The Health and Wellbeing Board was introduced by the
Health and Social Care Act 2012 which required that top tier
authorities (i.e. Unitary and County Councils) establish a Board by
1 April 2013.
The
statutory functions of the Board include:
·
To prepare a Joint
Strategic Assessment (JSNA); a Pharmaceutical
Needs Assessment (PNA) and Joint
Health and Wellbeing Strategy (JHWS).
·
A duty to encourage integrated working
between health and social care commissioners in connection with the
provision of health and social care services;
·
A power to encourage close working
between commissioners and health-related services and the board
itself; and
·
A power to
encourage close working
between commissioners of health-related services and commissioners
of health and social care services.
There are a number of principles underlying the
functioning of the Health and Wellbeing Board. These
include:
·
Shared leadership of a strategic approach
to the health and wellbeing of communities;
·
A commitment to drive real action and
change to improve services and outcomes;
·
Parity between Board members in terms of
their opportunity contribute to the Board’s deliberations,
strategies and activities
·
Shared ownership of the Board by all its
members and accountability to the communities it serves;
and
·
Openness and transparency in the way that
the Board carries out its work.
