Social care overlooked as government pledges £20bn for NHS

The social care sector has once again been overlooked as Prime Minister Theresa May has pledged a further £20bn for the NHS.

Anger in the sector has been further fuelled by news that the Prime Minister will today say that social care will have to wait until 2020 for a further funding injection.

NCF Executive Director Vic Rayner said: “We know that there is a need for an integrated solution to the challenges facing our public health and care system, and it is vital that the government takes this on board.

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“There should now be no delay in the production of a bold and audacious Green Paper that enables social care to offer an ambitious service to meet the needs of citizens now and in the future.”

The announcement followed publication of a report by ADASS last week which warned of further social care cuts by under pressure councils unless additional short-term and long-term funding is made available (see Bleak outlook for social care revealed by ADASS survey).

Chair of the Independent Care Group, Mike Padgham, said: “Figures from ADASS show a deepening of the crisis in social care provision but yet once again, no action is being taken to help the sector.

“An extra £5bn a year for the NHS sounds very positive, but when you think that it is currently costing the NHS £3bn a year to keep older people in hospital beds because there is no social care provision for them, you can see that the maths simply doesn’t add up any more and we have to address the funding shortfall in social care.”

Dr Rhidian Hughes, Chief Executive of the Voluntary Organisations Disability Group, said the government’s decisions to overlook the urgent to fix was “misguided”.

Dr Hughes added: “The social care sector has experienced years of cuts and underinvestment at a time that demand for support is increasing. The Green Paper must set out the solutions to ensure our sector has a sustainable future and this opportunity to secure social care services for older and disabled people services that rely on them must not be missed.”