Published in Fair Cost of Care on 18/08/2026
Health and social care systems work best when they are shaped around the people who use them. That was the central message of a recent NSCC Network webinar with Llais, the independent statutory body for Wales that listens to people’s experiences of health and social care and shares those insights with services, health boards and local authorities.
The webinar, attended by members of the CareCubed team, explored what people across Wales are saying about dignity, respect, communication and joined-up support. It also highlighted a clear challenge for the sector: listening is only the first step. The real test is how services respond.
Who Are Llais?
Llais has been in operation since summer 2023. As an independent statutory body, it gathers evidence from people across Wales about their experiences of health and social care, sharing both positive and negative feedback with health boards and local authorities.
This work helps identify where services are working well, where improvement is needed and how people’s voices can play a more active role in shaping the future of care.
Changing the Conversation Through the All Wales Project
A central focus of the webinar was Llais’ All Wales Project, which is exploring wider conversations across health and social care. The project looks not only at people’s reported experiences, but also at what the public and sector professionals understand about rights, expectations and access to support.
With more than 3,000 participants, the study provides a broad evidence base. One-to-one conversations also explored individual experiences in more depth, particularly around transitions between health and social care services.
People Want to Be Seen as Human Beings, Not Numbers
One of the clearest messages from the study was that people want to be treated “as human beings, and not as numbers”. During the webinar, Rebecca Lythgoe, Head of Insight and Engagement at Llais, explained that this theme appeared consistently throughout the report.
For Llais, the key challenge now is what happens next. Gathering people’s experiences matters, but the value of that insight depends on whether it leads to meaningful change.
In social care, unpaid carers described the frustration and exhaustion of having to repeat the same information to different parts of the system. This was not only difficult for individuals and families, but also inefficient for services, taking time away from providing support.
Alongside these challenges, people also highlighted the difference that small acts of recognition can make. Remembering personal details, taking time to listen and avoiding rushed conversations can help people feel understood, respected and supported.
The People’s Principles: Turning Insight into Action
From this research, Llais developed the People’s Principles. These principles connect with legislation such as the Well-being of Future Generations Act and wider rights-based approaches, focusing on how people feel when they interact with services as well as their rights, expectations, access and reachability.
The work asks an important question: it is not enough for services simply to exist; they must be genuinely accessible, meaningful and responsive to the people who use them. The principles have also informed a manifesto, particularly relevant in the context of the recent Senedd election.
Dignity and respect sit at the heart of the People’s Principles. People want services to see them as individuals, believe them and treat them with compassion.
For children and young people, the conversations explored what kindness means in practice, including power, time, relationships and the barriers that can prevent kinder, more relational support. Llais is also launching a toolkit to encourage these conversations in communities and workplaces.
Where Health and Social Care Needs to Improve
Clear and honest communication emerged as a key area for improvement. People described the importance of regular updates, particularly when they did not know whether things were progressing or felt as though they were falling through gaps in services.
Llais’ wider research also includes work on areas such as the removal of profit from looked-after children’s care and Welsh language provision, reflecting the breadth of issues shaping people’s experiences across Wales.
People also called for more joined-up care. They wanted support to feel seamless, without having to repeat their story or manage alone while different parts of the system waited on each other.
One example shared during the webinar captured this clearly: “Hospital said social care would take over. Social care said they were waiting on the hospital. Meanwhile, we were just coping on our own.”
Timely care and support while waiting was another important theme. People need to know what is happening, what support is available and how to manage while waiting for care or decisions. Prevention and early intervention were also central, with the reminder that some needs may not escalate if the right support is available earlier.
Towards More Human, Joined-Up Support
The future of health and social care must recognise people as whole individuals. People are not defined by a single need; different parts of their lives, identities and support needs are interconnected.
One person reflected: “I’m autistic, and every interaction feels like the system expects me to act ‘neurotypical’. It’s exhausting.” Their experience underlines the need for services to adapt to people, rather than expecting people to adapt to the system.
Support should also enable independence for both people receiving care and unpaid carers. As carers explained, care arrangements can affect their own independence as much as the independence of the person they support.
The webinar made clear that improving health and social care is not only about redesigning systems, but about changing how people experience them. Listening, communicating clearly, joining up support and recognising people’s individuality are not optional extras; they are central to creating services that feel fair, humane and effective.
