A SOUTH Lakeland homecare company has been rated ‘outstanding’ for a second consecutive year, placing it among the top ten in the country.

Kendal-based Westmorland Homecare was given the rating in all five key areas following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission, the independent regulator of health and social care services in England.

Westmorland Homecare was founded in 2017 by doctors Josh Macaulay and Chris Moss.

Both had experience of caring for people in their NHS roles as an A&E doctor and anaesthetist.

The service provides hundreds of hours of care each week, which enables elderly and often frail people to live independently in their own home.

“We are obviously delighted with the CQC report,” said Dr Macaulay, who paid special tribute to the company’s staff: “They work tremendously hard and they really care and want to do the best possible job that they can.

“For the work they do to be externally and officially verified as outstanding in every area is a great accolade for them.

On the key question of ‘‘Is the service safe?’, the CQC report stated that ‘people were protected by a strong and distinctive approach to safeguarding, including positive risk taking to maximise their control over their lives’.

It added: ‘One person said, ‘I know I am in good hands with Westmorland Homecare – I feel exceptionally safe’.”

The report stated: “People were well protected from the risk of infection, including during the coronavirus pandemic.”

The report highlighted the effectiveness of people’s care, treatment and support. Staff were ‘very well trained and exceptionally skilled’.

Families of those who had been cared for thanked Westmorland Homecare, describing staff as ‘amazing’ and the care as ‘exemplary’.

People were ‘truly respected and valued as individuals,’ and the report quoted one person as saying: “This is what being cared for truly feels like.

"It’s wonderful”.

Dr Macaulay has said Westmorland Homecare had been hand-picked to be on a working group led by Baroness Camilla Cavendish to look at how social services and the Government worked with care providers.