How will the Welsh Government work with members of the expert panel on social care to explore the potential of co-operative models of care to contribute to a future national care service in Wales?
Further to the commitment made within the Co-operation Agreement to set up an Expert Group to support our shared ambition to create a National Care Service, free at the point of need and continuing as a public service, work has taken place to establish the Expert Group. I published a written statement about the group, including its membership and terms of reference on 21 February: https://gov.wales/written-statement-national-care-service-expert-group.
It will be for the expert group to come to its own conclusions, but one of the objectives set for the group is to consider how to increase the percentage of care delivered on a not-for-profit basis. This would include increasing local government directly provided services as well as care provision delivered by cooperative enterprises.
We expect to receive the report and recommendations from the expert group by the end of April 2022.