Capricorn Cottage

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices and independence and good access to local communities most people take for granted. ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ is the guidance CQC follows to make assessment and judgements about services supporting people with a learning disability and autistic people and providers must have regard to it. We have taken these principles into account when assessing the service.

When assessing the environment people lived in we found it did not always meet ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ guidance. This was due to the layout of the service, which had been registered prior to the above guidance being issued. The registered manager and provider were aware changes were needed to bring the environment in line with the current guidance and had plans to address this issue as people moved on from the service so structural changes could be made. Their plans would mean more people were living in either single or much smaller apartments dependent on their needs and preferences.

We started our assessment of the service on 27 February 2025. We visited the service on 27 and 28 February, and on the 24 April 2025. We finished our assessment on 27 May 2025.

We undertook this inspection to follow up on some anonymous concerns raised related to safeguarding issues and staffing. However, throughout the inspection we did not find any evidence to support the concerns raised.

People were supported in a safe environment, staff supporting them had received the necessary training to guide them in their roles. There was sufficient staff in place to allow people to be safely supported and undertake social activities of their choice.

The risks to people’s safety were well managed and people were safely supported to maintain their independence. People’s medicines were managed safely.

Staff showed a good knowledge of how to support people in line with the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005. Where people’s liberty was restricted, this was undertaken lawfully using the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) assessments.

Staff supported people to live as full a life as possible and ensure they worked to support people’s choices were upheld.

People, relatives and staff were able to make their views known to the provider and felt they were listened to. The registered manager used the provider’s governance processes to monitor and improve the quality of care to the people they supported.