Title, commencement, application and interpretation

1.-(1) The title of these Regulations is the Care and Support (Partnership Arrangements for Population Assessments) (Wales) Regulations 2015.

(2) These Regulations come into force on 6 April 2016 and apply in relation to Wales.

(3) In these Regulations-

"partnership arrangement" ("trefniant partneriaeth") means the partnership arrangement which is required to be made by regulation 2;

"population assessment" ("asesiad poblogaeth") means the assessment which is required to be carried out under section 14(1) of the Act;

"specified functions" ("swyddogaethau penodedig") means the functions specified in regulation 3;

"the Act" ("y Ddeddf") means the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014;

"the partnership bodies" ("y cyrff partneriaeth") are those bodies which are required by regulation 2 to enter into partnership arrangements.

Partnership arrangements

2.  A partnership arrangement for carrying out the specified functions must be made by the Local Health Boards listed in the first column of the table in the Schedule and the corresponding local authority or local authorities listed in the second column of that table.

Specified functions

3.  The functions to be carried out in accordance with the partnership arrangements are the functions of the partnership bodies conferred on them by or under section 14(1) of the Act.

Form of partnership arrangements

4.  The partnership bodies must establish a joint committee to take responsibility for the management of the partnership arrangement.

Operation of partnership arrangements

5.-(1) The partnership bodies for each partnership arrangement must appoint one of the bodies to be the lead co-ordinating body.

(2) The lead co-ordinating body is to be responsible for co-ordinating the carrying out of the population assessments for the local authority areas covered by the partnership arrangement.

Information sharing

6.  The partnership bodies may share information with each other for the purposes of carrying out functions in accordance with the partnership arrangement.

Delegation of functions

7.  The lead co-ordinating body may carry out the functions which have been conferred on each of the local authorities in the partnership arrangement by regulation 6(4) of the Care and Support (Population Assessment) (Wales) Regulations 2015(2).

Regulation 2

SCHEDULESpecified partnership arrangements

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

Section 166 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 ("the Act") enables Welsh Ministers to make regulations requiring a combination of local authorities and Local Health Boards to enter into partnership arrangements for carrying out specified functions.

These Regulations require Local Health Boards and local authorities to enter into partnership arrangements for the purpose of carrying out their functions under section 14 of the Act. These functions relate to the assessment of the needs of people in a local authority's area, including the needs of carers (referred to in the regulations as a "population assessment"). A population assessment must also include an assessment of the range and level of services required to meet the needs of the people in the local authority's area and the range and level of preventative services required.

Regulation 2 specifies the bodies (referred to in the regulations as "partnership bodies") that must enter into a partnership arrangement for this purpose. Partnership arrangements must be entered into by each Local Health Board and the local authority or authorities within the area of each Local Health Board, as described in the Schedule.

Regulation 3 specifies the functions which are to be carried out in accordance with the partnership arrangements. These include the functions described in section 14 of the Act and any function described in regulations made under section 14(1) (see the Care and Support (Population Assessments) (Wales) Regulations 2015).

Regulations 4 and 5 make provision for the form of the partnership arrangement and the operation of the partnership arrangement, including the appointment of a lead co-ordinating body.

Regulation 6 makes provision for information sharing between the partnership bodies.

Regulation 7 enables the lead co-ordinating body to submit to the Welsh Ministers a copy of the population assessment reports which have been produced for the areas of each of the local authorities in the partnership arrangement.