- Conference
- 2012 Health Care Service Group Conference
- Date
- 15 December 2011
- Decision
- Carried
UNISON reaffirms its position on regulation for Healthcare Assistants. While welcoming the move to regulate Healthcare Assistants, we remain concerned with the lack of progress in some areas and the fragmented approach across the UK.
The NHS is increasingly reliant on Healthcare Assistants but as some high profile cases have shown there are huge variations across the country in standard of care and training.
Healthcare Assistants are essential to the NHS and it therefore follows that there should be mandatory training and regulation for this group of workers.
Training will help to improve the quality of care provided by Healthcare Assistants as well as increase their confidence. Mandatory training and regulation will ensure standardisation and a means to enforce employers to comply with the standards set.
UNISON represents the genuine voice of the Healthcare Assistants role and the wider health team.
Conference therefore calls on the Service Group Executive to enter into discussions with the Health Departments in all 4 countries to seek a UK agreement on regulation.
Any agreement should include:
a)A national code of conduct
b)A national competency framework
c)Standardised national staff induction
d)A single regulatory body (not necessarily the Nursing and Midwifery Council)