There’s still time to have your say on how we assess and rate health and care services

You still have time to take part in our consultation on proposals to improve how we assess health and care services, make judgements, and award ratings.

We want to hear views from everyone – providers, professionals, partner organisations, people who use services, and members of the public – about the changes we’re proposing to improve.

The consultation builds on our roadshows, workshops, meetings and other events with a wide range of stakeholders held over the past few months. These events have given us valuable early insights that have helped shape and co-design the proposals we are now putting forward.

Our proposed changes aim to address the concerns raised in external reviews of our current ways of working from Dr Penny Dash, Professor Sir Mike Richards, and the Care Provider Alliance. The changes aim to create a clearer, simpler, and more trusted framework, built through engagement, collaboration, and co‑design with those who deliver and use services.

The consultation closes at 5pm on 11 December.

• Get involved: read our consultation document and complete the online form

Join us! Work for CQC

CQC staff have a wide range of skills and work across many disciplines.

Current vacancies include:

• Lead User Researcher
• Rating Assurance Review Officer
• Senior Lawyer (Civil Litigation)
• HTA Regulation Manager – Human Tissue Authority

Benefits include generous leave entitlement, NHS or Nest pension schemes and a wide range of employee discounts.

Most roles offer flexible locations with the choice to be home-based. See the individual job listings for more information.

• Browse our current vacancies
• Working at CQC

Extended deadline: Share your views on how we assess local authorities

We have extended our deadline for feedback on what we look at when assessing local authorities to 9 December 2025. This is separate to our consultation on how we assess and rate health and care services.

To support our future assessments of local authorities, we want to introduce and use rating characteristics. These will suggest what care and support, and governance and leadership might look like for each quality statement across each rating in the assessment framework.

We want to hear your views on our initial draft rating characteristics for local authority assessments. These are based on what we have learned from our initial baselining assessments, current good practice, and our engagement to date.

• News: CQC local authority assessments: hearing from you as we develop our future approach

Professor Bola Owolabi: The state of care in primary care and community services

Professor Bola Owolabi, Chief Inspector of Primary Care and Community Services, has written a blog post looking at what we found in our State of Care report and the current landscape for primary care and community services.

Bola highlights that, although more GPs are training to join the future workforce, rising demand has had a considerable impact on people’s access to care and the quality of care they receive.

She also notes that community services will need substantial investment in both capacity and capability to deliver the transformation set out in the government’s 10 Year Health Plan for England.

• Blog: CQC State of Care: What does this look like for primary care and community services?

New local authority assessments published

We publish reports that look at how local authorities are meeting their responsibilities to make sure people have access to adult social care and support.

Recent reports look at:

• Kirklees Council
• London Borough of Waltham Forest
• London Borough of Barking and Dagenham
• London Borough of Sutton
• North Yorkshire Council

Each report looks at 9 areas spread across 4 themes to check how well each authority is meeting its responsibilities. Areas are given a score out of 1 to 4. A score of 1 is given when evidence shows significant shortfalls for this area, and 4 when evidence shows an exceptional standard is being met.

• Local authority assessment reports

Chris Dzikiti new Interim Chief Inspector of Mental Health

We recently announced that Dr Arun Chopra has taken on the role of Interim Chief Executive. While Arun fulfils this role, Chris Dzikiti has stepped into the role of Interim Chief Inspector of Mental Health.

In the role of Interim Chief Inspector of Mental Health, Chris will be leading on the future implementation of the Mental Health Bill and will be working closely with Arun as CQC continues to carry out its Mental Health Act duties. He will also be temporarily representing CQC as a member on the National Preventative Mechanism (NPM) Steering Group. CQC is the designated NPM for deprivation of liberty in health and social care across England.

• News: Dr Arun Chopra assumes role of Interim Chief Executive of CQC