Duty of Care

Duty of care training delivered at your workplace or live online. Half a day. The practical framework care workers need to balance safety and autonomy confidently in their day-to-day role.

Course Overview

Most care workers who get duty of care wrong aren’t negligent. They’re undertrained. They’ve been told to keep people safe, and they’ve taken that to mean: prevent every risk, override every decision that looks unwise, and err on the side of protection even when it costs someone their dignity.

Nobody told them that overprotection is itself a breach of duty of care. That’s the gap this course fills.

Duty of Care Training gives care workers a grounded, practical understanding of what their duty actually requires: how it connects to the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and its five core principles, and how positive risk-taking fits within that framework rather than against it. It maps directly to Care Certificate Standard 3: Duty of Care as updated in 2025, which strengthened the criteria around balancing rights and responsibilities, dilemmas in duty of care, and the relationship between duty of care and person-centred practice. You can read more about what Standard 3 requires and how it sits alongside the other 16 Care Certificate standards in our Care Certificate UK Guide.

Course Details

  • Duration: Half day (3 learning hours). Extended delivery available on request.
  • Delivery: Face-to-face in-house or live online via Zoom or Microsoft Teams
  • Certificate: CPD-Accredited Certificate of Achievement in Duty of Care
  • Awarding organisations: CPD-Accredited
  • Validity: No formal expiry. A refresher is recommended every 1 to 3 years, or sooner following changes to policy, legislation, or workplace practice.
  • Group size: Maximum 15 learners per trainer

Who This Course Is For

This course is right for anyone in health and social care whose role involves making decisions, responding to concerns, or supporting individuals with their day-to-day lives.

  • Care assistants and support workers in care homes, supported living, and domiciliary care
  • Senior carers and team leaders
  • Residential, nursing home, and community care staff
  • Staff supporting individuals with complex decision-making capacity or additional vulnerabilities
  • New starters completing the Care Certificate, specifically Standard 3 (2025 update)
  • Experienced staff who want a structured framework for the duty of care dilemmas they encounter in practice
  • Managers and supervisors responsible for overseeing safe, person-centred care delivery

This course works as a foundation for new starters and as a structured refresher for experienced staff. If your team also needs training on the broader legislative framework, our Mental Capacity Act and DoLS training covers the full detail of the Act and its application to care practice.

Not sure which combination is right for your team? Get in touch, and we’ll help you work it out before you commit.

The Legal Requirement

Under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014, registered providers must ensure care is delivered safely and in a way that protects the welfare of individuals. Under the Care Act 2014, the wellbeing principle requires that care and support promote individual wellbeing, which includes not just safety but dignity, autonomy, and the right to make decisions about one’s own life. These two obligations don’t always point in the same direction, and that’s precisely where duty of care becomes difficult in practice.

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 is clear that every adult must be assumed to have capacity to make their own decisions unless it’s established that they don’t. An unwise decision isn’t evidence of lacking capacity. A care worker who overrides an individual’s choice in the name of duty of care isn’t fulfilling their duty. They’re breaching it. At the same time, a care worker who steps back entirely from concern without applying a proper risk framework or escalating appropriately is also failing in their duty. The space between those two failure modes is where good practice lives, and it requires training to work in it confidently.

CQC inspectors ask directly about how staff balance duty of care with individual rights under Regulation 9: Person-Centred Care and Regulation 12: Safe Care and Treatment. A team that can articulate that balance clearly and demonstrate it in practice is a team that reflects well on the service at inspection.

What the Day Covers

All content reflects Care Certificate Standard 3 (2025 update), CQC Regulations 9 and 12, and current Skills for Care workforce guidance throughout. Topics covered include:

  • What duty of care is and what it means in everyday care practice
  • The legal framework: Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014, Care Act 2014, and CQC regulatory expectations
  • Care Certificate Standard 3 (2025 update): what the updated criteria require and how this session maps to them. Read more in our Care Certificate Standard 3 guide
  • Duty of care and the Mental Capacity Act 2005: the five core principles and how they shape duty of care decisions
  • The duty of care dilemma: when the right to choose and the responsibility to protect pull in opposite directions
  • Positive risk-taking: what it means, why it matters, and how to apply it within a clear risk framework
  • Roles, responsibilities, and accountability across a care team
  • Recognising unsafe or poor practice and knowing when and how to act
  • Reporting, escalation, and whistleblowing: correct routes and protections under the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998
  • Record keeping: documenting duty of care decisions clearly and accurately
  • Reflective practice: examining real scenarios and building confidence in duty of care decision-making

Every course is also built to include your industry-specific common risks and your organisation’s incident reporting systems as standard.

How the Course Is Delivered

This course is available face-to-face at your workplace or chosen venue, or live online via Zoom or Microsoft Teams. Both formats are fully interactive. Online delivery is a live session with the same scenario-based content and discussion as the room-based version, not a pre-recorded module.

Groups are capped at 15 to ensure every learner gets sufficient time to work through the scenarios and discussions that are central to this course. Every session is built around your working environment, your sector’s risks, and your internal reporting procedures. We also design each course to incorporate your specific workplace challenges, your organisation’s escalation and whistleblowing framework, and the findings of your needs assessment. If you haven’t carried out a needs assessment yet, we can guide you through what’s involved during the enquiry process.

