Social care spending has fallen by 6% ... while our foreign aid soared by 40%
SPENDING on social care for the elderly has fallen by 6 per cent at the same time that aid spending has soared by more than 0 per cent, a report revealed yesterday.
Funding for adult social care fell from £17.5billion to £16. billion between 2009-10 and 201516, said the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
In the same period, government figures suggest aid spending ballooned, from £8.5billion in 2010 to £12.2 billion in 2015. That is an increase of £3.7 billion or per cent.
The IFS – an independent economic forecaster – made clear the shocking scale of austerity in future as it warned spending cuts and tax rises will continue ‘well into the 2020s’.
The startling statistics prompted fresh calls for ministers to ditch David Cameron’s controversial target to spend 0.7 per cent of national income on foreign aid. The target has meant huge increases in aid spending in recent years – and also guarantees it will continue to grow as long as the economy gets bigger. Anger has grown amid shocking examples of how aid cash is wasted, such as the £5.2million grant to African girl band Yegna – nicknamed the Ethiopian Spice Girls.
International Development Secretary Priti Patel finally pulled the plug on the group last month but MPs are among those calling for Britain’s overall aid target to be ditched as the nation struggles amid a social care and NHS crisis.
Last night Tory MP Jacob ReesMogg said: ‘It is a question of priorities and it is a shame that a politically correct but wasteful department is being preferred to the elderly. It is time it was stopped.’
Tory colleague Philip Davies said: ‘Charity begins at home and we should prioritise looking after elderly and disabled people in our own country before sending money overseas.’
Between 2009-10 and 2015-16 the population of over 65s in England rose 15.6 per cent. In the same period however, social care funding overall – including spending on children – fell by 1 per cent, while spending on adults was down 6. per cent.
George Stoye, senior research economist at the IFS, said it would be ‘challenging’ for local authorities to provide the same level of care given increasing pressures on budgets
Warning of ‘substantial long run pressures’ in health and long-term care, the IFS said: ‘Looking forward, the ability of councils to maintain 2015-16 levels of social care will depend on how much revenue is raised through council tax, and whether they want and can continue to protect social care relative to other services.’