and re-ablement services, to make the most of assets and strength based approaches which offset or reduce needs progressing to an eligibility decision. This course assumes basic awareness of the scope of the Care Act 2014 and the Care and Support Guidance.

Care Needs Assessments under s.9 of the Care Act/Needs conversations

This half day course* explores the Assessment stage of the Care Act and how to get it right first time, so as to save time and staff resources on corrections, complaints or customer dissatisfaction.

*This course can be run together with a half day on Carers’ Support Needs assessments or Eligibility Decision-making.

Carers’ Support Needs Assessments under section 10 of the Care Act 2014

This half day course* aims to familiarise staff with the opportunities under the Care Act for getting the critically important stage of Carers’ Support needs Assessment correct, first time, so as to save time and staff resources on corrections, complaints or customer dissatisfaction.

* This course can be run together with a half day on Care Needs Assessments or on Eligibility Decision-making.

Eligibility Decisions under s.13 of the Care Act

This half day course* aims to familiarise staff with the opportunities under the Care Act for getting the critically important Eligibility decision done correctly, first time, so as to save time and staff resources on corrections complaints or customer dissatisfaction.

* This course can be run together with a half day on either Care needs Assessments or Support Needs Assessments.

Basic Care Act care planning principles, including MCA issues, Direct Payments and Choice of Accommodation/top-ups)

This half or full day* course aims to familiarise staff with the legal principles drawn from public law and human rights, which govern all care planning under the Care Act.

Reference is also made to the Continuing Healthcare National Framework (CHC) and Personal Health Budgets (PHB) regulations for comparison.

*This course can run as a half or full day (with relevant topics included in more depth in the full day)

* This course can also be run together with a half day on Budget Sign-Off and Sufficiency or a half day on Reviews, Revisions and Re-assessments.

Budget Sign-off and Sufficiency under the Care Act

This half day course* aims to familiarise staff with the legal principles underpinning ratification or assurance of care planning recommendations and the appropriateness and sufficiency of the content or financial value of the package/personal budget.

Comparisons will be drawn with the National Framework for CHC where relevant.

*This course can be run together with a half day on Basic Care Planning Principles or a half day on Reviews, Revisions and Re-assessments.

Care Act Reviews, Revision and Re-assessments (including Cuts)

The half day* course aims to familiarise staff with the rules, powers and duties associated with review and revision of a care or support plan.

Comparisons will be made with CHC care plans, where relevant.

*This half day can be run together with a half day on Budget Finalisation and Sign-Off.

Difficult Conversations, Complaints and Legal Challenges related to the Care Act

This full day course aims to familiarise staff with the right way to convey unpalatable information regarding legitimate decision-making about individuals’ packages of care, in the context of complaints, the Local Government Social Care Ombudsman, Care Quality Commission assurance and legal risk.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Care Act 2014 and the Care and Support Guidance and awareness of the nature of judicial review proceedings.

The following courses detail the basic knowledge required for attendance:

Supported Living under the Care Act and other legislative frameworks for people with special needs.

This full day course aims to familiarise staff with the legal frameworks for the provision of unregistered housing and housing adaptations for people with disabilities. This includes how to use legal frameworks in their day to day work with regard to identifying/corroborating vulnerability and making suitability or specified accommodation decisions.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Care Act and/or the Housing Act, depending on attendees’ backgrounds and roles.

The Housing Act interface with the Care Act

This half day course aims to familiarise staff with the interface in the legal frameworks for housing provision and for the meeting of needs by social services under the Care Act, focusing on ‘accommodation plus’ claims, where direct provision is permitted.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Housing Act 1996 if one is from Housing and of the Care Act 2014, if one is from Social Services.

The Continuing NHS Healthcare interface with the Care Act

This full day course aims to familiarise staff concerned with CHC patients with the legal interface between the Care Act and the National Framework for NHS Continuing Health Care.

It focuses on the legally defensible way to identify primary health need.

This course assumes a basic awareness of the Care Act and CHC National Framework.

