National Group for Volunteering in NHS Scotland

Transcription

1 National Group for Volunteering in NHS Scotland Minutes of the meeting held on Tuesday 15 November 2016 Crammond Room, Scottish Health Services Centre, Edinburgh. Present Neil Galbraith Alan Bigham Rob Coward Sandie Dickson Francis Santos Marion Findlay Diane Lockhart Lesley Munro Sandra McDougall Claire Stevens Vivienne Thomson Tom Wilson Lisa Taylor Chairman, NHS Western Isles (National Group Chair) Programme Manager, Scottish Health Council Educational Projects Manager, NHS Education for Scotland Involvement and Equality Lead, The State Hospital Patient Support & Participation team, Scottish Government Director of Services, Volunteer Edinburgh Voluntary Services Manager, NHS Lothian Clear Pathway Manager, Voluntary Health Scotland (accompanying Claire Stevens) Head of Policy, Scottish Health Council Chief Officer, Voluntary Health Scotland NHS National Services Scotland Staff-side rep, NHS Lanarkshire and Royal College of Nursing Project Officer, Scottish Health Council Apologies Margaret Young Tony McGowan Louise MacLennan Services Manager, NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde HR Manager, Healthcare Improvement Scotland Communications Manager, NHS National Services 1. Welcome and apologies Neil opened the meeting and apologies received were noted. Diane McCulloch has stepped down due to a change in her post in Dundee City Council. Alan to speak to Diane regarding a replacement. 2. Minutes of meeting held on 17 May 2016 The minutes of the meeting were agreed as accurate. Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 1 of 7 Review date: N/A

2 3. Matters arising (a) Proposed ministerial visit Neil reported that the ministerial visit planned for today (15/11/16), had been postponed via the Minister s office. This visit is in the process of being rearranged, and it is hoped that it will go ahead on Wednesday 1 February This will be confirmed as soon as possible. (b) Clear Pathway Update Lesley Munro gave an update on the progress of the project. Since the project was launched six months ago, she has directly engaged with over 100 individuals,, 44 third sector organisations, 10 NHS staff side representatives and 9 third sector interfaces. Lesley reported that a picture is beginning to form showing the risks and barriers to volunteering these organisations are facing: Relationships between third sector organisations, third sector interfaces and NHS Boards can be difficult if there is a lack of trust and shared understanding. There is awareness about the capacity issues facing Volunteer Managers, particularly in smaller boards. There is a great variety in approach to service agreements across Boards and Partnerships. Different approaches to these are adopted by Boards, and contracts put in place differ greatly. There are barriers to training and lack of support for training across the Boards. In regard to risk, on the evidence to date there appeared to be few significant high risks in current practice involving third sector volunteers. Lesley reported that there a lot of positives coming from the interviews in terms of various innovative volunteering projects including some projects which have robust funding. Moving forward, Lesley will continue with the mapping and conduct a Survey Monkey and case studies. A large part of her report will revolve around guidance for the NHS on working with third sector partners. Lesley is currently in talks with NESTA about the possibility of showcasing the NESTA Helping in Hospitals programme 1 in a VHS event in Neil thanked Lesley for her verbal update and asked if anyone had any further thoughts or questions. 1 Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 2 of 7 Review date: N/A

3 Lesley fed back to the Group that the risks highlighted during engagement did not appear to be widespread or extensive. Sandie Dickson noted the existing policies and procedures in place ensuring volunteers follow infection control procedures. Sandra McDougall asked about the Service Level Agreements, and asked if Lesley was getting copies of these sent to her. Lesley stated that she has requested copies of service agreements, but hasn t yet analysed the content. Claire Stevens suggested that the interim Clear Pathway report could be shared with the group in order to get some feedback on what goes into resulting guidance. Voluntary Health Scotland will look to establish a sub-group of its existing reference group to help shape the guidance and confirm its target audience. Neil asked that any useful information from this could be presented to the Minister at the rearranged visit in February. 4. Response to the Additional Employment PIN Policy Alan Bigham reinforced that were it not for the signposting of the draft PIN policy by Katrina Murray, he would not have been aware of the PIN policy. He stated that there are gaps in the document in terms of what volunteering can be and that this provided an opportunity to progress employer supported volunteering in reframing the document. Sandie Dickson stated that employer supported volunteering could be difficult to manage within acute services as it would be difficult to backfill staff on the front line within wards etc. She also felt that it would not be sustainable to cherry pick staff for this purpose. The Group agreed that any resulting policy needed to be equitable across NHS Boards and staff roles. Neil stated that the response was a very well written and comprehensive piece of work, noting the Group s agreement that the removal of volunteering form the draft policy would be the best option. Neil noted that the policy was very robust in terms of additional employment, however, not everyone is content to authorise this. Sandra McDougall stated that it would be helpful to add in the names of the National Group members to the beginning of the response. Neil reported that a Stuart Ferguson, Clinical Leadership Fellow (Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow) was engaging with NHS Boards on a Global Health and Volunteering in Scottish Health Sector. Alan to follow up. Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 3 of 7 Review date: N/A

