Welcome back. Wednesday is our deep-dive day — one topic that matters right now, explained properly, with your action points at the end.
The CQC is leaderless. Here's what that means for your next inspection.
On 6 February, Professor Sir Mike Richards resigned as CQC Chair. He'd been in the job less than a year. Before him, the CEO Sir Julian Hartley resigned in October after the Leeds maternity scandal. The interim CEO, Dr Arun Chopra, is now the most senior permanent figure at the regulator.
That means the organisation responsible for rating your service, deciding your registration, and shaping the regulatory framework you operate under has no permanent Chair and no permanent CEO — at the same time.
This isn't just a Westminster story. It has direct consequences for every care provider in England.
How we got here
The CQC has been in trouble for a while. The Single Assessment Framework — introduced to replace the old inspection model — was widely criticised by providers for being slow, inconsistent, and disconnected from frontline reality. Inspection backlogs grew. Providers reported waiting months for ratings to be published. Some waited over a year for any inspection at all.
Richards was brought in specifically to fix this. His independent review, published before he became Chair, acknowledged what providers had been saying for years: the framework wasn't working. He recommended specialist sector teams (now in place), a revised assessment approach (consultation response expected soon), and a return to regulatory basics.
Care England's Martin Green put it plainly: Richards' review "reflected what providers had been experiencing on the ground for some time — delays that made no sense, a loss of sector expertise, and a framework that felt disconnected from the reality of delivering care."
Now he's gone. And the reforms he started are in limbo.
What this means in practice
1. Inspections will continue to be slow and inconsistent
CQC has been rebuilding its inspection capacity, but leadership turnover disrupts everything. New senior leaders bring new priorities. Recruitment for a permanent CEO and Chair will take months. During that period, operational staff will be cautious about making bold decisions. Expect the current pace — already slower than pre-2023 levels — to continue.
If you're waiting for a rating to be updated, don't hold your breath.
2. The new assessment approach is coming — but nobody knows when
Richards confirmed that the consultation response on the new assessment approach would be published "shortly." That was before he resigned. The response may still come out on schedule, or it may be delayed while incoming leadership reviews it. Either way, providers will be operating in uncertainty about what the next inspection will actually look like.
3. Registration applications will take longer
The new stricter registration requirements (live since 9 February) were designed to speed up the process by filtering out incomplete applications. In theory, this helps. In practice, a regulator under leadership strain rarely processes things faster. If you have a registration application in the pipeline, build in extra time.
4. Local authority assessments will continue — and they're revealing
Despite the leadership chaos, CQC has continued publishing local authority adult social care assessments. This month alone: Oldham rated Good, Swindon upgraded to Good on review, Westmorland & Furness and Hackney rated Requires Improvement. These assessments tell you what CQC is looking for: waiting times, person-centred planning, partnership working, and workforce stability. The same themes will appear in your provider inspection.
What the sector is saying
The mood among providers is a mix of frustration and resignation. Most people running care businesses just want a functioning regulator that inspects fairly, publishes ratings promptly, and doesn't change the goalposts every 18 months.
Care England has called for "stability and follow-through" and warned that "providers need clarity, consistency and a regulator that understands the pressures they are under."
That's the polite version. The less polite version — which you'll hear at any care sector event — is that providers have lost confidence in CQC's ability to regulate effectively, and the leadership carousel is making it worse.
Your action plan
Here's what to do with all of this:
This week:
Update your evidence portfolio. Whatever CQC's leadership situation, inspectors will still turn up eventually. Make sure your quality assurance records, training logs, and incident reports are current. You want to be ready, not scrambling.
Check when your service was last inspected. If it's been more than two years, consider requesting an inspection. Some providers are finding that proactively engaging CQC leads to faster scheduling.
This month:
Review your CQC profile. Log into the CQC portal and check that all your registered details are accurate — manager names, service types, conditions. Errors on your profile can cause delays if an inspection is triggered.
Brief your registered manager. Make sure they understand that the assessment approach may change. The key themes CQC is currently focused on are: safe care and treatment, staffing, governance, and person-centred care. Those themes won't change regardless of who's in charge.
This quarter:
Watch for the assessment consultation response. When it drops, read it carefully. It will signal what inspections look like for the next 2–3 years. We'll cover it in detail when it's published.
Don't delay business decisions because of CQC uncertainty. If you're planning to open a new service, expand, or bid for a contract, do it. Regulatory uncertainty is not a reason to stand still — it's a reason to make sure your governance is airtight.
The CQC will eventually get a new Chair and a new CEO. The question is whether the reforms stick, or whether the next leadership team starts from scratch. Again.
In the meantime, run your service well, keep your paperwork sharp, and don't wait for the regulator to sort itself out before you sort yourself out.
Friday we'll round up the stories you might have missed this week, plus a useful resource and the best thing we read.
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— The Care Operator