In June 2022, CQC’s Research, Development and Evaluation Committee signed off a plan proposed by the Research & Evaluation team to evaluate the new regulatory model. This included evaluating how the model is applied to assessments of providers, integrated care systems and local authorities .

In Summer 2022 CQC undertook ‘test and learn’ exercises with 2 local authorities to test the approach to assessing how they meet their adult social care responsibilities under the Care Act. Using the learning from this testing and refining the methodology accordingly, it was agreed to pilot the approach in 5 local authorities during Summer 2023. The 5 pilot sites were selected from those that put themselves forward using a criteria to ensure the pilots covered a range of local authorities.

As with the test and learn exercises, members of CQC’s Research & Evaluation team joined the wider pilot project team to devise a full evaluation of the pilot process. The team included one Research & Evaluation Manager and one Research & Evaluation Advisor.