*This course can be run with a focus on hospital discharge and older people or on community CHC and the status and rights of people with Learning Disabilities or Autism.

Children's Continuing Care

This half day course aims to familiarise staff with the legal framework for children’s continuing care in the context of Educational Health Care Plans (EHCP)

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Children and Families Act and Care Act 2014.

Transition from Children's social services to Adults' services

This full day course aims to familiarise Local Authority Children’s Social Care staff or a specialist Transition team from Adults’ Services/NHS staff concerned with continuing care and adults’ CHC.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the children’s legal framework for EHCPs if one is working with children and the equivalent regarding the Care Act and CHC framework if one is working with adults.

Charging Law for Adult Social Care Recipients

This half day OR full day* course aims to familiarise Advice Information staff, and their charging and financial assessment colleagues, with the legal framework governing charging and means testing under the Care Act.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Care Act 2014.

*This course can be run together with a half day on Disability Related Expenditure Disregard and Charging Appeals.

Disability Related Expenditure Disregards and Charging Appeals

This half day course* aims to familiarise Advice & Information Officers and Charging and Financial Assessment Officers with the legal principles underpinning the lawful evaluation of Disability Related Expenditure and review or appeal against Financial Assessments.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Care Act 2014.

*This course can be run together with a half day on Charging Law for Adult Social Care Recipients.

Direct Payments (in depth)

This full day course* aims to further the existing knowledge of the legal framework for direct payment award and support staff in local authorities (and integrated systems using Personal Health Budgets or s117 Aftercare direct payments) and the specific legal pitfalls that can arise.

This course assumes an intermediate understanding of Direct Payments/PHBs under the Care Act or the NHS Act.

*It can be run at a more basic or bespoke level if a funding body is overhauling its Direct Payment/PHB systems.

Choice and control under the Care Act

This half day course aims to familiarise staff of all levels with the legal framework for choice, control and personalisation under the Care Act, so as to separate the rhetoric from the reality.

It focuses on the significance or otherwise of consent; incapacity or impairment; substitute decision-making; risk-taking and the difference between choice rights over a council’s spending verses choice rights arising from private spending or contracting.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the Care Act.

Commissioning and Co-operation Responsibilities in Health and Social Services ICSs

This full day course aims to familiarise contracts and commissioning staff in integrated health and care services with the scope of the legal duties that compel the purchasing of adequate and appropriate services for people assessed to be in need, and market management and shaping responsibilities for diversity, quality and sustainability. It will focus on the extent to which financial resources of the authority are a relevant consideration for provider selection and compare spot and framework contractual structures.

NB: This course does not require any understanding of the Care Act or CHC framework or the operation of public law. A basic understanding of contract, agency and procurement law is assumed.

Hospital Discharge, Delayed Discharges and the Interface with the Care Act and Continuing NHS Healthcare

This full day course aims to familiarise NHS Discharge Co-ordinators and Hospital Social Work Staff with the legal rights and obligations underpinning safe and legal discharge from general hospitals, including delayed discharges.

This course assumes a basic understanding of Discharge to Assess Guidance and the Care Act 2014 and the National Framework for Continuing Health Care – and ideally a knowledge of the policy in force, locally.

Complaints Handling in Health and Social Services ICSs

This half day course aims to familiarise Complaints Staff from Local Authorities and NHS integrated care systems with the workings of the complaints regulations and the LGSCO’s intentions for improvement of local complaints systems.

This course assumes a basic understanding of the public law principles underpinning health and social services functions under statute and the complaint system in operation, locally.

Public Law Principles underpinning health and social services decision-making - for new starters or middle and senior management

This full day course* aims to familiarise Local Authority and NHS integrated care services with a strong public law legal  framework knowledge base for discharging Care Act functions

*This course can be run at two levels: ie at an induction level for those with little or no awareness of the Care Act 2014 – or at a more senior level for those wanting managerial staff to acquire a stronger set of assurance and governance tools.