Recommendation F148: Training
From Report of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Public Inquiry, published 6 February 2013.
Recommendation
The complexities of the health service are such that proper training must be available to the leadership of Local Healthwatch as well as, when the occasion arises, expert advice.
In brief (written by this site)
In commentary provided in September 2024 and published in February 2026, the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England stated that Healthwatch continues to offer a range of training and resources for local Healthwatch staff and volunteers (DHSC and NHS England, Feb 2026). Earlier, in May 2024, the Thirlwall Inquiry legal team reviewed implementation, noting that the government had accepted the recommendation and that training, support, and access to expert advice were being made available (The Thirlwall Inquiry legal team, May 2024).
AI-generated summary of the record on this page, checked by a second model and automatic checks, 26 Sep 2026. The record below is the sources' own words.
Government response
Accepted.
Healthwatch England is working to support local Healthwatch in their identification and analysis of issues in their communities and to support them to raise these issues in the appropriate manner. Already, local Healthwatch organisations are rightly working in partnership with local community and interest groups that have a wealth of expertise and experience available to them. Local Healthwatch organisations also have the flexibility to source expert advice as they require, while training and support is being made available through Healthwatch England.
As an example of what has already been achieved, Healthwatch England has this year delivered training to local Healthwatch organisations across the country to ensure that they can maximise the impact of their power to enter and view local services.
How this response relates to the recommendation
Site note: This is volume two of "Hard Truths: The Journey to Putting Patients First" (Cm 8777-II), the government's response to the Inquiry's 290 recommendations, published by the Department of Health on GOV.UK on 19 November 2013 and dated to that day here. The PDF the row links to is the accessible edition, whose title page reads "January 2014". The Department of Health has been the Department of Health and Social Care since January 2018. The volume says it includes accounts from each of the national organisations the recommendations name, but it does not mark which passage each organisation wrote, so every row is filed under the Department that published it.
Blanket government agreement does not establish acceptance or delivery by each addressee. Some response passages cover groups of recommendations.
Scope of the government response
Government responded via "Hard Truths: The Journey to Putting Patients First" (2014), a single document covering all 290 recommendations with a blanket acceptance. Individual recommendation responses were not broken out.
Delivery
DHSC and NHS England say in progress (27 February 2026)
Healthwatch continues to offer a range of training and resources for local Healthwatch staff and volunteers.
Site note: DHSC and NHS England's own account of progress, supplied to the Thirlwall Inquiry in September 2024 and printed in the Inquiry legal team's Review of Implementation of Recommendations from Previous Inquiries into Healthcare Issues (version dated April 2025, published 27 February 2026). It is not a finding of the Inquiry. Their reviewed extent of implementation reads “Implemented - Ongoing”. Table row: section 18.2 No. 148, PDF page 494-495.
Department of Health and Social Care says in progress (11 February 2015)
Healthwatch England continues to provide support to local Healthwatch so that they can deliver effectively. During 2013/14 Healthwatch England provided training for local Healthwatch on entering and viewing local services and provided support across a range of other local Healthwatch activities. In 2014/15, Healthwatch England has delivered further training, for example on working with the Care Quality Commission inspection teams, and has also developed a network for local Healthwatch chairs.
The Department has also funded the Local Government Association in 2014/15 to support the development of an effective local Healthwatch network, with a specific focus on supporting local Healthwatch to be effective members of local health and wellbeing boards.
Site note: This is the supporting annex published on 11 February 2015 with "Culture change in the NHS: applying the lessons of the Francis Inquiries" (Cm 9009), attached to the GOV.UK page as "Culture change in the NHS supporting annex". The annex has no title page; that title is GOV.UK's and the PDF's own. Its table has four columns (No., Recommendation, Hard Truths Government response, Progress update), and the row carries the Progress update cell. No column says which organisation wrote an update, so the row is filed under the Department of Health (now the Department of Health and Social Care), which published it.
Site note: The Inquiry addressed this recommendation to Healthwatch England, not to the Department of Health. The annex gives this update in the Department's publication and does not say who wrote it, so the row is the Department's report of the progress made on it.
What other bodies have found
In their own words. These do not change the delivery statement above.
Thirlwall Inquiry legal team (15 May 2024)
This recommendation was accepted by the Government.
In the January 2014 Hard Truths report, the Government said that Healthwatch England was working to support local Healthwatch in their identification and analysis of issues, with training and support made available through Healthwatch England. On expert advice, the Government said that local Healthwatch organisations had the flexibility to source such advice as they require. In the February 2015 Hard Truths report, the Government said that Healthwatch England continued to provide training and support to local Healthwatch.
Site note: The Thirlwall Inquiry legal team's own notes on implementation, from its Review of Implementation of Recommendations from Previous Inquiries into Healthcare Issues (version of 15 May 2024). The review does not colour its Extent of Implementation cell for this recommendation green; it leaves the cell uncoloured where a recommendation was rejected, where evidence of implementation was insufficient, or where steps had been taken but implementation was not yet complete. Table row: section 16.2 No. 148, PDF page 461-462.
Source
Themes and tags
Who has spoken
- Department of Health and Social Care
Response, delivery statement - DHSC and NHS England
Delivery statement - Thirlwall Inquiry legal team
Finding