Social care chiefs call for government to invest £480m in home care over winter

The Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) has called on the government to invest £480 million to support the home care sector plus £1.2 billion to unpaid family carers who need breaks over the challenging winter months ahead.

ADASS has warned this winter will present one of the most challenging, in the recent history of adult social care in regards to the COVID-19 pandemic, recruitment and retention of a skilled workforce plus the potential impact of leaving the EU on 1 January 2021.

ADASS president, James Bullion, said: “We need an urgent package of support for carers to acknowledge what they have been doing but to also prepare them now for the next wave of COVID and seeing us through to next year.

“As we enter the new lockdown, there must be a greater focus on the majority of people who receive care and support in their own homes, and the millions of unpaid family carers who provide the majority of care and support for their loved ones.

“That is why we are calling on the government to provide £480m to ensure older people and working-age disabled adults continue to receive the care and support they need in their homes over the winter."

Families providing unpaid care have been hit hard by pandemic

ADASS is also asking the government for a further £1.2bn to ensure unpaid family carers get the breaks they need over the coming months, to enable them to continue providing vital, life-saving care and support.

Families and close friends providing unpaid care have been hit particularly hard during the pandemic and services would have been overwhelmed if they had not provided unpaid care.

Mr Bullion said: “This is not a nicety. It is a necessity. Without a stronger focus on care at home and greater support for family carers, those of us who have care and support needs will not receive that care, and our family carers will face an intolerable winter.”

ADASS has partnered up with Carers UK to help local authorities bring services in to help family carers in their local area.

Mr Bullion added: “During the first wave of the pandemic, much was made of the need to protect the NHS. The reality is that we only protect the NHS by equally protecting social care, and we will only protect the NHS and social care by protecting family carers.”

Learning from the spring and summer COVID-19 response

ADASS has also published a new report titled ‘Themes and Learning from ADASS Members on the Local Response to COVID-19 in Spring and Early Summer 2020’ which explores experiences of councils and decisions relating to the Care Act easements.

One of the many points highlighted in the report states: ‘Earlier, more proactive national responses and support to social care in terms of training, testing, PPE distribution may have resulted in reduced anxiety for social care recipients and staff around infection spread.’

Mr Bullion said: “We all learned a great deal during the first wave of the pandemic, and we must take that learning forward to meet the further challenges we now face.

"We are keen to work with government to ensure that adult social care is better understood and has the resources to ensure that people’s needs for care and support are met.

“What the pandemic is starkly showing us is that people who need adult social care must have parity of esteem with NHS patients. And care services and those who provide them must be valued alongside and equally with the NHS.”