recording and reporting of deaths in externally provided local-authority-funded social care
Case reference FOI2026/02464
Received 12 October 2026
Published 13 November 2026
Request
Please treat this email as a request for recorded information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Scope and definitions Unless otherwise stated, I am seeking information for the five financial years from 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2025, inclusive.
For this request: Externally provided social care means care delivered by an organisation or provider independent of the commissioning local authority, or NHS body, rather than through the authority's own in-house services. Publicly Funded social care means care that the local authority or NHS body commissions, arranges or funds wholly or partly using local-authority funds. This includes placements or services purchased directly from an external provider, block or spot contracts, commissioned care packages and other externally delivered services funded wholly or partly by the authority or NHS body. Eligible providers includes for-profit private companies, voluntary organisations, charities, social enterprises and other independent-sector providers, regardless of their legal structure or profit status. The request covers adult social care for people aged 18 or over and children's social care for children under 18. Relevant services may include, where applicable:
* Adult residential and nursing care.
* Adult domiciliary care.
* Supported living and other externally provided adult social care.
* Children's residential care.
* Foster care provided through independent fostering agencies.
* Other externally provided children's social care placements or services funded wholly or partly by the local authority. The request includes placements located outside the commissioning authority's geographical area, where the authority commissions, arranges or funds the care. It excludes care delivered directly by the local authority through its own in-house services, care funded entirely by the individual or family without public funding. Where funding is shared between the local authority and another body, or between the local authority and the individual or family, the arrangement falls within scope. I do not require personal data or identifiable information about individual deceased people. Please answer the adult and children's social care sections separately wherever possible.
Part A - Adult social care 1. Recording systems Please confirm whether the council maintains any register, database, spreadsheet, case-management system, reporting system or other recorded dataset used to record, collate or monitor deaths involving adults receiving externally provided social care funded wholly or partly by a public body. If such systems exist, please provide any existing data dictionary, field list, system specification or equivalent document describing the information recorded. In particular, please indicate whether the council records:
a. Date of death and, where recorded, location of death.
b. Type of care service received.
c. Name or category of the external provider.
d. Whether the council commissioned, arranged or funded the care.
e. Whether the care was funded wholly or partly by the council, including any distinction between local-authority funding, joint funding, NHS funding and self-funding.
f. Whether the death was notified to the council, including the source and date of notification where recorded.
g. Whether the death led to a safeguarding referral, incident report, investigation, review or other recorded follow-up action.
h. Whether the care was delivered within the commissioning authority's geographical area or outside it. If information is recorded only in individual case files or separate operational systems rather than a central register or aggregate dataset, please indicate this where known from existing records or documentation. I am not asking the council to manually review individual case files to create new totals.
Part B - Children's social care 2. Recording systems Please confirm whether the council maintains any register, database, spreadsheet, case-management system, reporting system or other recorded dataset used to record, collate or monitor deaths involving children receiving externally provided social care funded wholly or partly by a local authority. If such systems exist, please provide any existing data dictionary, field list, system specification or equivalent document describing the information recorded. In particular, please indicate whether the council records:
a. Date of death and, where recorded, location of death.
b. Whether the child was looked after by the local authority at the time of death.
c. Whether the placement or service was commissioned, arranged or funded wholly or partly by the council.
d. Type of placement or service, including children's residential care, independent fostering agency placements, supported accommodation for children under 18, respite care and other relevant externally provided services.
e. Name or category of the external provider.
f. Whether the placement was within or outside the council's geographical area.
g. Whether the child was placed by the council or by another local authority.
h. Whether the death was notified to the council and, where recorded, the source and date of notification.
i. Whether the death led to a safeguarding referral, incident report, investigation, child death review or other recorded follow-up action.
j. Whether the funding arrangement or commissioning authority was recorded.
If information is held in separate children's social care, looked-after children, safeguarding, placement or death-notification systems, please indicate this where established by existing system documentation.
I am seeking existing recorded information.
I am not asking the council to create new datasets, manually review individual case files, or undertake new statistical analyses. If any part of this request is considered likely to exceed the appropriate cost limit, please provide the information that can be supplied within the limit and advise which specific part should be narrowed, in accordance with the duty to provide reasonable advice and assistance.
CLARIFICATION: To clarify, I am only seeking (1) whether the types of data listed are or are not held and (2) in what format they are held, for example in a format which could allow extraction and statistical comparison.
Response
Please treat this email as a request for recorded information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
Scope and definitions
Unless otherwise stated, I am seeking information for the five financial years from 1 January 2020 to 31 December 2025, inclusive.
For this request:
Externally provided social care means care delivered by an organisation or provider independent of the commissioning local authority, or NHS body, rather than through the authority's own in-house services.
Publicly Funded social care means care that the local authority or NHS body commissions, arranges or funds wholly or partly using local-authority funds. This includes placements or services purchased directly from an external provider, block or spot contracts, commissioned care packages and other externally delivered services funded wholly or partly by the authority or NHS body.
Eligible providers includes for-profit private companies, voluntary organisations, charities, social enterprises and other independent-sector providers, regardless of their legal structure or profit status.
The request covers adult social care for people aged 18 or over and children's social care for children under 18.
Relevant services may include, where applicable:
Adult residential and nursing care.
Adult domiciliary care.
Supported living and other externally provided adult social care.
Children's residential care.
Foster care provided through independent fostering agencies.
Other externally provided children's social care placements or services funded wholly or partly by the local authority.
The request includes placements located outside the commissioning authority's geographical area, where the authority commissions, arranges or funds the care.
