Westminster Committee visits Isle of Wight as part of its inquiry on adult social care
7 February 2025
Parliament’s Health and Social Care Select Committee this week conducted a visit to the Isle of Wight, to explore the provision of health and social care on the island, as part of its Adult Social Care Reform: The Cost of Inaction inquiry.
The Committee chose to visit the Isle of Wight to inform its inquiry, as the island’s demography is characterised by a higher proportion of residents aged 65 and above compared to the national average.
Members of the Committee visited St Mary’s Hospital, part of the Isle of Wight NHS Trust, the only NHS organisation in the country that provides Acute (hospital based) services and ambulance services.
During their visit MPs were able to see first-hand the delivery of health care services, touring the hospital’s Urgent and Emergency Care Floor and its unplanned care ward and frailty provision.
MPs met with the Trust’s CEO, Penny Emerit, and its Chief Officer, Joe Smyth, to understand the local context in which care is being delivered, and also met with the hospital’s Consultant Practitioner in Acute Frailty and Emergency Medicine Consultant amongst others.
After touring the hospital, the Committee met with Directors from the Isle of Wight Council, including its Strategic Director for Adult Social Care and Housing, and heard about the challenges they face meeting the needs of the island’s population, including working age adults.
In its meetings with employees at the hospital and the Council, the Committee explored the extent to which challenges in social care provision locally impact on the hospital’s ability to move more care into the community and its ability to focus on prevention.
At the hospital, the Committee had the opportunity to meet with representatives from community groups including Healthwatch, Age UK and Carers Isle of Wight. They heard about the changing nature of the work these groups are doing and the challenges they face around funding and providing services.
During their time on the Isle of Wight, MPs also visited Care in the Garden, a not-for-profit organisation set up to create work opportunities for adults with additional needs, and Hazel Lodge care home, where they met with both employees and residents.
Comments
The Chair of the Committee, Layla Moran MP, said:
“The Committee is grateful to the Isle of Wight’s St Mary’s Hospital, Care in the Garden and Hazel Lodge for welcoming us this week and for giving up their time to ensure a constructive day for us.
“We found it very valuable to be able to see first-hand the delivery of health care services and to learn about how the NHS Trust, the Council and the voluntary sector work to provide health and social care services for a population significantly older than the national average.
“Our visit has given us much food for thought and helpful insights, which will inform our future work in our inquiry into adult social care.
“We were pleased that our visit to the island also afforded us an opportunity to visit a not-for-profit organisation supporting work opportunities for adults with additional needs and we enjoyed chatting to employees about the value of the support provided by Care in the Garden.
“A major part of adult social care is of course care provided in residential care homes, and so we are grateful to Hazel Lodge Care home for facilitating our visit to them during which we were glad to be able to speak to care workers and residents.”
Penny Emerit, Chief Executive, Isle of Wight NHS Trust and Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust, said:
“We were delighted to welcome the Health and Social Care Select Committee to the Island. As an Island community we face additional challenges to ensure we provide high quality care and it was great to have this recognised. We were able to showcase some of the fantastic innovations we already have in place across our integrated acute and ambulance trust and also discuss what changes would help to further progress this and our partnership working.”
Joe Smyth, Chief Officer, Isle of Wight NHS Trust, said:
“The island is a great place to test innovative work, due to our unique position of having integrated acute and ambulance services. It was a real opportunity for our staff to share how we are already transforming our services. We are also keen to do more to support the development of new models of care and welcome the opportunity to work together on trialling and implementing the needs of an increasingly frail community.”
Further information
Images: House of Commons