Delyth Jewell MS, Deputy Minister for Social Care, Mental Health and Women’s Health
Social care supports thousands of people, families and communities across Wales every day. Effective commissioning is essential to ensuring those services are sustainable, high quality and centred on what matters to people. Strengthening commissioning is therefore an important part of our wider work to strengthen social care and progress towards a National Care Service for Wales.
As demand for care continues to grow, we need lasting change that strengthens services, supports the workforce and improves care for people, so that they can expect the same high standards of care and support, wherever they live in Wales from a health and care system that wraps around individuals and their unpaid carers.
The recently published National Care Service Programme sets out how we will work together to achieve that during this Senedd term.
As a first step to delivery of this programme today, I am launching a 12-week public consultation on proposed revisions to the National Framework for Commissioning Care and Support: Code of Practice. The consultation will run from 9 November 2026 to 1 February 2027.
The Code came into effect in September 2024 and sets out the principles and standards that support the commissioning of care and support services across Wales by Local Authorities and Health Boards. It promotes a consistent, transparent and outcomes-focused approach centred on well-being and what matters to people who need care and support, including adults, children and unpaid carers.
Since the Code was introduced, the National Office for Care and Support has listened to commissioners, providers, representative organisations, regulators, trade unions, people with lived experience, unpaid carers and social care workers. Their feedback, together with wider policy and legislative developments, has informed the proposed revisions.
The proposed revisions reflect the lessons learnt from the implementation of the Code and seek to ensure it continues to support high-quality commissioning within an evolving policy and service landscape.
The revisions are intended to strengthen commissioning practice across Wales, support greater consistency and accountability, improve integration and collaboration between health and social care, and ensure commissioning decisions are informed by evidence, lived experience and a focus on outcomes. They also reinforce our commitment to fair work, equality, human rights, the Welsh language and support for unpaid carers. Ultimately, the aim is to support better outcomes for people, families and communities through more consistent, evidence-informed commissioning.
The consultation seeks views on the proposed revisions, and on how they will affect people and the commissioning organisations themselves both practically and financially. Responses will help inform the final version of the Code, accompanying impact assessments and our ongoing plans for investment in commissioning capacity and capability. Responses will also contribute to the developing evidence base for funding and spending decisions, to ensure fairer and more sustainable social care in Wales.
The National framework for commissioning care and support consultation and supporting documents are available on the Welsh Government website in Welsh and English. Accessible versions and alternative formats are also available.
I encourage everyone with an interest in care and support services to respond. I am listening, and I want the revised Code to reflect the experience and evidence of those who commission, provide and rely on care and support across Wales. The consultation closes on 1 February 2027.
Diolch