Covid reporting, Care Homes Funding, “The Cornwall We Want” survey & How Council Spend could benefit Cornwall

Cornwall Council Report 27/6/20 - Jayne Kirkham - Labour Councillor for Falmouth Smithick

There have been concerns about the reporting of Covid cases. There had been 594 in Cornwall as at 22 June and 203 deaths as of 12 June. Since then there have been outbreaks in 2 care homes. Only Pillar 1 cases are being reported which are the NHS tested ones. The government are not releasing the Pillar 2 figures to the public. These are the tests done from the mobile testing centres by the private providers. This is because of inaccuracies. This means that the figures are likely to be quite a bit higher than those reported.

On 17 May, additional funding for care homes as an infection control grant was announced, with Cornwall receiving an allocation of £6.7m. Based on 5,272 registered care homes beds, this equates to £962 per placement in Cornwall which is being distributed. Care homes and domicillary care providers finally have most of the PPE they need. We are still concerned that staff and residents in care homes are currently only entitled to be tested once. Repeated testing is the only way to prevent the spread of Covid in care settings like the one that has just happened at Pengover. Information about cases is still not making its way from the national Test and Trace service to local Public Health officers.

The council have done a survey on ‘the Cornwall we Want’ - https://letstalk.cornwall.gov.uk/the-cornwall-we-want It’s about how the changes that have happened during the Covid pandemic have affected Cornwall and where to go next. Please have your say.
The hospitality industry re-opens on 4 July and bookings are already mounting for the rest of the tourist season. The Council and Visit Cornwall can do little more than encourage holidaymakers to book accommodation and day trips well ahead, follow social distancing guidelines while they’re here and help businesses to re-open as safely as possible

My motion on Cornwall Council adopting a Preston Labour Council style model of procurement has been accepted to go on the agenda of the full council meeting on 7 July, after much effort. It is gaining cross-party support. It is hard to object to the Council using its spend to benefit the people, climate and economy of Cornwall, after all! I am hoping that after all the work we have done on the wording to make it comply with competition and procurement law, that the Chair of the Council accepts it for debate.