Consultation outcome

Fundamental standards for health and social care providers

This was published under the 2010 to 2015 Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government

Applies to England

This consultation has concluded

Download the full outcome

Detail of outcome

From April 2015, subject to parliamentary approval, all health and social care providers will be required to meet fundamental standards of care as a condition of their registration with the Care Quality Commission. There will be criminal penalties for failing to meet some of the standards.

The fundamental standards are intended to describe the basic requirements that providers should always meet, and set the standard of care that service users should always expect to receive.

We used the responses to this consultation to improve the drafting of the fundamental standards regulations. The consultation response document explains the changes we have made in more detail.

Duty of candour and fit and proper persons requirement

The duty of candour and fit and proper persons requirement are both being implemented through this set of regulations.

From October 2014, both requirements will apply to NHS trusts, foundation trusts and special health authorities. We intend to implement these requirements for all other providers by April 2015, subject to parliamentary approval.

The consultation response document also details these changes.


Original consultation

Summary

Asks for views on changes to CQC registration requirements, in order to introduce fundamental standards of safety and quality for care.

This consultation ran from
to

Consultation description

All health and adult social care providers registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) will have to meet the fundamental standards. These are the basic requirements that providers should always meet and the standard of care and service that patients or care-service users should expect.

They will be legal requirements – CQC will be able to take enforcement action, including prosecution where appropriate, when they find breaches.

This consultation:

  • sets out our aims for the fundamental standards
  • sets out our responses to CQC’s previous consultation on the principles behind fundamental standards
  • includes a draft of the regulations that will introduce the fundamental standards.
  • asks whether the draft regulations meet those aims.
  • asks about the impact of the new regulations on providers

Documents

Impact assessment: review of CQC registration requirements

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Published 23 January 2014
Last updated 7 July 2014 + show all updates
  1. Added the government response to the consultation on fundamental standards for health and social care providers.

  2. First published.