The Care Minister has told BBC Radio 5 Live
that the much-anticipated social care green paper is “ready” –
but that it’s been “difficult” to publish it because of
Brexit.
Speaking to Emma Barnett, she said it would be coming “very
shortly”, though she couldn’t say specifically when, and admitted
that she finds the delay “frustrating”.
On the current delay to the adult social care green paper, Ms
Dinenage said:
“The social care green paper has been moving forward all the
time. We’ve taken the opportunity to make sure that this
green paper is one that we’re very happy with. But
certainly, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that Brexit has
taken up an enormous amount of parliamentary time, because we
should have been done and dusted with Brexit before
Christmas. And here we are in March and it's still
dominating quite a lot of parliamentary agenda. Which does
make it difficult to do some of the other stuff that we're very
passionate about… and things like adult social care are
very, very important.”
When asked when the green paper would be published, she said:
“Shortly. Very soon.”
When pressed to be more specific, Ms Dinenage said:
“I can't be more specific, because I’m not responsible for
parliamentary scheduling. But the document is ready, and as
soon as we have a moment in parliament to publish it, then we
will. But it’s important that when we do publish it, it has
a lot of focus. It can't get overwhelmed by other things.”
When asked by Emma Barnett how she felt about the fact that
“Brexit has kaiboshed this”, Ms Dinenage responded:
“It is frustrating. I share everybody's frustration.
This is a document that I have put a lot of my own time and
effort into creating. And it's one that I feel is extremely
important. We have a duty to make sure that our adult
social care sector is fit to face the challenges of not only the
future but also the modern world and the pressures of a growing,
ageing population.”
Ms Dinenage explained that the reason for the original delay to
the social care green paper – which was first due in the summer
of 2017 – was to link it with the long-term NHS plan. That
was published at the start of January this year. She said:
“Last summer… the government announced the extra money, the
£20.5bn additional a year for the NHS. But it was very
important that that NHS long-term plan, which is a very important
document that sets out priorities for the NHS, wasn't done in a
silo and irrespective of adult social care, because adult social
care drives so much cost to the NHS, and vice versa. So it
was important that these two documents came simultaneously and
were prepared with each other in mind.
“But as you know, because of various other things that have been
going on in parliament, the long-term plan was only just
published in January. So we always said that the adult
social care green paper would come out in its wake.”
