Efforts have been made to develop home care in the last few years, but most of the objectives have not been achieved. Home care’s most prominent issue is the shortage of personnel. Linguistic equality is not realised due to the lack of Swedish-speaking nursing personnel.

The recommendations the Audit Committee issued in 2019 usually led to measures.

51 per cent of the binding operation objectives were achieved. The prolongation of the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the achievement of the objectives of the Education Division and the Social Services and Health Care Division in particular.

The number of employees in the services of open child welfare is at its statutory level, but due to the increased challenges families face, all needs cannot always be addressed. Furthermore, child welfare has open vacancies for social workers, but the vacancies remain uncovered.

Home care and service housing have introduced a guidebook for emergency situations and the mobile nurse service, but they are not utilised to their full potential. Closer cooperation should be established when discharging patients from hospital.

The city has strived to promote mental health rehabilitees’ access to housing services by turning the Aurora Hospital’s wards of rehabilitative psychiatry into housing units and by increasing the service selection of housing services in the competitive tendering of purchased services. However, the number of people on the waiting list for housing services has not decreased.

The Social Services and Health Care Division has developed the treatment of people with substance abuse problems and harm reduction services and lowered the threshold for access to services. Cooperation with other operators, particularly child welfare services, needs to be developed.

Access to non-urgent care is provided at health stations mainly within the time limits prescribed by law, but not in accordance with Helsinki’s own objectives or in an equal manner.

The environmental policy objectives set by the City Council in 2012 have not been fully achieved in the City of Helsinki’s procurement. Although environmental criteria have been set in several procurements with significant environmental impact in the past, more extensive development has only begun in recent years with the Carbon-neutral Helsinki 2035 action plan.

Child Welfare is having challenges in meeting the increased need for foster care with family care and special and demanding institutional care.

The results obtained on enhancing the use of space and changing the measures used for this purpose have varied in different services of the City. However, taking the views of customers and staff into account has been found to be important in facility alterations.

The electronic health care services are high quality, but not all residents of the municipality are able to use them. Because of this, the availability of traditional service channels must also be ensured in the future.

The quality control of the 24-hour care of the elderly can be considered to be satisfactory in the City’s own service provision and sufficient in purchased services.

The oral health care services of the City of Helsinki are high quality, but access to care has been difficult, particularly due to problems in making contact and the lack of non-urgent appointments.

The family centre model has increased cooperation between different professionals according to the objectives. Family centre work is just beginning in several areas of Helsinki, and there are still needs for development.

With the introduction of the new management system and City division model, the controllability of the City organisation has improved. However, control and direction have become more fragmented, and there is a lack of clarity regarding who directs what.