CARE SYSTEM IN CITY CALLED ‘NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE’
Revamp of £8.6m service as hours unmet
THE system for providing home care for hundreds of vulnerable people is being redesigned after it was branded ‘not fit for purpose’.
Stoke-on-trent City Council currently purchases 8,310 hours of domiciliary care a week, for 590 adults with care needs, through a guaranteed minimum hours contract (GMH) and a framework agreement.
But there are a further 3,371 hours a week of unmet demand, which leaves some people waiting to be discharged from hospital or stuck at home without care.
The existing contracts, which began in 2019, were originally meant to deliver 11,000 hours a week, with 1,000 hours of growth anticipated over four years.
But since 2019, several providers have either gone out of business or left the care market, meaning ‘demand for domiciliary care outweighs capacity’, according to a council report.
Cabinet members have now agreed to extend the GMH contract and the framework agreement by a further year, to February 2024, to allow time for a ‘thorough commissioning exercise’ to be completed.
The aim is to develop a redesigned care service that is ‘fit for purpose’.
The existing contracts cost
£8.6 million a year. The service is being redesigned in the light of national changes to the way care is funded, such as the introduction of the £86,000 care cap.
According to the report to cabinet, there has been an increase in the complexity of people’s care needs in recent years, with fewer opting for residential care, while at the same time providers have had significant issues with recruitment, especially since the pandemic.
The report to cabinet states: “The various models currently in place for care within Stoke-on-trent are not fit for purpose. They do not address the capacity gap and they do not effectively and sustainably support the local market in the best way possible. The delivery models need to be redesigned in order to adequately meet the sufficiency needs of our residents.
“The future model aims to explore the purchase of guaranteed capacity by way of purchasing home care rotas.
“Approval of the proposed extension will support the winter pressures and winter planning period, and would avoid unnecessary disruption to adults in receipt of care and support.”
The council will also carry out a ‘fair cost of care’ exercise, which will be used to set a sustainable hourly rate of pay and develop a three-year ‘sustainability plan’.
The council introduced an increased and standardised rate of £20 an hour for all providers under the GMH contract and framework agreement this year.
Peter Tomlin, director of adult social care services, said: “This is to extend contracts, which in their entirety are worth just over £8.5million. We would not normally extend contracts at this level but next year we have changes to the way this is funded in terms of both fair cost of care, and charging.”