Delivery includes:

  • Scenario-based discussion covering the tension between duty of care, mental capacity, and positive risk
  • Reflective exercises that ask learners to examine their own decision-making instincts and where they come from
  • Practical application of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 principles to real care situations
  • Honest conversation about the moments when duty of care feels unclear and what to do in those moments

Certification and Validity

On completion, learners receive a CPD-Accredited Certificate of Achievement in Duty of Care.

There is no formal expiry, but a refresher every 1 to 3 years is good practice, or sooner following changes to policy, legislation, or workplace practice. For organisations delivering the Care Certificate to new starters, this course directly supports evidence against Standard 3 (2025 update).

Our Care Certificate UK Guide covers how Standard 3 sits alongside the other 16 standards and what assessors look for at each stage.

Why Organisations Book With Prima Cura

Most training providers arrive with a course. We arrive with yours.

Before the day, we gather information about your workplace: your incident reporting forms, your internal procedures, the specific hazards your team actually faces. On the day, your trainer works that into every scenario, every discussion, every practical exercise. If your staff work in a care home, they’re not practising on hypothetical office workers. If your team are lone workers, that context shapes how the session runs.

It means the training lands. Not because it was well-delivered in a generic sense, but because it was relevant to the people in the room and the situations they’ll actually encounter.

A few other things that matter to the organisations that book with us:

  • 98.9% learner satisfaction across all Prima Cura courses
  • All trainers hold Enhanced DBS certificates and maintain ongoing CPD
  • We advise honestly on the qualification level at the enquiry stage. If a different course is a better fit for your workforce, we’ll say so before you book, not after

We respond to all enquiries within one working day.

Where We Deliver

We deliver in-house training at your workplace or chosen venue across Manchester, Greater Manchester, and the wider North West. We also deliver nationally across England, including North England, South England, London, and Surrey.

All sessions are led by experienced Prima Cura Training instructors. Groups are capped at 15 per trainer to protect the quality of learning.

Our associate network means we can deliver across England. You can meet the team on our Associates page.

FAQs

What is the difference between duty of care and overprotection?

Duty of care requires care workers to take reasonable steps to keep people safe and promote their wellbeing. It does not require them to prevent every possible risk or override an individual’s right to make their own choices. Overprotection, where a care worker removes choice or autonomy in the name of keeping someone safe, is itself a breach of duty of care, because it fails to respect the individual’s dignity, rights, and legal entitlement to self-determination under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. This course addresses that distinction directly and gives care workers a framework for holding both responsibilities simultaneously.

How does the Mental Capacity Act 2005 relate to duty of care?

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 establishes that every adult must be assumed to have the capacity to make their own decisions, and that an unwise decision is not evidence of lacking capacity. Duty of care must be exercised within that framework. A care worker cannot override an individual’s decision simply because they disagree with it or believe it carries risk. Understanding how the Act’s core principles sit in relation to duty of care responsibilities is one of the most important things this course develops.

What is positive risk-taking, and does this course cover it?

Yes. Positive risk-taking is the practice of supporting individuals to pursue their goals, independence, and wellbeing by taking reasonable, considered risks rather than defaulting to restriction in the name of safety. It sits within the duty of care framework and requires a structured approach to risk assessment, not a blanket refusal. This course covers what positive risk-taking means in practice, how to apply a risk framework that holds safety and autonomy together, and how to document positive risk decisions clearly so that both the individual and the care worker are protected.

Does this course align with the updated 2025 Care Certificate Standard 3?

Yes. This course maps directly to Care Certificate Standard 3: Duty of Care as updated in 2025, which strengthened the criteria around duty of care dilemmas, the balance between rights and responsibilities, and the relationship between duty of care and person-centred practice. For organisations delivering or assessing the Care Certificate, this training reflects those updated requirements and supports evidence against Standard 3 for new starters and existing staff.

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Book or Enquire

Book your training or request a quote

Tell us your team size and your sector. We’ll come back with a quote, the right advice on qualification level, and a straight answer on whether this is the best course for your team.

We respond to all enquiries within one working day.

Our Commitment to Quality and Compliance

At Prima Cura Training, all courses reflect current UK guidance and best practice. All trainers are experienced professionals with relevant qualifications and ongoing CPD. Because many of the organisations we support work with vulnerable individuals, all trainers hold Enhanced DBS checks.

This course is reviewed against updates from the Care Quality Commission, Skills for Care, and current UK legislation, including the Mental Capacity Act 2005, the Care Act 2014, the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014, and the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998. Content is also reviewed against the Skills for Care Care Certificate 2025 update, specifically Standard 3: Duty of Care.

You can read more on our Quality Assurance and Compliance page.

Reviewed by Stephanie Austin, Owner and Lead Trainer, Prima Cura Training | 25+ years in health and social care | 15+ years as a trainer | Last reviewed: June 2026 | Next review: June 2027

This page is for general guidance only and reflects current UK legislation, CQC regulatory requirements, and sector best practice as of the date of review. It does not constitute legal advice. Duty of Care Training is a practice development course and does not replace organisational policies, codes of conduct, or professional registration requirements. Decisions involving mental capacity, deprivation of liberty, or complex risk must be made in accordance with the Mental Capacity Act 2005, the organisation’s policies, and, where necessary, appropriate legal or clinical advice.

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