Will the changes to health and social care funding in this year’s Spending Review benefit people requiring home care?

George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer

Mike Padgham, United Kingdom Home Care Association

YES

In his spending review the Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announced that the Government will be investing an extra £3.8bn to integrate health and social care.

He said that the investment will improve services for people requiring social care in the community.

Mr Osborne said: “I want to make sure everyone gets a properly joined up service where they won’t have to worry if that service is coming from the NHS or the local council.

“By 2015-16, over £3 billion will be spent on services that are commissioned jointly and seamlessly by the local NHS and local councils working together.

“It’s a huge and historic commitment of resources to social care, tied to real reform on the ground, to help end the scandal of older people trapped in hospitals because they cannot get a social care bed.”

Mr Osborne also argued that integrating health and social care will also bring other benefits. He said: “This will help relieve pressures on Accident & Emergency.

“It will help local government deliver on its obligations.

“And it will save the NHS at least a billion pounds.

“Integrated health and social care: no longer a vague aspiration but concrete reality, transforming the way we look after people who need our care most.

NO

However the United Kingdom Home Care Association (UKHCA), the professional association for home care providers has highlighted its view that the changes put for forward by the Chancellor could have a negative impact on both home care providers and service users.

UKHCA chair Mike Padgham has questioned whether in reality the reform will be beneficial to people requiring home care services after the spending review announced cuts to local councils by ten per cent.

He said: “There wasn’t much in the Chancellor’s speech to give us hope in social care. Publicly funded homecare has been squeezed in real terms over the past three years.

“Unless new, adequate funding is identified for councils, we fear there will be more reductions in the care people receive in their own homes.

“The evidence is clear that where people receive less homecare than they need, they are more likely to experience health issues, falls and unexpected hospital admissions – unintended consequences that will cost the public more in the long term and does not seem to make economic sense.

Mr Padgham did comment that the reform was a step in the right direction but warned: “We need to see the issues facing homecare addressed now, as a matter of urgency.”