4 5. National Group remit and membership Alan spoke about the ongoing challenge of the group in terms of guidance around the integration of health and social care. There is a need to look at the scope of reach of the group, which should be across health and social care and be reflective of volunteering in Scotland. Neil stated that a sample group for the National Group works well currently and it must be ensured that the group stays within a reasonable number of representatives. Marion Findlay stated she would be interested to hear the thought of strategic leads around the membership of the group. Diane Lockhart commented that distribution of minutes presently doesn t include strategic leads, in the past they have stated that they do not have time to read documents longer than a few pages, due to their workload. Alan confirmed that similar feedback was received at a meeting of strategic leads. Sandie Dickson expressed some concerns about the Boards not being asked to give hard data on their volunteering activities or what impact it has had. She felt that it has been allowed to slide so questions remain about progress. She thought perhaps a short sharp update from these meetings could be helpful. Neil agreed that a one page brief could be useful for strategic leads. Alan referred to the earlier research on the needs of integration authorities in terms of volunteering development. They summary of the research suggested that they were not yet ready to discuss volunteering and across the feedback the understanding of volunteering varied considerably. Alan went on to highlight the difference in support to NHS Boards compared to local authorities. 6. Programme update Alan gave an update on the programme: NHS Highland have now begun to use the system. The next introductory webinar is due to take place on Tuesday 22 November. The next advanced webinar is due to take place on Wednesday 7 December. Further webinar dates for 2017 are being organised presently. The Volunteering Information System User Group will meet again on 23 November. There are plans to expand on the current webinars, to include some input around Excel training. Review of the Volunteering Handbook is anticipated to begin in January Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 4 of 7 Review date: N/A

5 Volunteer manager research deadline has been extended to end of November. Subsequent report will be delayed due to this extension. Volunteer Managers Network Meeting took place on 18 October, next meeting will be on 9 March. It is hoped that Edinburgh City Council s Social Care team will be presenting. 7. Volunteering Information System 2016 second quarter report Alan gave an overview of the 2 nd quarter report for Alan reported that NHS24 and Dumfries and Galloway are expected to be the next Boards to be using the system. Additional work is required for NHS National Services. Marion Findlay expressed concern that only 1% of volunteers had a route in via the Third Sector Interface and suggested there may be work to do here. Alan reported that there could be some work done around further defining what the routes into volunteering were, by doing some research into the 20% with no response. Marion felt that this may not be of any value, as the further defined these responses become, the less defined it actually is as volunteers may not recall their primary referral source. 8. Employer Supported Volunteering There was some discussion around the Employer Supported Volunteering paper produced by Alan. Sandra McDougall commented that it would often come down to staff resources in that nonpatient facing staff would have more opportunity to undertake employer supported volunteering. Staff at ward level would need bank cover as off duty rotas are prepared well in advance and it is necessary to have a certain amount of staff to cover the floor. Sandie agreed that it would be very difficult for managers of patient facing staff to endorse this. Neil commented that this report was formatted in 2010 and asked whether it still proved relevant in The group agreed that is was still relevant information at present. Neil commented that ways to reduce barriers to employer supported volunteering must be looked at and further discussion around this is needed. Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 5 of 7 Review date: N/A

6 Sandie told of a staff member at The State Hospital who is presently doing what would be regarded as employer supported volunteering. One of the nursing staff is teaching groups of people how to create sugar icing for baked goods. This has been a very successful group. Sandie thought it could be a good idea to get a snapshot of these types of roles across all the Boards. Alan agreed and stated this could be looked into and shared. 9. Any other business Sandie reported that she will attend the Cross Party Group on Volunteering at the Scottish Parliament on 16 November Sandie will provide feedback to the group on this. 10. Future meeting dates It was agreed that the next meeting will take place on 31 January or 1 February 2017 (after the meeting with the Minister). Alan will confirm the details for this. Lisa Taylor will take over the planning of group meetings and organise these for the rest of Action log Agenda item Action Responsibility Timescale 1 Contact Diane McCulloch Alan Bigham regarding a replacement for the group 2 Draft minutes to be sent to Group Lisa Taylor Within 1 week member 2 Minutes of November meeting to Alan Bigham be made available on the Scottish Health Council website 3 Confirmation of date for Ministerial Alan Bigham visit to be sought 4 Contact to be made with Stuart Ferguson at Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow Alan Bigham None specified 8 Research into employer supported roles currently ongoing within NHS Scotland Boards Alan Bigham / Lisa Taylor 17 th January 2017 Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 6 of 7 Review date: N/A

7 Agenda item Action Responsibility Timescale 9 Feedback from Cross Party Group Sandie Dickson 31 st January 2017 on Volunteering (16 November 2016) 10 Planning of all National Group meetings for 2017 Lisa Taylor Produced by: L. Taylor, A. Bigham Page 7 of 7 Review date: N/A