Council ‘needs £25m to tackle care crisis’
SEFTON Council is calling for immediate £25m funding as it seeks to tackle a growing crisis in social care.
The council last year called on the government to open “a grown-up conversation” on how people are cared for in future, and how the growing bill for care will be met.
Council chief executive Dwayne Johnson said: “It has now been a year since the government announced a further delay to the publication of its Social Care Green Paper.
“While we wait, Sefton, like many other councils across the country, is having to make incredibly difficult decisions on adult and social care provision with limited funding.”
Sefton is among many councils supporting the Local Government Association’s (LGA) stance in calling on the government to publish the longawaited green paper before Parliament goes
into recess in September.
The call was made at the LGA’s annual conference in Bournemouth.
Mr Johnson said: “What we all need is funding certainty for both the immediate and long-term so that everyone with care and support needs can rightly live their lives to the full.
“This is why we are backing the LGA in their call for action.”
Last year, Sefton Council responded to the LGA consultation on adult social care and raised serious concerns about the future of the service.
It believes that without cross party conversation about a sustainable way forward, the most vulnerable people in our communities will not receive the care and support that they need.
The council is calling for immediate action and money, placing emphasis on the importance of investing more in developing early intervention and protection models.
It believes this will help reduce future demand on services, develop the social care market, demonstrate how much the care and support workforce is valued and most importantly support those in need of care and their carers.
To do this, the council estimates that it will require £25m over the next three years to ensure that people in need of care are supported in a way that is right for them.
It also stresses the importance of national investment to wider wellbeing services that work towards reducing the health and social inequalities in their communities and calls for this matter to be looked at holistically as children’s social care is also under great pressure.
Cllr Paul Cummins, cabinet member for adult social care, said: “We stated last year that social care is in crisis and a grown-up conversation needs to happen nationally but it seems nothing has moved forward.
“We desperately need more money to meet the needs of our most vulnerable people to ensure that we do not fail them when they need us the most.
“We must ensure that people in need of care and support are able to continue to live the lives that they want to live.
“We stand by the LGA and strongly believe the government must put this matter at the very heart of its thinking right now and publish the social care green paper within 10 weeks.”