A care company has been rated “inadequate” and placed in special measures by the health watchdog.

Unite Highland Care, based in Victory Way, Admirals Park, Dartford, supports people to live in their own homes and also cares for people in supported living accommodation.

When the Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspected the service between August 19 and September 13, the firm had 23 people on its books.

The CQC found that standards - previously rated “good” - had declined to “inadequate” and immediately took action to restrict care packages at the service and sought immediate action to address the safety risks it had identified.

The service is now in special measures which means it will be kept under close review and re-inspected to check on the progress of these improvements.

Serena Coleman, the CQC deputy director of operations in the south, said: “We expect health and social care providers to guarantee people with a learning disability and autistic people the respect, equality, dignity, choices and independence, and good access to local communities that most people take for granted.

“We weren’t assured this was the case at Unite Highland Care.

“They didn’t understand the type of service they were running, and that the principles of supported living accommodation mean these spaces are people’s homes.

“We found leaders had installed visitors’ books inside people’s rooms, built staff and visitors’ toilets, an office, and put office signage on the walls, which institutionalised the building rather than treating the area like people’s home.”

She said: “Staff didn’t support people to have maximum choice and control of their lives, in the least restrictive way possible.

“Staff had removed cigarettes from some people using the service so they would smoke less, but there was no evidence they’d asked people what they wanted to do, sought consent, or assessed if they had the capacity to make such decisions for themselves.

"CCTV had been installed without clear reason"

“In the supported living homes, they had moved all of one resident’s kitchen knives into a locked room labelled the staff room, without any evidence supporting this decision.

“The service also wasn’t respecting people’s dignity and privacy in their own homes.

“CCTV had been installed in all of the supported living homes, without clear reason.

“We saw one monitor which showed CCTV footage of different areas of the building was in a communal area which anyone could access.”

She added: “Leaders weren’t managing the service well and we weren’t assured of the registered manager’s integrity.

"We found safeguarding incidents hadn’t been raised with us"

“They weren’t aware of or acting on risks at the service, or making improvements after incidents occurred.

“We found safeguarding issues, such as incidents between people, hadn’t been raised with us or the local authority which meant people were at risk of abuse.

“The registered manager also referred to people with autism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) as having a mental health condition, which clearly shows a lack of understanding about the people they were supporting.

“We have told the service where we expect to see significant improvements and will continue to monitor the service closely to keep people safe during this time.

“We will return to check on their progress and won’t hesitate to take further action if people aren’t receiving the care and treatment they have a right to expect.”

The inspection revealed incidents were not always submitted to the CQC, as required by law, and that leaders were not effectively auditing or monitoring how the service performed.

Staff care calls were poorly organised and managed.

Sometimes they were early, late, or overlapped in the staff rota with other people’s calls.

One relative told inspectors their loved one sometimes took prescribed medicines later than they needed to because of staff delays.

People’s care plans lacked detail, including on how to support medical conditions or manage risks to their safety.

Records weren’t kept updated when incidents occurred, or people’s needs changed.

Recruitment checks to ensure staff were suitable for their roles hadn’t been carried out.

Medicines weren’t always managed safely. Someone missed taking their prescribed medicines when they left their home because there wasn’t a system or risk assessment in place to support this.

However, some relatives and people using the service spoke positively about their care.

Unite Highland Care has not responded to a request for comment.