22 January 2025
By Kathryn Smith, SCIE Chief Executive Officer
I am truly honoured to have been awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE) for Services to Social Care in His Majesty The King’s New Year Honours List 2025. It has given me the opportunity to pause and reflect on a journey that began over 35 years ago—and to look ahead with renewed commitment.
I have had the privilege of holding various roles across a wide range of organisations—from private sector providers to local authorities, health trusts, and the Commission for Social Care Inspection. Since 2020, I have led the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) to support best practice, shape policy, and raise awareness of the importance of social care.
I have seen a profound evolution in the way we understand and provide care and support in that time. The sector has centred the people who draw on care and support and their families and now encourages choice, control, and independence; we have built a body of research and evidence that demonstrates what good care and support look like, and we have begun to focus on developing ways to deliver it more efficiently and effectively, such as through new care models and digital innovation.

Despite this progress, the sector faces significant and critical challenges. Inflation, demographic and epidemiological changes, falling recruitment and retention, and tightening local authority budgets are placing immense pressure on care and support services and impacting their quality and availability.
On 3 January 2025, the Government launched the Casey Commission to inform the creation of a National Care Service underpinned by national standards.
There is understandable reason for apprehension. This is not the first Commission that has been launched and the first and second phases of the Commission won’t report until 2026 and 2028 respectively.
However, there is real cause for optimism. The Commission has the potential to end decades of gridlock and create a clear roadmap for how care and support will be funded and delivered going forward.
At my evidence session with the Health and Social Care Committee on 8 January 2025, I emphasised that social care is fundamentally about people – the millions of people who draw on care and support daily as well as those who provide care. The Commission needs to be guided by an inclusive approach to engaging with the sector, putting the people who use services at its centre. Such an approach will also create agreement about the key design principles needed to guide the planning of a social care system fit for the future, one which builds on the consensus and partnerships that already exist across the sector.
It is now our responsibility to work with the Commission to create a more responsive, sustainable, and equitable system. This is a real moment to create a system that enables people who draw on care and support to live fulfilling lives. There are challenges ahead, but I have confidence that the resilience, dedication, and passion within the social care sector will see this vision realised.