Councils subsidise Britain’s social care bill

Authorities dip into emergency reserves

YORKSHIRE COUNCILS are underpinning the billion-pound burden of adult social care by dipping into emergency reserves to the tune of almost £80m this year, an investigation by The Yorkshire

Post can reveal. The “broken” social care system is being propped up by rainyday funds, slashing budgets for other services and cash from council tax precepts as authorities battle to fill funding gaps which, with reductions in some key funds likely in the coming years, are only set to worsen.

Councils across the region are dedicating chunks of their budgets to adult social care with one, North Yorkshire, spending 42 per cent of its total budget, and altogether authorities will spend £1.5bn this year alone on vulnerable older people. However, individual councils have told The Yorkshire Post they faced funding gaps of up to £15m when trying to balance their books earlier this year.

Bradford’s “significant” funding pressures meant £15.2m needed to be found from elsewhere to balance its adult social care budget, while Hull’s funding gap was £9.5m, Rotherham’s amounted to £9m, Sheffield’s was £7.7m.

York Central Labour MP Rachael Maskell, who chairs the AllParty Parliamentary Group on Ageing and Older People, called on the Government to introduce sustained funding for social care.

“Over the last eight years we have seen a 10 per cent cut in social care funding amounting to £6.3bn,” she said. “The system itself is broken.”

The majority of local councils with social care responsibilities, of which there are 15 in the region, were able to raise extra funds by implementing the full 3 per cent adult social care precept on council tax bills this year. Nine councils, including Leeds, Kirklees and Bradford, did just that, while all the remaining authorities added a precept of between 1.5 and two per cent – raising £53.4m, a figure dwarfed by the cumulative funding gap. Fears are already being raised over council’s abilities to meet next year’s social care bill, with authorities’ saying they expect funding gaps to be even larger.

Leeds expects to have funding pressures of about £14m in 2019/2010 – up from £5.6m this year. Coun Rebecca Charlwood, executive member for adults, health and wellbeing, said higher wage costs for care workers, the impact of Brexit on recruitment and rising expectations of support were all going to bite.

Kirklees Council’s funding gap looks set to rise from £4m this year to £7.6m next year.

Last month Health and Social Care Secretary Jeremy Hunt told the Commons a long-awaited Green Paper on the future of social care funding, due to be released this month, will now be published in the autumn.

A department spokesperson said: “We know the social care system is under pressure — that’s why we’ve provided access to £9.4bn of additional funding over three years.”

THE “UNRELENTING pressures” of meeting demand for adult social care is pushing Yorkshire’s local authorities to the brink, councils have said.

Authorities were forced to make extensive savings and dip into emergency reserves to fill a £79.4m funding gap in this year’s adult social care budget, an investigation by The Yorkshire Post has found.

The Local Government Association has warned the Government must act on the social care “crisis” in order to secure longterm stability, and said council’s across England face a £2.3bn funding gap over the next two years.

With a heavily ageing population, North Yorkshire faces “enormous pressures” in the delivery of adult social care services.

While its finding gap for this year was one of the lowest in the region at £3m, its total adult social care bill was £154m, the third highest in Yorkshire, behind Leeds and Sheffield, and dwarfing other local authorities. It now spends more than 42 per cent of its budget on the social care of older people, as well as adults with disabilities and with mental health issues.

Executive member for adult services and health integration, Coun Michael Harrison, said it has long called on the Government to provide a long-term and sustainable funding settlement.

“This issue comes into sharp focus at a time when we are not only marking the 70th anniversary of the NHS but also 70 years of the National Assistance Act, which was one of the cornerstones of social care in this country.

“There are 140,000 people aged over 65 in North Yorkshire, out of a 600,000 population, of which 19,000 are aged over 85. National studies show North Yorkshire is already at a place the rest of the country will reach in 2020.

“Despite additional funding for adult social care raised through the two per cent social care precept in the council tax, the pressures are unrelenting and the county council is this year expecting a £3m overspend on its care budgets.

“The County is developing services with an emphasis on prevention to help people to have a better quality of life and to keep costs down. However, funding pressures mean that even this work will be squeezed without fundamental changes to the adult social care system.”

The increase in demand is being felt across the region. In Sheffield, councillors had to fill a £7.7m funding gap this year.

Sheffield City Council’s cabinet member for adult social care, Coun Chris Peace, said: “The council has experienced several years of sharply reduced funding from central government at a time when there is increasing demand for care from people who are living longer, often with multiple illnesses.

“The cost of living has also increased significantly for Sheffield’s care workforce and it requires more and more money from the council each year to keep pace with this. We’re trying to respond to the situation by doing the right thing to support people to have as good a life as possible.”

York Central Labour MP Rachael Maskell, who chairs the AllParty Parliamentary Group on Ageing and Older People, said historic Government cuts to social care had left a broken system.

“Social care should be a universal benefit – it’s the other side of the coin of the NHS. If there is investment in social care it will have an impact of the NHS,” she said. “Local authorities have been given the power to raise revenue through the social care precept but that in itself creates inequality in poorer areas.

“Cuts to the Revenue Support Grant in 2020 will have a massive impact on local authorities’ ability to provide social care. That combined with eligibility criterias constantly rising, a recruitment crisis in the care sector, and the scale of closures, is going to leave people without the care they need.”

THE CRISIS in social care is starkly illustrated today as we reveal the massive financial burden it is placing on local authorities in Yorkshire.

It is both deeply concerning and financially unsustainable that councils in our region are having to use their emergency reserves to the tune of almost £80m this year in order to cover the everincreasing costs of care, not least because it begs the question of what will happen when those funds are exhausted.

This is a state of affairs that demands urgent Government action. It has been guilty of a reprehensible degree of buck-passing on social care, with responsibility being dumped on local authorities.

The council tax precept that was levied to fund care has not provided a solution, and places poorer areas at a disadvantage because they are less able to raise funds.

The consequence of this ill-thought-out policy is that already hard-pressed local authorities are being forced to cut other services.

The Government needs to acknowledge that social care is a national issue, and one that is inextricably linked to the NHS.

There is currently a disconnect between health and social care, with hospital beds being blocked because there is insufficient provision for looking after the frail and vulnerable once they are well enough to be discharged.

Theresa May’s pledge of an additional £20bn a year for the NHS was welcome, but the Government must face up to the fact that the money will not create the benefits that both staff and patients want unless the issue of social care funding is also addressed.

The Government’s Green Paper on care, due in the autumn after being delayed last month, offers an opportunity to address the imbalance.

What is clear from local authorities in our region is that a rethink cannot come soon enough.