1. Please can you tell me the amount of money you spent on the Independent NHS Complaints Advocacy service for the following financial years, the organisation you commissioned to deliver this statutory service and the number of new cases taken on each year:
Devon County Council commissions NHS Complaints Advocacy on behalf of Devon’s two NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups, who both make contributions to the wider adults advocacy contract this is a small part of.
| Financial Year | Amount spent | Number of new cases | Organisation |
| 2013 -2014 | * | * | seAp |
| 2014 – 2015 | * | * | Devon Advocacy Consortium inlcuding seAp |
| 2015 – 2016 | £45,000 | 150 | Devon Advocacy Consortium including seAp |
| 2016 – 2017 | £43,000 | 140 | Devon Advocacy Consortium including seAP |
| 2017 – 2018 | £41,000 | 130 | Devon Advocacy Consortium including seAp |
| 2018 – 2019 | £40,000 | 118 | Devon Advocacy Consortium including Living Options Devon |
2. In addition to complaints advocacy for NHS services, does your local authority directly provide or commission complaints advocacy services for those looking to make complaints or raise concerns about local social care services?
Financial Year Does your local authority provide advocacy for social care complaints – indicate one of the options below:
• Yes, as an independent contract in the same way as NHS complaints advocacy.
• Yes, as an independent contract but case are limited to those eligible for advocacy support under the Care Act.Adult social care complainants will only receive advocacy if they are eligible for it under the Care Act. Data on Care Act referrals does not enable the complaints stage of cases to be identified, nor the amount spent just on the complaints stage of cases. The provider of Care Act advocacy is the Devon Advocacy Consortium.
• Yes, but as part of the broader advocacy provision offered by the council.
3. Does your local authority set out a clause in any contracts for complaints advocacy providers in health and social care to share information and insight with relevant local partners such as local Health and Wellbeing Boards, Quality Surveillance Groups or Healthwatch?
No