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Collaborate's latest report argues for greater support between commissioning teams and third sector care and support providers.

With the Scottish referendum over and further cuts to public services on the horizon, a new Collaborate report argues for greater collaboration and stronger relationships between third sector care providers and commissioners.

Last week Collaborate launched its latest report, From Providers to Partners: What Will It Take?, in partnership with the Coalition of Care and Support Providers in Scotland (CCPS).

The report, co-authored by Dr Henry Kippin and Rory Swinson Reid, was the result of research and extensive interviews with senior figures across the Scottish care and support sector and central and local government.

While there is currently a wide range of reforms both planned and under way in Holyrood, including Self-directed Support and the integration of health and social care, there remains a gap between policy and practice, particularly in regards to the commissioning of care-related services.

Key arguments from the report include:

• Commissioners and providers must change their behaviour to build stronger relationships – led by a more robust model of ‘public social partnership’. 
• Providers should influence commissioning by building a stronger evidence base for preventative and personalised forms of care and support.
• Commissioners must look beyond short-term imperatives of cost and volume, and work with those providers delivering innovative models of personalised support.
• Both commissioners and providers need to take collaboration more seriously and should work together to develop a Collaborative Leaders Hub for improving cross-sector dialogue.

Dr Kippin said, “Scotland has set the framework for a radical and innovative model of public service delivery that has prevention and co-production at its heart. But it will take real collaboration across sectors and across the purchaser-provider divide to make it happen in practice.”

Annie Gunner Logan, director of CCPS, said the report comes at an important time as “relationships between commissioning authorities and providers have become characterised by a ‘buyer-supplier’ dynamic conducted through procurement processes that inhibit, rather than advance, our shared agenda for better outcomes, greater collaboration and real partnership with the people we support.”

She believes the report sets out “an alternative approach to these crucial relationships, capitalising on the opportunities offered by the positive framework of policy and legislation that we have all worked so hard to put in place. We hope that our partners in the new health and social care integration authorities will embrace its recommendations and work with us to transform the way we do business together”.

Welcoming the report, Martin Cawley, chief executive of Turning Point Scotland and convenor of the CCPS board, said: “CCPS has been delighted to work with Dr Henry Kippin from Collaborate on this project.  Henry has produced a very helpful report which will go a long way in helping us positively engage with commissioning colleagues from the statutory agencies we work with. The paper also provides a number of positive alternatives to traditional ways of procuring services which have the potential to strengthen collaboration and help partners to confidently navigate their way through the challenges that lie ahead for all parties involved in the development and delivery of public services.”

Dr Kippin presented the research at CCPS's annual conference on the 26th November.