The Health, Wellbeing and Adult Social Care Scrutiny Committee met to discuss adult social care, public health, and the work programme for the coming year. The committee agreed the final report on adult social care accommodation from the previous year, and approved the scrutiny initiation document for the coming year, which will focus on life expectancy in the borough. Members also heard from Healthwatch Islington about their annual report and work programme, and discussed the latest performance report from adult social care.

Healthwatch Islington Annual Report and Work Programme

Laura Saksena, Chief Executive of Healthwatch Islington, presented the Healthwatch Annual Report and Work Programme to the committee, outlining the organisation's achievements in the past year and its plans for the future. However, she began by noting that the government had recently announced that both Healthwatch England and the local Healthwatch network would be abolished, with patient engagement functions being split between local authorities and Integrated Care Boards (ICB). Ms Saksena said that Healthwatch Islington was hoping to continue delivering patient engagement in the borough, but that the organisation would likely need to change its structure.

Ms Saksena highlighted several key areas of focus for Healthwatch Islington in the coming year, including:

• Reach: Increasing engagement with residents through outreach in libraries and at community events such as the Chapel Market and Califest.
• Demographics: Working with demographics that Healthwatch Islington has not historically reached, such as children and young people, and working more at the intersection of drug and alcohol services and the criminal justice system.
• Diverse Communities Health Voice model: Continuing to utilise and build on this model, which supports smaller minority-led organisations to deliver health interventions within their communities.
• Systems: Improving systems for recording demographics and measuring impact.
• Sustainability: Focusing on workforce development and supporting wider capacity building within the voluntary care sector in Islington.

Councillor Toby North raised the issue of vaping among young people, and asked if Healthwatch Islington had any insights from their conversations with young people on this topic. Ms Saksena responded that the messaging around vaping was deeply confusing for young people, as it is presented as a positive alternative for smokers but a dangerous choice for non-smokers. She added that more clarity was needed on the reasons why vaping is harmful.

Councillor Marian Spall, Armed Forces Champion, expressed her sadness at the news of the abolition of Healthwatch, and thanked the organisation for being a wonderful ally in protecting nurse services from cuts. She asked Ms Saksena about her hopes and fears for the future, and what councillors could do to help. Ms Saksena responded that one of the main concerns was where the independence would sit, and that councillors could look to protect some kind of independent scrutiny of services within the local area.

Councillor Benali Hamdache, Leader of the Independent and Green Group, noted the convening role that Healthwatch plays in bringing together statutory health and voluntary community centre partners. He asked Ms Saksena to elaborate on the work Healthwatch has done in this area, and what lessons the council could take forward in the future. Ms Saksena responded that Healthwatch sits on a number of spaces where it can bring together the voluntary sector voice and a wider understanding of statutory service provision. She added that investment in infrastructure organisations such as Voluntary Action Islington (VAI) would be useful, and that commissioning processes should value local insight and reach.

Adult Social Care Performance Report

The committee received the Quarter 4 Performance Report for Adult Social Care. The report highlighted that 60% of service users receiving long-term support had received at least one review, which was an all-time high for the service.

Councillor Benali Hamdache said that he would like to see more information on the finances of adult social care included in the quarterly report, as adult social care is often what tanks a lot of council's finances . He suggested tracking block or spot spending in terms of accommodation.

In response, officers said that the purpose of the report was a performance report which demonstrates some of the statutory terms on performance. They suggested that a separate finance update could be brought to the committee.

Councillor Benali Hamdache noted that the Corporate Resources Scrutiny Committee (CRESC) works very well at a high level, but that it is sometimes harder to get into the detail of individual scrutiny committees.

Councillor Toby North suggested that the number of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) in the report could be increased. He said that he and other committee members could suggest additional items to track.

Councillor Asima Shaikh, Deputy Business Manager, Independent and Green Group, referred to the scrutiny review from last year, which looked at access to GP surgeries and the adult social care front door. She asked for an update on the reporting of contacts at the front door. Officers responded that they were expecting to have a dashboard in September with the intention that this starts to be reported on a quarterly basis back to scrutiny.

Councillor Marian Spall asked for more detail about the work being done to improve data recording and practice in relation to the safeguarding metric. Officers responded that they had made the decision to move all of their mental health adult social care safeguarding recording onto the wider adult social care system, which is LAS. They added that there had been improvements in practice through an ongoing program with safeguarding, regular auditing, and a regular training program.

Scrutiny Review

The committee agreed the final report and recommendations from the previous year's scrutiny document on adult social care and accommodation, and submitted it to the executive to endorse the recommendations.

The committee also approved the scrutiny initiation document for the coming year, which will focus on life expectancy in the borough. Jonathan O'Sullivan, Director of Public Health, gave an overview of the topic, noting that life expectancy in England has slowed down in terms of improvements over the last decade and a half. He said that the review would look at trends in life expectancy, healthy life expectancy, and inequalities in life expectancy, as well as the major causes of early death. The review will also focus on underlying areas such as smoking, food and healthy diets, physical activity, and alcohol and drug use. The aim of the review is to take stock of key interventions and programmes in healthy life expectancy and inequalities, and identify opportunities to make further progress.

Work Programme

The committee reviewed the work programme for 2025/26¹.