The founder of a multi-award-winning healthcare recruitment agency is calling for stronger regulation of agencies supplying care staff, warning that insufficient scrutiny risks people’s safety.
Deborah Stock, Founder and Managing Director of Hull-based Care Connection Partners, wants the Government to introduce direct, independent oversight of agencies’ recruitment and training standards.
She says businesses supplying staff to care homes should face scrutiny comparable to the providers responsible for delivering care, with checks that go beyond assurances and paperwork.
Currently, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) regulates care providers but agencies that provide them with staff generally fall outside its registration and inspection system.
Deborah said: “We provide the people who deliver care, so we should be accountable for making sure they are properly trained and suitable for the work they are being asked to do.
“Care homes are accountable to the CQC. They can be inspected and challenged on the quality of their services. I believe agencies supplying their staff should face that same level of scrutiny.
“This is about people’s lives. If someone arrives without the right training or checks, the consequences could be serious injury or death. We cannot afford to get it wrong.”
Under the current system, care homes and other registered providers remain responsible for ensuring all staff, including agency workers, are competent and suitable for their roles.
Recruitment agencies have requirements concerning references and relevant qualifications.
Deborah’s concern is the absence of an equivalent CQC-style system directly assessing agencies’ care staffing standards.
The distinction is illustrated within her own CCP Group of businesses, which includes Care Connection Partners, specialist care provider My Caring and recruitment company CCP Industrial.
Homecare agency My Caring has to be CQC-registered because it provides specialist, regulated care for adults and children with complex needs. Care Connection Partners supplies staff to other providers, rather than managing the care itself, so that staffing activity does not require CQC registration.
Deborah said: “My Caring has to be registered with the CQC and can be inspected at any time, which is quite right. Care Connection Partners is doing something different, supplying people to care settings, so it does not come under that same system.
“We carry out our checks and provide information about the people we send, but I believe there should also be independent scrutiny of how agencies do that work.
“A care home manager already has enormous responsibilities. They should be able to have confidence in the agency supporting them, backed up by meaningful oversight.”
Her call comes as Prime Minister Andy Burnham pursues plans for a National Care Service. In July, he set out ambitions to improve social care training and job security and bring the workforce closer together with the NHS. In September, he warned that failure to fix social care would ultimately threaten the NHS itself.
Deborah believes scrutiny of recruitment agencies should form part of that wider debate.
She said: “Agencies are an established and necessary part of care. Providers need support to cover sickness and other staffing pressures, and good agencies make a real difference.
“If we are serious about strengthening the care workforce, we need to look at every part of the system, including the businesses supplying it.
“I recognise the CQC and care providers are already under pressure. Whether this sits with the CQC or another body, it needs proper resources and the ability to hold agencies accountable.”
Founded in 2021, Care Connection Partners works with care settings across the country, underpinned by its #feelthelove ethos of making staff and partners feel valued and supported.
Its numerous award wins include Best for Recruitment, Training, Retention and Motivation at the national Care Sector Supplier Awards 2025, and Best Family Business at the Yorkshire Post Business Awards 2025.
It also won the Yorkshire People’s Choice Award at the National Family Business of the Year Awards 2026.
Deborah added: “Families need to know their loved ones are in safe hands. Everyone involved in providing that care should be able to demonstrate that they are doing things properly. That includes us.”