It excludes care delivered directly by the local authority through its own in-house services, care funded entirely by the individual or family without public funding.
Where funding is shared between the local authority and another body, or between the local authority and the individual or family, the arrangement falls within scope.
I do not require personal data or identifiable information about individual deceased people.
Please answer the adult and children's social care sections separately wherever possible.
Part A - Adult social care
1. Recording systems
Please confirm whether the council maintains any register, database, spreadsheet, case-management system, reporting system or other recorded dataset used to record, collate or monitor deaths involving adults receiving externally provided social care funded wholly or partly by a public body.
Answer: The service area has advised for Adult Social Care data, the Council does not maintain a separate central register, database, spreadsheet or reporting dataset specifically for recording, collating or monitoring deaths involving adults receiving externally provided social care.
If such systems exist, please provide any existing data dictionary, field list, system specification or equivalent document describing the information recorded.
In particular, please indicate whether the council records:
a. Date of death and, where recorded, location of death.
b. Type of care service received.
c. Name or category of the external provider.
d. Whether the council commissioned, arranged or funded the care.
Answer: Information relating to a person's death may be recorded within the individual's case record held in Mosaic, the Council's adult social care case management system. Mosaic is used to manage care and support records and may contain information recorded as part of the person's assessment, care management, safeguarding, commissioning and review activities. This will include the type of care service received, the provider the service is delivered by and the type of care (commissioned, joint or self funded).
e. Whether the care was funded wholly or partly by the council, including any distinction between local-authority funding, joint funding, NHS funding and self-funding.
Answer: Details of the person's funding arrangements include whether they are local authority funded services, where relevant, jointly funded packages with the NHS, or if someone is self funding. The Council does not maintain a dedicated dataset specifically categorising all deaths by funding source.
f. Whether the death was notified to the council, including the source and date of notification where recorded.
Answer: Notifications of death may be recorded within the individual's Mosaic record. The source and date of notification may be captured within case notes or workflow activity where this information is provided.
g. Whether the death led to a safeguarding referral, incident report, investigation, review or other recorded follow-up action.
Answer: Where applicable, safeguarding concerns, incident reports, investigations, reviews or other follow-up actions may be recorded within Mosaic through the relevant safeguarding and case management workflows.
h. Whether the care was delivered within the commissioning authority's geographical area or outside it.
Answer: Information relating to service provision, including provider details and placement location, may be recorded within Mosaic.
If information is recorded only in individual case files or separate operational systems rather than a central register or aggregate dataset, please indicate this where known from existing records or documentation.
Answer: The Council does not hold a central register or aggregate dataset that brings together all of the above information specifically in relation to deaths of adults receiving externally provided social care. Relevant information, where held, would ordinarily be contained within individual Mosaic case records and associated operational workflows.
The Council does not hold a separate data dictionary or system specification specifically relating to the recording of deaths. Any available Mosaic system documentation would describe the wider case management system rather than a dedicated death-monitoring dataset.
I am not asking the council to manually review individual case files to create new totals.
Part B - Children's social care
2. Recording systems
Please confirm whether the council maintains any register, database, spreadsheet, case-management system, reporting system or other recorded dataset used to record, collate or monitor deaths involving children receiving externally provided social care funded wholly or partly by a local authority.
If such systems exist, please provide any existing data dictionary, field list, system specification or equivalent document describing the information recorded.
Answer: The service area has advised their case management system records as per the below:
In particular, please indicate whether the council records:
a. Date of death and, where recorded, location of death.
Answer: The date of death is recorded when a child is open to social care.
b. Whether the child was looked after by the local authority at the time of death.
Answer: Yes, this is recorded.
c. Whether the placement or service was commissioned, arranged or funded wholly or partly by the council.
Answer: Yes, this information is recorded.
d. Type of placement or service, including children's residential care, independent fostering agency placements, supported accommodation for children under 18, respite care and other relevant externally provided services.
Answer: Yes, this information is recorded.
e. Name or category of the external provider.
Answer: Yes, this information is recorded.
f. Whether the placement was within or outside the council's geographical area.
Answer: Yes, this information is recorded.
g. Whether the child was placed by the council or by another local authority.
Answer: Yes, this information is recorded.
h. Whether the death was notified to the council and, where recorded, the source and date of notification.
Answer: The service area has advised, if they are notified of a child death, they will record this on the Case Management System on that child’s file. This will include the source of the information and the date the information was shared.
i. Whether the death led to a safeguarding referral, incident report, investigation, child death review or other recorded follow-up action.
Answer: All child deaths in Worcestershire and Herefordshire go to the Child Death Overview Panel (CDOP) which is attended by multi-agency partners and chaired independently.
The Safeguarding Partnership keep a separate record of children referred for Child Safeguarding Practice Review / Rapid Review – but this is only where abuse or neglect contributed to the death, not all deaths.
j. Whether the funding arrangement or commissioning authority was recorded.
Answer: Only if the child is from Herefordshire.
If information is held in separate children's social care, looked-after children, safeguarding, placement or death-notification systems, please indicate this where established by existing system documentation.
I am seeking existing recorded information. I am not asking the council to create new datasets, manually review individual case files, or undertake new statistical analyses.
If any part of this request is considered likely to exceed the appropriate cost limit, please provide the information that can be supplied within the limit and advise which specific part should be narrowed, in accordance with the duty to provide reasonable advice and assistance.
CLARIFICATION:
To clarify, I am only seeking (1) whether the types of data listed are or are not held and (2) in what format they are held, for example in a format which could allow extraction and statistical comparison.
Documents
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